In case you're wondering, I'm trying to make this at least semi-realistic with the romance and everything but the good stuff will come, never fear.
Have fun!
Chapter 2
- FROZEN -
Then she woke up, jolting out of bed. She was sweating and panting and it was already 9 in the morning. Faint light streamed through mahogany curtains.
'Where am I? Right, Konoha. Tsubaki Hotel. Job hunting.' She groggily refreshed herself on what had happened the day before.
She stepped out of the tangled sheets and took a long scorching shower, put her hair up, braided it, and got dressed in the only clothes she had brought – the ones she wore the day before.
Next, she needed to go back to the Hokage's office and get a job. That squeaky receptionist had told her yesterday that they were too busy to see her. She would keep going back there if it killed her. She left her room and headed down the stairs.
Stepping out of the door, the atmosphere of the village took her by surprise all over again. After a swivel of her head she spotted the scarlet building above all of the others and took her time getting there.
In hope of restocking of necessities of living that couldn't be found in the wild, she intruded into the first store she saw. Luckily it was a ninja general store with everything with shampoo to katanas. Kohare bought more clothes similar to the ones she had on. Her navy scoop neck sleeveless shirt and black baggy cargo pants with thick white straps randomly circling the articles weren't hard to match with other pieces of clothing.
Then, she bought a one-shoulder backpack that came with basic survival equipment like rope and extra kunai. She was now officially broke. She stuffed her new clothes into the pack and kept marching on.
When she arrived at the intimidating red building with it's clashing yellow roof she opened the door and walked into the lobby. She spotted the receptionist and stood in front of her desk.
"I need to speak with the Hokage," she said, her words echoing throughout the room.
"May I ask why?" the lady asked, her shrill voice piercing the repeatings of Kohare's words.
"I'm a ninja and I need a job."
"Well…" she scanned a piece of paper and smiled a blindingly white smile. "It seems you've come at a good time. Go down the hallway and it will be the second door on your right."
Kohare wordlessly followed her directions and at the first door on her right, she passed another ninja coming from where she was going. Not taking the time to worry about him, she kept walking until she came to the second door and knocked.
"Come in," a deep voice ordered. She pushed opened the heavy obstacle and entered the sunlit room. Sitting in front of the wallat a single desk in the middle was presumably the Hokage.
"What can I help you with?" he asked pleasantly.
"I came here yesterday. I'm a ninja - I need a job," she said.
"Your name?"
"Kohare. No last name." He looked a bit thrown off for a moment and his brow furrowed, but he quickly regained his composure.
"Where are you from?" he pried.
"Kirigakure." it was the same questioning as yesterday all over again.
"Why did you come here?"
"I wanted to live here." He could sense that she was leaving something important out, but she didn't seem hostile. He wanted to give her a chance.
"I'd be happy to give you a mission to complete but I have to first assess you myself to know what you can handle. You will take a written exam and an abilities exam. Be at the Konoha Academy at 10:30," he demanded.
"Hai," She was already half way out the door.
Right before she was about to leave the building the receptionist shrieked, "Have a nice day!"
Kohare could only barely hide her cringe.
She had about half an hour to be at the academy. Her plan was to walk around until she stumbled across it – it wasn't a very confusing village anyway.
"I love you," she declared quickly, blushing furiously.
"I love you to," he said as he looked at her with eyes filled with hope.
They ran to each other across the meadow and embraced each other, tears streaming down their cheeks. He bent down to kiss…
'Who's that?' Hatake Kakashi was sitting on a bench under a sakura tree reading his book. He could feel a presence he did not recognize. It seemed different somehow than any other he had felt before. Like they weren't even a person. Like they were empty.
He looked up to see a woman walking down the streets of Konoha. The way she was looking around told him she wasn't from around there.
He remembered one of his students, Sakura, asking him about a certain kunoichi…
"Kakash-sensei!" hollered Sakura as she ran down the street waving at him.
"Hn?" was all he had to say. It was too late to run now.
"I met this lady at lunch that I've never seen before! Do you know who she is?"
"What? No. A lot of new people come to Konoha all the time, Sakura. You probably won't see her again." Sakura pouted. "I've got to rescue a cat stuck in a tree now," he said and teleported away. He could hear from the other side of Konoha the screech of "LIAR! You just wanted to read your stupid book!"
The woman was about five and a half feet tall with an athletic build. Her dark hair in a messy high braid with bangs sticking down suggested that she didn't spend much time on it or that she had been rubbing her head on the ground. It was most likely the former. Her eyes that you could only tell were brown in the sun seemed strong and alert, but it didn't appear to fit her age.
She looked to be maybe twenty years old. She looked back at him expressionlessly and he inconspicuously turned back to his book.
He sensed her walk on.
Kohare found the academy easily. She assumed that the place where there were kids running around outside was the academy, at least. She walked into the ivory building and an average-looking ninja was standing in the center of the lobby. He smiled when he saw her.
"Kohare-san. Hokage-sama told me to expect you. You can call me Iruka and I'll be proctoring the written exam." He waited expectantly for her to say something and when she didn't, he continued. "This is a general exam with questions ranging from simple common sense to advanced battle tactics. You'll have an hour." He explained as he led her into an empty classroom.
He gestured for her to sit down and when she did, he handed her the test and a pencil. It had to be at least fifteen pieces of paper with the front and back sides covered with words and numbers. "Any questions?" He paused. Silence. "Alright. Begin."
The moment Kohare glanced at her paper her heart sunk to her stomach. She hadn't taken a written test in years. The terminology alone was enough to cause her to fail. She had always been a good guesser, and she would only have to hope that it would be enough. The common sense questions were a breeze but she didn't even attempt to understand the more complicated ones.
Before she knew it, Iruka yelled, "Time!"
Her brain was fried. She didn't show her distress, but Iruka sensed it. "Do you want a break?" She reminded him of how Naruto feels after an exam.
"I'm fine," she snapped. 'I don't need anyone else's help.'
Iruka grabbed a clipboard and pencil and began to lead her back outside as he spoke. "Alright. Now for the abilities test. Hokage-sama is going to be watching this portion of the assessment."
"Right." If it was something physical, Kohare could do it. Her energy came back to her and she was ready once again.
They met the Hokage at the training grounds and stood in front of a worn out wooden circle riddled with holes and dents. It was a miracle that the piece of junk was still standing.
"We'll do a simple test of the basics now. Step back as far from the target as you can while still maintaining sharp accuracy, please," Iruka told her. She turned and walked back about forty yards as Iruka and the Hokage looked on in doubt. "We'll do shuriken first, then kunai," he informed her.
Kohare pulled out two shuriken and launched them at the bulls-eye. They hit their mark. She then did the same with two kunai and watched Iruka's jaw drop and the Hokage smile. It looked as if Iruka would drop his clipboard if he didn't start holding it steadily. The Hokage motioned for her to come back to where they stood.
"O-okay," Iruka stammered. "Next Hokage-sama is going to place a genjutsu on you. Enemy ninjas will attack you. There's an endless amount of them and their strength will be steadily and constantly increasing. When you want to quit or just release the genjutsu by interrupting your chakra flow. If you die, you will automatically be brought out of it."
"Right." Simple enough. This was nothing like the test she had taking in Kirigakure.
Iruka formed the needed handseals and sent Kohare's mind to a different world.
The two teachers set Kohare's limp body down in the shade of an oak and waited for her to regain consciousness. Her back leaned against the trunk and faint playful screeches could be heard from the training grounds to the right.
"She's been fighting for two hours now. The ninjas should be well above chuunin strength by now. But, we can't even see what she's doing!" complained Iruka.
"That's why I did it like this."
"What?" he asked, flabbergasted.
"She's hiding something. If we could see her techniques she would be aware that we were watching and might not show her true skill. This way, we can assess her more accurately even if we cannot see her," informed the Hokage.
"Of course…" Iruka only wished he could have realized it sooner on his own. They sunk back into silence and watched the kids in the neighboring fields play with wooden weapons and dramatically pretend to die. The thought that the Hokage was sitting outside of the academy and waiting for Kohare to wake up as an excuse not to do work never crossed Iruka's mind.
One more hour later, Kohare woke up, her breathing labored. Seeing that she was awake, the Hokage and Iruka turned to face Kohare.
"You were in the genjutsu for four hours and nine minutes. The fighting level of the ninjas was just elevating to jounin." Iruka's voice was disbelieving. While he was looking at Kohare in awe, she could only feel contempt. She knew that she could do better but couldn't concentrate and had been killed.
"I'd definitely say you're fighting skills are jounin level at least. But there's much more to being a ninja of Konoha than fighting. I'll dispatch you on a mission I have in mind that should take two to three weeks to complete. You'll go with one other jounin. They will explain the mission to you at another time." Then, the Hokage smiled an almost apologetic smile and disappeared in a cloud of smoke.