It was a week after our school life started that I decided to speak with Shikamaru and Choji. Kiba and I usually ate lunch together, sometimes he'd invite some other kids, but they turned out to be incredibly annoying, ranting on and on about how Sasuke was getting all the girls. Who would want girls like them? They're fucking scary little things.

Shikamaru and Choji sat at a secluded area where a large tree provided them shade. There was a spot like it, in another area not far from this one. It was the one Kiba and I sat at. I was sick of listening to Kiba boast about his skills alone.

The young Nara noticed me walk up to them, and lazily kept eye contact with me. Once I was close enough, I gave a small wave and smirked slightly. They weren't ready for my fucked up grin. "Hey." I greeted.

"Hey." Shikamaru replied. Choji blushed and nodded in acknowledgment. Shy thing, he was. "You're Taidana Kuroki, right?"

I nodded. Nice to know people knew of me. "I'm going to be blunt, so be warned." I warned with a small grin. "I would like you two to join my little group of Kiba and I. Although the dog is hanging with those annoying kids of our class right now, I just wanted to make the offer."

Choji looked to Shikamaru. Shikamaru looked to Choji. A few moments passed before the lazy kid sighed and looked at me. "Troublesome, but I guess we have no choice."

Pscht. They had a choice, but whatever. I smirk-grinned. "Nice. Well, I'm going to sit here." I moved and sat in between the two, leaning against the large tree trunk as well. "Going to find Kiba would be more of an annoyance than anything. I'd probably get into a fight with one of his bratty friends."

I guess that comment led to us three talking a bit more, I mean, Shikamaru was a lazy one and Choji was shy, but they gradually opened up to me.

"Chip?" Choji held out his packet of chips, the flavour eluding me. I was hungry anyways, even though Kiba and I wolfed down our rather huge lunches.

The chips tasted a bit like barbeque. That was cool.

Lunch was over, and I decided to move to the back with Shikamaru and Choji. I wanted to be here in the first place, but Kiba was always down front, and I felt like being compliant.

Kiba walked in with his friends, being as loud as ever, boasting about his awesomeness and some other bullshit. When he glanced at the front row, he was confused to not see me there. His eyes scanned the room, and eventually saw me next to Shikamaru, who was next to Choji, who was next to the window. For some reason he wasn't happy.

"What if I didn't want to sit with them, huh?" Kiba argued as we were walking to his house. I don't know how it's so fucking bad that I decided to sit with newly made friends. I groaned.

"Kiba, come on. I just wanted to sit with some new friends." I tried to diffuse his unreasonable anger, but it didn't work. No, he seemed to be horribly offended by this comment, and even gasped dramatically. We had to stop walking because he seemed so upset.

"What about me? Aren't I enough?!" He exclaimed. I had an annoying reminder that he's six. I sighed, my fuck, I wanted to hit him. "Kiba."

He waited impatiently when I stated his name. We stared at each other for a bit. "How many friends do you have at school?"

Kiba seemed taken back by the question, and shifted his look on the ground. He looked guilty, I had to hide the growing grin. "Seven..."

"Exactly." I commented, continuing to walk to his house. He followed after me. "I only had you before Choji and Shikamaru." Well, there was two certain Uchihas, but I wasn't going to mention them.

Glancing at Kiba, he was looking away with a blush. Probably out of embarrassment. "I don't want to become your second or third best friend..." He muttered. I stopped and looked back at him with slightly wide eyes.

"You're jealous?"

The dog boy frowned, his blush deepened, but he said nothing. A wide grin formed.

"Aw~! Little Kiba's jealous his Kuro-chan is going to be taken away from him!" I didn't even bother to hide my very apparent amusement, stepping forward and bending down to his face, basically teasing him. Right in the face.

Kiba's eyes widened and he reeled back in shock, before exploding. "I'm not! Shut up!"

"Hahahaha!" I laughed as one of my hands was placed on top of Kiba's brown mess of hair, his little arms just barely out of reach to punch me. I ruffled his hair, which caused his little explosion to hault.

I smirk-grinned. "You'll always be my first best friend."

Akamaru jumped towards Kiba as we entered the house, much like how Shiruba did. Except my dog was huge now. The dog boy laughed happily as he picked up his new companion, petting him affectionately. "Did you miss me, Akamaru?" Kiba asked. Akamaru yipped in response.

Saying that Kiba was my first best friend had caused him to calm down, and he even began to boast about how no other friend would surpass his greatness. What a dork, heh.

Akamaru soon jumped from Kiba's arms to me. I grinned as I caught the jumping dog, petting him as he happily greeted me. "Hey, Akamaru. How are you?" Akamaru yipped in response, despite my question actually being rhetorical. "That's good."

I laid at an upside down on the couch in their living room. My legs just barely reaching the top of the couch. My vision was upset down, Kiba's face scrunched up to something akin with disgust, a pencil in his hand. Akamaru laid on my stomach.

"You're horrible at homework." I deadpanned, having a look at his answers for the academy's set homework. Really, I hated homework, studying and all that, but with a mum who threatened to cut off my training and food supply for two days or more, the tests she provided were necessary for my training and life.

"Shut up, I know. I'm not meant for sitting around." Kiba replied, trying to balance the pencil on his finger. When it tipped, he looked at me. "Let me copy yours."

"Pscht. Hell no. You need all the brain training you can get."

"Hey!"

I snickered, Akamaru awoken by my stomach's vibrations.

"It's true." I commented, staring at him. He pouted. I sighed.

"Come over here. I'll teach you." He seemed to be happy about that, and basically jumped to me with his pencil and book.

"See you, Kuro-chan!" Kiba grinned at me, I grinned back.

"I'll see you."

I waited on the grassy hill which gave me a good view of the village and Hokage Mountain. It was peaceful, and I laid back, staring at the warm blue sky that featured a few wandering clouds. I shut my eyes as I used my arms as a pillow.

"You like staring, huh?" I asked, after some time. My eyes were closed, but I knew there was someone beside me. They flinched, and I slowly opened my eyes to look at them.

"Kuroki-chan...!" Sasuke exclaimed, surprised. "I thought you were asleep."

I grinned. "I was, until I felt the tingling sensation of someone staring."

"Humph."

"Where's Itachi?" I asked as we sat together on the hill.

"Itachi-Nii's on a mission. He won't be back for a week or two." Sasuke informed, jeez, he sounded so lonely. I poked him.

"Wha-?! Hey!" Sasuke lightly glared at me, unsure why I poked him.

A yawn escaped my lips. "You're not alone."

Sasuke blinked, losing his little glare that I found rather cute. He looked down. "Yeah, I guess so..." He agreed slowly, then looked up at me and smiled. "I have you with me."

I nodded, smirk-grinning. "I'll always be there for you."

"Promise?"

"Promise."

I said my goodbyes to Sasuke after walking him to his compound. Kuroi mentioned we had Lightning Release Kenjutsu tomorrow, so tonight was the time to do some chakra exercises.

It was called tree climbing, right? Well, I was currently hanging upside down on a branch in our spacey backyard which is a makeshift training ground/normal backyard. I was reading the Icha Icha series Kuroi had tried to hide from both myself and Aonami. They can't hide shit from me. The series was actually interesting, and while I'm dirty minded, I wasn't into porn, it actually made me laugh at how messed up it all was. I was reading the book to see if I still needed to concentrate when sticking myself upside down on a high tree branch. Every time I lost my shit from laughter, I would fall. But at least I didn't need a lot of concentration.

Water walking isn't that difficult, but concentrating the amount of chakra needed for the water whenever it rippled or swayed was annoying, especially at night. But it was good training. I decided that was all I should do before heading inside and doing all my nightly routines and heading off to bed.

I woke up in the middle of the night. The window which was above my bed gave me a perfect view of the moon. It was in a crescent shape, and it shined brightly. For some reason, I was entranced by it, and I softly petted a sleeping Shiruba as my mind went through many subjects. I didn't get much sleep, much to my annoyance.

Sleep deprivation pissed me off. While I was a nocturnal being in my old life, I'm not here, and being tired meant I wasn't at my best. Then again, training like this could also improve my skills whenever I'm mentally and/or physically exhausted.

Would that work?

It's been two months since the beginning of my life at the academy. Shikamaru, Choji and I usually hung out, and Kiba often stayed after eating his lunch with us, instead of going off with his friends. He liked to repeat the fact that he was my first best friend. Maybe I should've just smacked him upside the head.

Naruto joined in with our little group. At first, he was skeptical of our intentions, thinking we were trying to trick him into believing we actually liked him before doing some kind of poor prank. I'm rude, crude and blunt, but I respected people's feelings. Some of them. Naruto was a good kid, but he was treated like shit because of the demon locked within him. Ungrateful shits should be seeing him as a hero.

Well, actually. My respect and awe for the Kyuubi made me like Naruto a lot more despite his loud tendencies. Now we have two loud-mouths. Who were also competitive. Like Shikamaru says; 'They're troublesome, but we can't just abandon them.'

Very true in my opinion.

"Kuroki-chan. Why do you have that mark running down your cheek?" Naruto asked as he picked at the selection of our lunches. We all had large lunches except for Naruto, who we gladly shared with. But back to his question.

"I don't know, actually." I replied honestly, shrugging. "My parents say I've had it since birth."

"So it's a birth mark?" Shikamaru asked, seeming a little curious. Guess he must've been wondering about that too.

"Guess it is. I don't know how it got there."

"What about your scars, then?" Naruto asked, even more curious than the marking under my eye. I smirk-grinned, a lot of people were curious about them.

"There were caused by kunai and ninja stars that accidently got me in training."

"She has a lot more under that hoodie of hers." Kiba added, grinning. Boasting about my scars like he was the one with them. It made me grin how proud he was to be my friend.

"Cool!" Naruto exclaimed.

We were sitting in class, all five of us in the back row. It went from Choji was nearest to the window, to Shikamaru, then me, Kiba and Naruto. Choji ate whilst Shikamaru and I slept and Kiba and Naruto did something loud. Which got chalks thrown to their head. If only I was awake for them. Would've laughed in their faces.

In the academy, everything we did, I held back in. At my advanced level, they would've graduated me in no time and sent me on my way to a genin team. Which I didn't want, yet. In taijutsu, I applied more chakra to my weights, causing them to become abnormally more heavy that usual. It slowed my movements, but my forms were always good. Actually, I don't even want to go on explaining it all. All we need to know is that I was holding back, a lot. Well, except written tests.

Aonami was a demon if I didn't score the top marks for written tests. But they were easy compared to her tests from Satan's ass.

As the months past, my friendships with the boys improved, Naruto was doing a bunch of pranks, Kiba visited regularly, Shiruba grew, Itachi was on his way to being a Jounin, I improved on my skills, and Sasuke was being neglected majorly by his father.

I was nine when Sasuke said that he wanted to learn how to do the Great Fireball Jutsu in front of his father again. He failed the first time, his father becoming disappointed in his son. I would slap him if I was allowed.

I had learnt how to do kenjutsu and also enhance it with lightning ninjutsu, I still needed to work on them though. I've become overly advanced at taijutsu, as well learnt how to Body Flicker. Genjutsu, I've become kind of decent at, able to cast light genjutsu's on Kuroi, who was easily able to break them. Ninjutsu was inbetween Taijutsu and Genjutsu, but it I was much better at it than Genjutsu, whereas I wasn't as good at it as with Taijutsu.

Kuroi's been teaching me how to know when I'm in a genjutsu and to break them, rather than to cast them. It was good training for me.

A week had passed, and Sasuke was able to show his father the Fireball jutsu. I was happy for him, but my mind constantly wandered to the elder Uchiha, who had became an ANBU member half a year after he became a chunin. I couldn't help but sigh at the fact that he was already so advanced...and that I only had a year left before he destroyed his clan and the mentality of his brother. I looked to the bubbly Uchiha to sat beside me on the hill we sat at so much. I wanted to see him smile more, because after the massacre, it didn't exist anymore.

I poked his cheek. He flinched and leaned back, looking at me in mild shock. Then he frowned.

"Why do you always poke me?"

"Because I like to." I grinned at him, "And because you look cute when you're angry."

"What?!" I snickered as he abruptly stood with a large blush staining his cheeks, looking at me with incredulous eyes. I waved a dismissive hand in his direction. "Chill."

"I like it better when you smile."

"You do?" He looked at me weirdly.

"I do." I confirmed. "So smile more often, because you never know when your happiness will be pulled to a halt."

Sasuke seemed to contemplate my words, that was simple for a smart seven-year-old, right? He looked at me and nodded, grinning mischievously.

What's he up to?

"Only if you smile more often too. Kuroki-chan's smile is pretty." As if he said something rude, he gasped and quickly covering his mouth, another wave of pink splashing against his cheeks.

At first, I was a little surprised to know that the little Uchiha thought my smile, however rare, was pretty. Because Sasuke was more emotive, I allowed myself to form a small, genuine smile. "Cheeky. Fine."

I must've stunned the boy for a second, because he only gaped at me before giggling and smiling. Oh, my fuck. His giggle is so fucking cute.

In my new class, (the classes change every year), which is fairly old, considering it's August, consisted Haruno Sakura, Yamanaka Ino, Kiba, Naruto and Shikamaru. Choji was the only one separated from us, but we kept together at lunch. While I despised how fucking useless Sakura was in the first season, she was...alright in the second. Ino, well, she's loud. Loud females were something I couldn't handle well. They both obsessed over Sasuke.

They don't know him. Yet they crush over him anyways. I know him well, but I can only see him as something akin to a brother, much like the rest of my circle of friends. I'm not overly fond of my gender.

"Taidana-san." Someone called. I turned around to see Sakura walking towards me. What's going on?

"Mm?"

"Um...it's about Sasuke-kun." Sakura begin to blush and fidget.

Ah, fuck. Get out of it. Get out of it now, Kuroki.

"What?" What, in-fucking-deed, mouth! Why you got to go and let her elaborate?! Huh?! Despite the mental dispute, I kept my expression relaxed.

"Do you kn-"

"KUROKI-CHAN!"

I looked past Sakura to see Naruto sprinting towards me. He jumped over Sakura, and pulled his fist back to try and punch me when gravity pulled him down. I sighed as I grabbed his fist, absorbing the punch into my hand, which sadly, I couldn't feel.

"Eh?" Naruto sounded, confused by my block whilst he seemed to float in the air, if only for a second.

Before his body could connect with the ground, I shifted to face the open window on my right, still gripping Naruto's fist before literally throwing him outside the window and smacking into the tree trunk that was conveniently in my trajectory.

I yawned as I dusted my hands off.

"OW, KUROKI-CHAN!" Naruto yelled, rubbing his now red face at the base of the tree trunk he had smacked into. I smirk-grinned at him before turning back to Sakura, who seemed mind fucked as she looked at Naruto outside.

"W-What?!"

"Eh." She didn't bother asking her question, so I just walked off, hoping to find Kiba or someone who had food today. Aonami forced me into a test whilst I was sleep deprived. Not cool.

I grinned, Shikamaru, Choji, Kiba and Naruto sitting with me at the large tree we always sat at. Except we had a guest who was currently hiding behind the trunk.

"Where is he?! I swear he ran this way!" One random fangirl screeched. My fuck, they're seven. Seven. When I was seven. I trained. And my voice was a lot deeper than that dreadful sound.

"You five!" Ino pointed at us with a determined look. The other girls were afraid of Naruto apparently, so they didn't speak up. Shikamaru and I groaned, Choji froze up, Kiba growled lightly as Naruto gave a disgusted look at the mob of females.

"Have you seen Sasuke-kun?" Sakura asked, pushing her way to the front, next to Ino. They looked at each other with heated glares. Females, man.

"No, but if I had, I wouldn't tell yous. So piss off before I have to hurt you." I threatened casually. I wasn't in the mood for them, and they could sense it, so they hurriedly retreated before anything 'bad' could happen. I resumed to eating.

"Kuroki is so cool!" Kiba and Naruto exclaimed in unison. They immediately glared at each other for speaking at the same time.

"Sasuke~. Come out now."

Slowly, Sasuke's head poked out from behind the trunk, although I could only see the spikey bit of his hair, as I was leaning against the middle of the trunk. When he came into my view, he looked embarrassed.

"...Thank you."

Naruto gasped in shock, pointing dramatically at the Uchiha.

"Did he just say 'thank you'?!"

"Shut up, Dobe." Sasuke frowned and folded his arms. I grinned.

"Anyways," I began before Naruto could retort, I glanced at Sasuke, "sit with us."

Sasuke looked at the members to see if there was any protest in their expressions.

"Troublesome, but I don't mind."

"Shikamaru says it's okay, so I do too."

"Sweet, another rival!"

"But Kuroki-chan~! Do we have to have teme here?"

I rolled my eyes, that comment by Naruto caused Sasuke to officially sit beside me and toss a smug look at Naruto.

"No complaining, or the next time you try to attack me, I will do more than throw you into a tree."

Naruto froze, and the group shifted their eyes towards him.

"You attacked Kuroki-chan?" Sasuke asked with controlled anger.

"How dare you attack my best friend!" Kiba exclaimed.

"But...she's my rival..." Naruto muttered, looking down as he fidgeted.

He looked up. "You all are!"

All of us took on mildly surprised expressions.

"You're all stronger than me, and I'm going to change that. Kuroki-chan is the strongest here," Naruto started, everyone nodding at Naruto's accurate announcement of my strength. It's only because I started earlier, and my mind is way advanced.

"So, I'm going to start with her! I'll find some way to finally land a hit on you!"

Sasuke's eyes widened and then he looked to me.

"You do that exercise with him too?"

I was about to reply before Kiba interrupted me.

"She does with me too. Can't get a hit on her though." Kiba lightly glared at me, whilst I grinned.

"Sasuke's the closest to being able to hit me, even if he hasn't yet. Compared to you two, it's like he's already hit me." I think my comment caused Sasuke to gloat and feel smug, smirking at Naruto and Kiba. A three-way rivalry. That's different.

Been going through my chapters, editing bits here and there.

EDIT: BAM! And that line of text I've been getting complains about is gone. Happy?