Chapter 10 - Ino-Shika-Cho Vs. Mirai

Ino eyed Mirai carefully. "Something came up, huh? Like master like student, I suppose."

Mirai chuckled shamefully to herself.

Shikamaru felt like he was being insulted as well, but decided to just shrug it off. Besides, they needed to hurry and get on with the training.

"Shikamaru, are you sure about this? Making the kids fight Mirai is a little harsh for their first training session, don't ya think?" Choji asked. "Even if its 3-on-1, she's still a chunin and they're all just academy students."

"Relax, Choji. I wouldn't pit them against Mirai without a few handicaps swinging their way. For starters... Shikadai, Inojin, Chocho – you three don't have to actually have to beat Mirai. All you need to do is grab the Leaf headband off her forehead." Mirai adjusted her headband while Shikamaru spoke. "Also, she'll will have a few restrictions during the fight: number one: she can only use one ninja weapon."

"That would be this kunai," Mirai said while whirling it out.

"Number two: she's not allowed to use any advanced taijutsu."

"No distinguished fight styles, and no special techniques."

"And number three: she can't use any genjutsu. She only use one C-rank ninjutsu, and she can only use it once."

"I'm using the Sarutobi clan's Kindling Ash Jutsu. The hand signs are Snake → Monkey → Tiger. And the way the jutsu works is-"

"Oi! You don't need to tell them all that..."

"I'm just trying to keep it fair, Uncle Shikamaru. I mean, they're gonna need all the favors they can get."

Chocho pouted and squinted. She and the other two were just academy students, and it was true that under normal circumstances the trio would stand zero chance against Mirai, but hearing it stated with such blase still put a chink in her pride.

"Anything else, Shikamaru?" Inojin asked.

"Yeah. Mirai won't be able to leave this outing. You three are free to hide in the surrounding forest if you want, but Mirai can't follow you. Just a head ups."

Ino brushed back her hair. "First it seemed too harsh, now it seems like the kids have it too easy."

"We'll see. Now, let's get started." Shikamaru looked at his son. "Shikadai, are you guys ready?"

Shikadai felt the pouch on the back of his waist that contained shurikens. Inojin unsheathed his tanto, and Chocho withdrew a scroll that poofed out two Hidden Cloud-style long swords. Finally, Shikadai nodded. The old Ino-Shika-Cho along with Hana went to stand at the edge of the outing, leaving Mirai and the new Ino-Shika-Cho staring at each other. It was obvious from the sidelines which side was more confident.

Shikamaru raised his hand, then he swung it down. "Begin."

As soon as the '-in' in 'begin' was said, Chocho blitzed at Mirai like a falcon, both her swords held out like wings.

Her initial jumping slash only managed to cut the air in front of Mirai's face. The low slash after that trimmed the grass. Mirai's vest and arms proved equally untouchable. The chunin smiled every time a sharp "swish" went past her ear.

Chocho growled in frustration and thrust at Mirai. The latter easily weaved around it, and locked her arm under Chocho's. The chubby sword wielder knew a throw was coming, but before she became a leaf in a wind, a shadow crept near Mirai's feet and made her back off.

"Chocho! Retreat!" Inojin shouted.

Chocho quickly returned to her team. "Thanks, Shikadai."

"Don't thank me. Just don't do anything stupid for now on," Shikadai said as his extended shadow receded. "Even with all those restrictions, big sis Mirai is still miles out of our league. In a straight up fight we'd get destroyed."

"Think she knows that?" Inojin asked.

"Why do you think she's just standing there? She could have lunged and decimated us already, but she's hasn't. She trying to give us a chance."

Chocho made a face. "So she's being nice on top of going easy on us? Man... my feelings have never been this hurt before... Wait. Actually, there was this one time at the dango shop when the cook spilled all the batter, and Anko sensei and I-"

"Yeah... Getting back to the situation at hand," Inojin said, cutting her off. "How are we going to handle Mirai, Shikadai?"

Shikadai paused. He was still on one knee when he clenched his right fist with his left hand.

Over on the sidelines, Hana cocked his head, wondering what Shikadai was doing. "Is that a special hand sign?"

"Nope. Shikadai's just thinking," Choji clarified. "His Dad used to do something similar when he was younger. He really is a chip off the old block, eh Shikamaru?"

Shikamaru sighed while Choji jabbed him using his elbow. "I just hope he didn't pick up too many of my habits."

"But wouldn't it be better if he did? If he's like you then the new Ino-Shika-Cho is already on its way."

"That's what I'm afraid of." Ino and Choji both gave Shikamaru odd looks. "It's true that Shikadai being like me means he, Chocho and Inojin will be more like us, but being 'like us' isn't what I want these three to get from this training."

"So you want Shikadai to act less like you so Ino-Shika-Cho can... evolve?" Ino asked.

"Well, that's one reason. Another reason is, I've been training Mirai since was a academy student. She pretty much knows all my moves."

Ino made a face. "And if Shikadai acts just like you..."

"Alright, I've got a plan," Shikadai said while standing.

"Already?" Chocho asked, surprised. "We don't even know each others' jutsu that well, and you already made a plan?"

"Actually, I already had Inojin tell me how the Yamanaka clan's jutsu worked while you were out there trading blows with the wind. I'm haven't seen your jutsu in action, but I'm guessing you already know the Akimichi clan's expansion jutsu?" Chocho nodded. "We're good to go then. Now, listen up."

Mirai stood a few yards away from the three, waiting for them come at her. 'Man... Shikadai is really taking his time. I wonder if he's even taking this seriously?'

She got her answer when Chocho stepped forward, both her blades still drawn. Inojin was crouched behind her, and Shikadai was crouched behind him.

'Oh~ Is this one of Shikadai's plan?' Mirai wondered while getting ready.

Shikadai eventually stood. "Go!"

On the shadow weaver's command, Chocho and Inojin split off and charged at Mirai from opposite directions. Mirai was surprised; not by the attack, but by the simplicity of the plan. 'A pincer attack? That's it? …a little disappointing, to be honest,' she thought while flipping off her kunai.

Chocho's steel met Mirai's iron first. The chunin weaved around, parried and blocked the flurry of swings Chocho delivered. When Inojin and lunged at her open back with his tanto, Mirai reverse somersaulted off of his head, and kicked his back while still in the air. The kick sent him colliding with Chocho, and the pair fumbled to the ground.

Before she could grin at her handiwork, Mirai noticed shurikens flying her way. She dodged, and the shurikens flew past her, either heading into the forest or hitting one of the practice logs. After cursing to himself for missing, Shikadai crouched and made a hand sign → rat. He was about to use his Shadow Possession Jutsu.

"Oh, no you don't!" Mirai said while sprinting at Shikadai.

Shikadai cringed when Mirai got into striking range. The hand holding her kunai wound up. Then she stopped. To be more literal, she froze. She tried to struggle free, but her body had been completely immobilized by a shadow that had caught her by behind. Mirai looked back as much she could, and saw Inojin performing the Shadow Possession Jutsu.

Everyone on the sidelines were shocked, but none more than Ino. She wondered when her son learned the Nara clan's secret techniques. Then she thought about it, and realized what was really going on: the person using the Shadow Possession Jutsu right now wasn't Inojin, it was actually Shikadai.

Mind Exchange Jutsu – it's one of the Yamanaka clans' secret techniques, and one of the more advanced ones. Unlike the normal Mind Transfer Jutsu that injects the user's consciousness into the target while keeping the target's consciousness dormant inside, the Mind Exchange Jutsu switches the user and target's consciousness altogether, allowing both parties to use each others' bodies as they please.

'When did Inojin master that jutsu? I know he takes training more seriously than the other two, but even I hadn't mastered that jutsu until I took the Chunin Exam for the second time,' Ino thought.

Inojin smiled while he was inside of Shikadai's body. It was a smile of victory. Mirai could do nothing while he reached for her headband. Then he looked past her ear, and saw Mirai's kunai falling from the sky. Directly below it was Shikadai who was still in Inojin's body.

Inojin glanced up at Mirai's hand and finally noticed that it was empty. 'When did she...' Inojin recalled the over dramatic wind up from before. She wasn't attacking with the kunai, she was throwing it.

"Shikadai! Move out of the way!" he shouted.

Shikadai made a face. He couldn't react in time, but Chocho could. She grabbed him while jumping out of the way, and a the kunai plummeted into the grass. Having been moved abruptly, Shikadai's shadow waned, and Mirai could move again. Her first action: planting her sandal in Inojin's chest. He barreled backwards. Then as he coughed pushed himself off the ground, he opened his eyes. The first thing he saw was Chocho.

"I'm in my own body again... That blow must disrupted the jutsu," he said.

He looked over at Shikadai who had also returned to his original body. The sharp-eyed boy looked up at Mirai. "Can you please be a little more gentle? I mean, seriously... That one's gonna still hurt tomorrow." He stood. "So how did you know that it was me in Inojin's body?"

"I didn't. It was actually the opposite," she said. "I knew it was Inojin who was in your body."

"How?"

"He threw shurikens at me while I busy fighting you and Chocho. And then he acted like he was going to use Shadow Possession. Using that jutsu on somebody who can see it coming is suicide. You would never do something that silly."

Shikadai humphed. "You know me that well, huh?"

"I've known you since you were diapers. It shouldn't be that surprising."

Shikadai dusted off his pants. "Well... maybe I can surprise you this time. Inojin! Chocho! Time for Plan B!"

At Shikadai's word, the other two went into action. Inojin darted into the forest, while Chocho attacked Mirai again. This time, with a bit more gratuity.

"Try this one for size! Expansive Front Slice Jutsu!" she shouted.

Chocho's arm, along with the sword it held, expanded while she slashed at Mirai. The latter barely escaped the massive swing. A small gust even blew into her face. Mirai heard footsteps and peeked back. Shikadai had escaped into the woods while she was distracted.

"Okay... I admit, I was a little surprised that time," she said. She exchanged looks with Chocho. "You aren't heading into the forest with them?"

"Don't need too. My responsibility is to keep you busy."

Mirai heard rustling from the trees behind her. She understood at once. Things had just now gotten very troublesome. All she did was glance backwards, and Chocho was on her. The chubby kunoichi expanded both her arms and brought her enlarged blades down on top of her. Grass and dirt blasted up from the crushed earth.

"Mirai looks like she's in a pinch..." Hana said.

"That's because she is. Geeze Shikamaru..." Ino sighed. "Why did you tell those three that they could go into the forest?"

Shikamaru played with the wedding ring around his neck. "Yeah... I'm kinda regretting that now."

Hana was confused. "Is Mirai at a disadvantage?"

"A huge one," Ino emphasized. "You see, one of the reasons Mirai was keeping her distance was so she could see what all three of them were doing at once. Visibility is a major necessity when going up against multiple opponents."

"But Mirai's a chunin. Could three students who aren't even genin really pose that much of a threat to her?"

"Normally, no, but its not any ordinary techniques she's having to counter."

Mirai jumped out of the dirt cloud unscathed. She lunged at Chocho with the intent to disarm her, but felt a presence from the trees beside her. She flipped back a couple steps, and saw a thin shadow retreat back into the foliage. Before she could even comment in thoughts, she had to dodge another one of Chocho's slashes. Realizing that parrying an armed opponent with her bare hands was more trouble than it was worth, she scouted the ground for her thrown kunai.

"Are the Nara and Yamanaka clans' jutsu special?" Hana asked.

Ino nodded. "The Nara and Yamanaka clans never created their jutsu with the intention of using them in head-on fights. Their jutsu were meant to be used for subterfuge and ambushes. To catch the opponent off guard when they least expected it was a strategy the Nara and Yamanaka shared. That's why they excelled so much back when ninja clans kept to secrecy and never shared their family names."

"Though, that kinda changed when the village system got established, and all the clans came out into the open," Shikamaru added. "A lot of enemies the Nara and Yamanaka had made way back when came looking for payback. And they almost got it too."

"What stopped them?" Hana asked, still curious.

Choji smiled proudly and held his fist to his chest. "The Akimichi clan! That's who!"

Mirai successfully got a hold of her kunai. She turned to face Chocho, and the two gave birth to sparks. Now that Chocho was using her Expansion Jutsu along with Hidden Cloud kenjutsu, she was a bigger pain to deal with than before. Add in the shadows that kept creeping from the forest and the fact that somebody was aiming for mind, and Mirai certainly had her hands this full. Not to mention, she couldn't go into forest after Shikadai or Inojin, and they had no reason to come out so long as Chocho was distracting her.

'Come on, Mirai. Think! You can't go home and tell Mom that you got outsmarted by a couple academy students,' she scolded herself.

Her thoughts rambled on while she ducked under another of Chocho's massive swings. What a bullheaded girl. She completely forgotten that the point of the fight wasn't to defeat Mirai, but to simply take her headband.

'…wait. That's it!'

"Wow! So the Akimichi clan saved the other two clans from destruction?!" Hana asked excitedly.

Shikamaru and Ino frowned. "I wouldn't go that far..." the former said. "Well, that's sorta pushing it.." the latter said.

"You betcha they did!" Choji exclaimed. "You see, back in the old days, the Akimichi clan was threatened by other clans too, because out jutsu scared the crap out of them; being able to turn into giants the size of mountains and all. Twice we were on the verge of being wiped out, and both times a clan helped us in our time of need. The first time it was the Nara, and the second it was the Yamanaka. Protecting the two clans after the village was created was just our way of returning the favor."

"And that returned favor became what everyone in the Hidden Leaf knows as Ino-Shika-Cho!"

Every time Choji nodded, his chin seemed to go higher than before. Hana was amazed by the story, but the Ino and Shika were not as enthralled by the tale as the Cho was.

"Anyway... bottom line is, Mirai's got her work cut out for her now," Shikamaru concluded. "When I asked her to help Shikadai and others train, I didn't think they would end up working this well, so I'm little surprised by the results."

"So you think Mirai is going to lose?" Ino asked.

"No, I just said I was surprised. Those three are good..." Shikamaru watched Mirai and Chocho duel. "but them beating Mirai just isn't possible right now."

Shikadai was tucked neatly in the bushes. His shadow was ready to crawl after Mirai's at anytime. He just needed the right moment. All the other times he had used his Shadow Possession Jutsu, he was just trying to put Mirai on her toes, and he had told Inojin to do the same.

'An alert enemy is a drag to deal with, but an enemy that's too alert is an easy catch,' he thought. 'Now that big sis Mirai has all her hairs standing up, Inojin and I just need for Chocho to give us an opening. Then one of us can use our jutsu and make big sis take off her headband.'

Shikadai watched Mirai and Chocho's bout, looking for a chance to strike. Then he realized something was off. Mirai's moves, they had lost some of their crispness. It was impossible that any of Chocho's attacks had impaired her, so that meant that she was sabotaging herself. Shikadai knew she was up to something.

Then Mirai tripped on nothing. Shikadai watched Chocho's sword collide with Mirai's headband and knock it off her forehead towards the forest, and then knew exactly what she was planning.

He rose up from the bushes. "Inojin! Don't do it!"

It was too late. Inojin jumped from the tree he was hiding in to grab the headband, but b efore his pale fingers could catch it, Mirai threw her kunai. It skewered the the headband, and pinned it to a tree.

Inojin looked where the headband had been nailed. Like Shikadai, he had realized too late what Mirai's plan was. He felt a hand on his shoulder. He looked back, saw Mirai grinning, then saw Mirai grinning upside-down. He flipped a couple times in the air before crashing back down into a bush, where he stayed and groaned.

Shikadai saw his big sis glance his way. He cursed himself and tried to retreat deeper into the forest. Chocho tried to cover his escape by attacking Mirai again, but the chunin ignored the young kunoichi, and dashed straight where she knew Shikadai was. She knew she couldn't chase him into the forest, but now she didn't need to.

She made the hand signs Snake → Monkey → Tiger. "Fire Style: Kindling Ash Jutsu!"

She spewed from her mouth a stream of dark-purplish smoke that coasted its way through the forest that Shikadai was in. The young Nara coughed as the smoke got into his lungs, and teared up when it burned his eyes.

"Dangit! I-" He coughed. "...I gotta get away from the smoke!"

He tried to escape the smog, but it seemed that he only got deeper the further he went.

"Why can't I get out?!" he shouted.

"Because its not the forest that's smoky. It's you," Mirai called from outside the forest. "The Kindling Ash Jutsu produces a smoke that sticks to whoever gets caught in it the same way cigarette smoke sticks to clothes. I doubt you'll be able to use your jutsu now that you can't even see two feet in front of you."

Shikadai kept coughing. "...gimme a break already..."

Mirai turned away from the smoking forest. There was only one left to go, and that one was standing right in front of her.

Chocho took a stance. "I'm not giving up. No way I will!"

Chocho charged at Mirai with everything she still had. Every once her strength was going into this exchange. When she brought her blades down, Mirai stepped to the side, put one hand on Chocho's shoulder, and gently flipped her a complete 360 degrees. Chocho looked back at Mirai who gave her a cool smile in return.

Finally recognizing the enormous gap in strength, she threw her swords down. Shikadai slumped out of the forest, still shrouded in smoke and still coughing. Inojin messaged his back while getting up out of the crumpled bushes.

Shikamaru watched the scene with the other disappointed parents and sighed. "Well... at least hey did better than I thought they would. ...kinda."