Please Enjoy and I only own Ami and her unique Justus. The chapters of the story will occasionally combined some episodes in to one
Chapter 3: - Genin Takedown
We arrived in front of room 301, where a familiar face greeted us, we stared at the person waiting at the door. The silence was tense in the air, so tense that it could be cut with a blunt kunai.
"Glad you cam Sakura. For your sake… and the others," Kakashi said. Sakura seemed shocked by his statement, then again I think we all were. "Now you can all formally register for the Chūnin Exam," Kakashi informed us.
"Why? What did you mean?" Sakura asked, confusion evident in her voice.
"You see only groups of three, are allowed to apply for and take the exams, that's the way it's always been," Kakashi explained. Sakura seemed confused by his explanation.
"But sensei, you said the decision to take the exam was up to the individual and Ami is here so wouldn't they have been able to get in anyway?" Sakura protested.
"That's right I did, sort off. It is an individual decision but it effects all of you, I didn't tell you before because I didn't want the other guys pressuring you. At the same time I didn't want you to feel obliged to participate because of any feelings you might have for Sasuke or Naruto, I wanted you to come to a decision of your own free will," Kakashi responded.
"Wait a minute are you saying that if the others had shown up without me-," Sakura began to realise the implications
"It would have been the end of the line for them. Even with Ami being present, as she is technically a temporary member her true team has yet to be decided. But it's a moot point your all here for the right reasons," Kakashi finished up.
"Sakura, Naruto and Sasuke I'm proud of you, Ami I'm sure you'll make me proud. I couldn't ask for a better team. Good Luck," Kakashi wished. We all smiled at this, even I was touched by what he said.
"We won't let you down sensei. Believe it," Naruto declared. Sasuke and Sakura both walked forward and opened the doors, we stepped through and the doors closed however before us was an extremely intimidating sight… well to the others it probably was.
"Wh-What's this?" Naruto stuttered out in shock. Sasuke narrowed his eyes whilst Sakura's eyes were filled with fear. Before us, row after row, of ninja from different nations stared at us, their eyes filled with annoyance, tension filled the room to a boiling point.
"Sasuke where've you been," a shrill voice shattered the tension. I whipped my head around only to see a girl of my age jump onto Sasuke's back hugging him, his expression showed he was less than pleased with the action. "Boy you have no idea how much I was hoping you'd show up here. I've missed those brooding good looks of yours," The girl said.
The girl was fair-skinned and of average height with blue eyes, her most noticeable trait in her appearance is her long, blonde hair, which was worn in a high-ponytail with bangs covering the right side of her face. She wore a pair of small silver hoop-earrings and a short purple vest like blouse with a raised collar, a purple apron skirt that is cut off on the sides and bandages on her stomach and legs. She also wore purple and white elbow warmers with this, and her forehead protector around her waist as a belt.
"Hey you porker, back off he's mine," Sakura declared. I looked at the pinkette and saw that she had a furious expression on her face. The girl let go of Sasuke when she took notice of Sakura.
"Miss Forehead, they let you in? Still got those big frown lines on your Billboard Brow I see," The girl retorted.
"Leave my forehead out of it," Sakura yelled back. I remained by Naruto's side staying out of this spat as much as possible.
"Oh it's you guys," A male voice said. I looked behind the girl only to see two other boys of my age. "I knew this was going to be a drag but I didn't know it would be this bad," The boy on the right spoke.
The boy that spoke had shoulder length black hair tied in a spiky ponytail and narrow brown eyes. He wore a simple pair of silver hoop earrings along with a green lined mesh T-shirt under a short sleeved grey jacket with green edges, adorned on both the sleeves and the back with a circle with a line through it, his blue forehead protector worn around his left arm, brown pants, and blue sandals.
The boy that was next to him had spiky, brown hair, swirl marks on his cheeks, and a more robust physique than most other people I had seen. He wore black shorts, a long white scarf, a short-sleeved, green haori, over a white shirt with the kanji for food on it, small, hoop earrings, and his legs and forearms were wrapped in bandages. His forehead protector was styled in a manner that allowed two tufts of hair to poke out at each side.
"So all three stooges are here," Naruto taunted.
"Hey you know what pipsqueak. Ah forget it you're a waste of time," the boy retorted. I pulled Naruto back to my side whilst avoiding the arguing girls.
"Who are these people?" I asked. Naruto sighed and nodded towards the boy that spoke. "Quitely as well please," I added on, Naruto pouted but nodded
"Shikamaru Nara. Always complaining never does anything about it. The laziest kid in the academy," Naruto said. I nodded and Naruto turned to the other boy that was currently munching away on a bag of chips. "Chōji Akimichi. Aki-munchie's more like it I think he'd eat his own head if he could," Naruto continued, he then nodded towards the girl.
"Sorry but Sasuke is all mine," The blonde girl taunted as she pulled a face at Sakura.
"Ino Yamanaka. Now she's annoying and not just because she's got the same stupid thing for Sasuke that Sakura's got," Naruto finished up with the introduction.
"It's called a crush… or infatuation they're the same thing," I said. Naruto blinked at me surprised before turning back to the group.
"Well, well, what do you know? It looks like the whole gangs back together again," another male voice called out. I looked over to see another group of three approach us, two males and one female.
The boy at the front had messy brown hair, sharp black eyes with vertical slit-like pupils, pronounced canine teeth, and nails, he also has the distinctive red fang markings on his cheeks. His outfit consisted of dark greyish pants reaching to his calves and a grey, hooded fur-lined coat, with the hood placed on his head, with a blue forehead protector and blue sandals. On his head was a small white dog.
The other was a fair-skinned ninja and the tallest member of the group that was gathered near me. He has dark, bushy, brown hair and dark sunglasses. He wore a sea-green jacket with a high, upturned collar, blue pants and blue sandals.
The girl had short dark blue hair and fair skin, she also has the same white yet slightly tinted lavender eye as the boy from the hallway earlier. She wore a cream-coloured hooded-jacket with a fire symbol on the upper right and left sleeves and fur around the cuffs and hem, with navy blue pants, she wore her Konoha forehead protector around her neck.
"Oh, hi Naruto," the girl greeted. Naruto looked at her and she suddenly looked down, her pale cheeks flushed red.
"Hinata Hyūga. She's ok, but I don't know why she gets all shy and embarrassed every time I like… look at her, it's kind of weird," Naruto told me. I sighed, not believing how dense Naruto could be, Hinata obviously like him.
"Kiba Inuzuka and his dog Akamaru. Forget what I said about Ino, this guy's the most annoying of all, thinks he's so cool," Naruto said gesturing to the boy with the dog, before turning to the last boy.
"Then there's Shino Aburame. Well he's just weird, kind of a mystery but that doesn't mean he isn't annoying to," Naruto finished up the introductions. I nodded and turned back to the others.
"You guys to huh? Man everyone's here for this stupid thing," Shikamaru complained.
"Yep, here we all are. The nine rookies, this is going to be fun. At least for those of us good enough to make the cut, right Sasuke?" Kiba boasted.
"Kiba careful you don't get over confident," Sasuke warned.
"Just wait we're going to blow you guys away. We've been training like crazy," Kiba boasted. I rolled my eyes at the over-confidence brimming form this fool.
"I think you're a little late Sasuke-san," I chirped in. Everyone's head snapped towards me varying expressions of shock, annoyance and confusion appeared on all their faces… except for Shino.
"Who are you cutie?" Kiba asked, a smirk on his face.
"Ami. And call me cutie again and I'll break your arm," I hissed at the boy. He smirked even wider.
"Alright then Ami, first rule you got to learn is that Sasuke is-," Ino began to speak but I snapped my head in her direction.
"Is a human being and has the right to choose who he wants to be with. He is not a possession and to add to that point I haven't seen your name on him at all," I cut off the blonde. Everyone froze as if stunned by my sentence, Sasuke most of all had a surprised look on his face.
"Hey you guys. You might want trying to keep it down a little, I mean no offence you're the 9 well 10 rookies, right? Fresh out of the academy, I wouldn't go making a spectacle of yourselves, just cool it this isn't a class field trip," A man advised. I looked in his direction, my body immediately tensed upon seeing the man and a string of curses rose in my throat, but I clamped my teeth down on my tongue.
The man had ash-grey tied in a ponytail with bangs framing his forehead and onyx eyes hair he wore a pair of black rimmed circular glasses, a dark purple shirt with a high collar, a white under-shirt, dark purple fingerless gloves with armoured plates on the back of the hand, a white cloth waistband worn at an angle, dark purple pants, blue sandals, and a shuriken holster on his right leg, he wore Konoha forehead protector.
"Well who asked you? Who are you?" Ino asked the man. I kept my gaze trained on the man, waiting for anything to happen.
"Kabuto Yakushi. But really look around you, you've made quite an impression," Kabuto said. All the others turned to look at the horde of ninja before us, whilst I kept my eyes locked on Kabuto, I could feel the eyes of every ninja in the room boring into us. "See those guys, they're from the Rain village. Very touchy, they all are, this exam makes everyone tense, and you don't want to rub them the wrong way," Kabuto warned the others. Things fell quite for a short time before Kabuto began to speak again.
"You can't help it. I mean how could you know how things works, you're just rookies. You remind me of myself a little while back," Kabuto stated. I clenched my fist, to restrain myself from snapping at him.
"Kabuto is that you're name?" Sakura asked and Kabuto gave a positive answer. "This isn't the first time you've taken this exam," Sakura stated. Kabuto adjusted his position and he looked nervous.
"No it's my seventh," Kabuto revealed. Everyone seemed confused by his statement. "Well they're held twice a year, so this will be my fourth year," Kabuto explained.
"Wow a veteran, you must really be an expert by now?" Sakura questioned the man. He seemed embarrassed by this statement.
"Yeah, sort of," Kabuto answered
"Cool you can give us all the inside tips," Naruto exclaimed. I took a deep breath, to calm my nerves and I relaxed my hand.
"Yeah some expert. He's never passed," Shikamaru pointed out. He had a good point.
"Well seventh time's the charm. That's what they say," Kabuto said as he scratched the back of his head in embarrassment.
"So I guess all those rumours about the exam being hard are true. Oh man I knew this was going to be a drag," Shikamaru wined.
"Hang on, don't give up hope yet. Maybe I can help you kids out a little, with my ninja info cards," Kabuto responded, as he pulled out orange-backed cards, with a green outline and the kanji for shinobi was also on the back.
"What the heck are those?" Sakura asked. Pushed off the wall I leant against and headed over to her.
"They're special cards that contain different types of information," I explained. Kabuto's eyes flicked to me and they narrowed in confusion, before turning back to Sakura.
"Your friend is right. These cards have been chakra encoded with everything I've learnt over the past four years. I've got more than 200 hundred of them so you see, I haven't been completely wasting my time," Kabuto added on. He bent down and set down a single card, which on the other side appeared blank. "They may not look like much to the naked eye, in fact they appear blank. Don't want just anyone seeing this stuff," Kabuto explained. He then placed a finger on the card and began to rotate it.
"What are you doing?" Sakura asked confused.
"You see, I'm using my chakra to reveal they're secrets. Like this for example," Kabuto finished up and a puff of smoke came off the card revealing a map of the lands, upon some of that lands were green bars stretching up and these bars were connect to the symbols that were commonly seen on the forehead protector.
"Awesome a map!" Sakura exclaimed, before she gained a thoughtful expression. "Of what?" Sakura asked.
"It shows the geographical distribution of all the candidates who have come to take the Chūnin exams, what village they come from and how many from each village," Kabuto explained, everyone seemed to understand what he meant. "Why do you guys think they all come here to take the exams together at the same time?" Kabuto asked. However nobody gave an answer to his question.
"It's to foster friendship between nations of course. International brotherhood and all that and it's true enough… as far as it goes," Kabuto answer his own question, yet left something lingering in the air.
"But there's another reason," Sasuke stated, obviously sensing that Kabuto was leaving something out.
"Yeah, you see the important thing is that this way they can carefully regulate the total number of shinobi that end up in each village, there by maintaining the balance of power," Kabuto explained.
"Yeah, balance of power," Naruto repeated but I could tell that he was confused.
"Balance of power. Big deal, it's all a drag," Shikamaru stated, in a bored tone. Kabuto stopped the chakra flow and the image on the card disappeared.
"If the balance isn't maintained, one nation could wind up with many more than its' neighbours and it might be tempted to attack them, so they try to maintain the status quo. Makes sense I suppose," Kabuto expanded further into his explanation.
"Do those cards of yours have any info on the other candidates, individually?" Sasuke questioned. I glanced at the boy wondering exactly who he wanted to learn about.
"They might, you have someone special in mind?" Kabuto asked, not giving a straight answer to Sasuke.
"I might," Sasuke responded also not giving a straight answer.
"Well, I can't promise that my information is complete or perfect, but I've got something on just about everyone. Including you guys of course, well expect for you," Kabuto finally answered, directing the last part at me. He put the map card back onto the pile and made it neat.
"So which one is it tell me anything. A description, where they're from, whatever. Anything at all," Kabuto told Sasuke. A gleam in his black eyes as he held one of his ninja cards.
"He's Gaara of the Desert and there's Rock Lee of the Leaf Village while you're at it," Sasuke told him. A frown appeared on Kabuto's face.
"Man, that's no fun, you even know their names. That makes it easy," Kabuto complained. He then removed two cards from the pile and placed them down on the floor.
"Ok first up is Rock Lee," Kabuto informed as he pushed his chakra into the card. When the image appeared it showed Lee, I assumed his team, his skills stats and his mission stats and other information.
"Looks like he's about a year older than you guys. Mission experience, 11 C-ranks and 20 D-ranks. His squad leader is Guy, in the last twelve months his Taijutsu has radically improved but his other skills are pretty shaky. Last year he got a lot of attention as a Genin but for some reason he chose not to participate in the Chūnin exams. This will be his first time as a candidate, same as you. His teammates are Tenten and Neji Hyūga," Kabuto listed off.
My eyes widened at hearing the name, the picture depicted the boy from earlier, who had demanded answers from Sasuke. 'So he was blind that was his clan's customary eye.' I thought realising the truth.
"Ok. Now for Gaara of the Desert," Kabuto muttered as he pushed chakra into the card. The display of Gaara's card was the same as Lee's card, except that his skill stats were displayed as unknown. "Mission experience 8 C-ranks and, get this 1 B-rank as a Genin. There's not a lot more information on this guy, he's a rookie from another land after all, but there is this, he survived every mission without getting a scratch on him," Kabuto told us. This caused shock to course htrough the nine Genin.
'So nothing has changed, has it, Gaara.' I thought in my mind. Kabuto reactivated the map card.
"Leaf, Sand, Rain, Grass, Waterfall, Sound. From the looks of it they've all sent exceptionally skilled candidates to the exams this time around. Of course the Hidden Sound Village is small, it sprang up recently. No one knows anything about it, those guys are a mystery. Well you get the point, the competition's going to be intense this year," Kabuto explained as he placed the cards back onto the stack.
Everyone was unnerved by what Kabuto said and Ino even snapped at Hinata for stating a simple fact. Sakura asked for Kabuto's opinion and he agreed, Naruto's body began to shake and then suddenly he spun around to face the other ninja and pointed at them.
"My name is Naruto Uzumaki and I'm going to beat every one of you. Believe it!" Naruto called out. Everything fell silent, the tension so thick a blunt tooth could cut through it, the only thing I could really do was stare in shock at Naruto's… I couldn't describe it.
Ino and Sakura ended arguing about something, however everyone else was quite, Naruto was relax whilst the other ninja were glaring at us. Kiba and Shikamaru insulted the boy and Sakura put him in a headlock, I walked over to Sasuke and tapped his shoulder.
"Is it always like this?" I asked motioning to the scene before us. Sasuke looked forward and sighed as if annoyed by our teammates' antics.
"Pretty much," Sasuke answered. I detected the smallest of smirks on his face before shaking my head at the two ninja, as Sakura attempted to pacify the glaring contestants, before returning to yelling at the blonde. Suddenly something caught my attention, a blur moving at a fast speed amongst the crowd of ninja and it was heading… straight for Kabuto.
A man appeared and he threw two kunai at Kabuto who dodge them, however another man appeared and swung at him. Kabuto dodged the attack however after a mere few seconds his glasses cracked and he fell to the floor coughing up blood.
Naruto and Sakura rushed over to him, whislt the man that had swung at him talked down to Kabuto I walked behind him and then I quickly seized the arm he attacked with and twisted it behind his back and I kicked at the back of his leg foring him down.
"I suggest that you stop causing trouble before trouble finds you," I advised the Sound ninjas who all stared at me.
"How did you-," The man I held began to ask before a sound cut him off.
"All right you baby-faced degenerates, pipe down and listen up," A male voice called out. Letting the Sound ninja go and I whipped around to face the speak, as the spoke cleared it shown a large group of ninja with a single man in front, I could only assume the one at the front was the one who spoke. "It's time to begin, I'm Ibiki Morino your proctor. And from this moment your worst enemy," The man said.