BURN
It was the day of team assignments and sakura was understandably nervous. The next few years of her life would revolve around today's announcement. Undoubtedly she would become friends with however she was teamed with; one couldn't spend that amount of time with someone and not become at least casual friends. Not to mention this was her one best shot at becoming close to the ever reclusive Sasuke. Just the thought of being on the same team as him was enough to almost make her brake out in a fangirlish squeal. He had this dark broody feel to him and with his tragic past she just knew all he need was for her to come in and fix him and that he would be so grateful he would have no choice but to return her feeling and then ... this time she actual did let out a squeal.
The rest of the class just turned their head to stare at their obviously insane pink haired classmates.
"Anyway. As I was saying team one will be..." most of the class just tuned out iruka's voice only really listening when they heard their own name called. "Team seven will be Sakura Haruno," sakuras head shot up and as she crossed her fingers well sending a hopeful look the dark haired boy sitting a few seats to her right. "Sasuke Uchiha," sakura let out an ear splitting cry of joy before turning to her perpetual rival in all things Sasuke and promptly started one of their usual arguments which as always devolved into childish name calling. "ah-hem," iruka tried to get everyone's attention back on him as he still had a number of teams to announce. Unfortunately both sakura and ino were so into their argument that his own attempt at intervening had gone completely unnoticed. "Shut the hell up!" thank the kami for his devil head jutsu. "Now as I was saying. Team seven will be Sakura Haruno, Sasuke Uchiha and Kiba Inuzuka. Your jounin sensei will be Naruto Uzumaki." He was more than a little surprised when he announced the team sensei. As their academy teacher he had a hand in making genin teams as well as picking which sensei should go with which team. The last he had checked it was suppose to be Hakate Kakashi leading team seven. It was all more than a little suspicious but the list had the Hokage's signature on it so he guessed it must have been a last minute decision.
It only took him a few more minutes before he had finished the list. "Alright your dismissed for lunch, just remember your jounin sensei's will be arriving after lunch so be sure to be back before the bell rings." He had barley finished before all the students ran out the door nearly trammelling him in the process. Now that he had almost an hour before his students would be back he had time to ponder this new development with team sevens sensei. Granted it had been years since he had even thought about the host of the nine tails. After all he had all but disappeared after the Hokage had made the announcement about him. Truth be told now that he had time to think about it this situation was getting weirder and weirder. Unless he was mistaken the boy should only be about the same age as the rest of the class that had just graduated. That meant he had to of been in the ninja corps. For years now to be considered strong enough to be a jounin sensei. That though alone made him uneasy. Add onto that he was the container of the kyuubi and iruka was starting to question just how stable someone like that could be. Unfortunately it was not up to him and he was forced to follow the orders of the Hokage just like everyone else.
XXXXXX
Lunch had passed by quickly and soon everyone found themselves back in their old classroom for the last time. Most were talking excitedly with their new team mates, though in some cases this was more one sided than others.
"So now that were on the same team and all do you want to go out and get something to eat or something." Asked sakura sitting of to the left of her crush.
"no." He answered with a little annoyance setting into his tone. After all one could only say no so many times before it became tedious.
"What the hell are you, gay? You got a smoking hotty hanging of your arm and you say no. What the hell is wrong with you? If it was me ...." he continued on in this vain until a punch to the back of his head interrupted his tirade.
"Shut the hell up baka, don't talk to Sasuke-kun like that again or I'll give you a beating you won't soon forget." Screeched the pink haired girl on his right. Throughout the holes scene Sasuke just sat there silently wishing that the sensei would show up and save him from the madness that was his team.
Not long after the end of lunch bell wrong did the team sensei's start to arrive, usually just picking up their team and leaving off to some secluded part of the village. Finally the only team left was team seven. Both kiba and Sakura were more than a little annoyed at being the last team to be picked up and were more than happy to vocalize their annoyance. Sasuke had a bit more self control but even he was less than pleased at being the last team to be picked up. However soon the sound of foot steeps could be heard approaching the room and all three genin straitened hoping to make a good first impression on their new teacher. What steeped through the door shocked all three in to a stunned silence.
He had long silver hair that went down to his lower back and his bangers were done in such a way that that they framed his face on both sides. On each of his cheeks were three whisker like marks. He still had a bit of baby fat but over all his face was very angular and smooth. However the most notable sight was his almost glowing blue eyes, it wasn't even that they seemed to glow but the fact that they were slited like a cats.
From what they could see all he wore was a pair of standard black shinobi pants, with a pair of knee high black leather boots with silver buckles over his feet. Instead of a shirt he had two leather belts crossing his chest in an X and over top of all of that he wore a long black leather coat with silver palindromes' on his shoulders. And in his left hand was by far the largest sword any of them had ever seen, probably seven feet in length it was almost twice as tall as the man holding it.
However the thing that had them all rooted to their spot was the fact that their sensei could be no older than they were. It didn't make any sense. They had seen the other sensei's most of them had at least been in their late twenties. The boy in front of them couldn't be older than then thirteen.
"Team seven I presume." it wasn't a question. Not waiting for them to make any sight that they had heard him he continued. "Meet me up on the roof in five." And without further adue he turned around, his long coat flaring out behind him and walked out the door without giving his team another glace.
All three of the new genin just stared at the door their new sensei had just walked out.
"Ah, you guys just saw what i just saw too right? I mean he looked our age to you too right? Asked kiba very confused.
All sakura could do was nod her head. Sasuke on the other hand was trying to calm himself down. There was someone out there that was his age and was already so far beyond him. he couldn't help but to start comparing the silver haired buy to his brother, and although he was sure that Itachi would win in a fight between the two, after all Itachi was still an Uchiha and the only person who could kill an Uchiha was another Uchiha. Still his new sensei had to of been powerful to of become a jounin already and he was full prepared to do what he had to learn from him, even if he had to swallow his pride for a time then so be it. "Come on, he only gave us five minutes to get to the roof, and I for one would rather not be late." And with that he stood up and walked out the door, his two teammates not far behind him.
XXXXX
He was leaning up against the railing when he first heard his new students approach up the stairs. In all honesty he was less than impressed with them, though it was admittedly still too early to form any opinions and more than likely he was just transferring his annoyance at having to do this onto them. So shaking his head to clear his thoughts he waited for them to arrive.
First was the young Uchiha. He may not have read all the way through his file but it was hardly necessary to understand the boy. Unfortunately he had never had the pleasure of serving with Itachi, but he had met the prodigal Uchiha on numerous occasions when he had been younger, he had even served as a sparring partner on a few occasions. Truthfully even now he still held some respect for the older boy, that's not to say he would not kill him if their paths ever crossed. He was still a missing-nin and no matter how much he may have respected him that would not stop him from doing his duty. But back to the boy standing in front of him, it was easy to guess that the boy was walking down the path of the 'avenger' so to speak. He already knew the boy was going to be a problem. Not only in the fact that his attitude was less than exemplary and he was most likely even less stable than himself, but simply because revenge was another one of those emotions that he still had trouble understanding. Kakashi had said it was one of those things that he couldn't really explain but something that one had to experience firsthand. The only thing he could think of doing to help the problem was to do the same thing he suspected the Hokage of doing to him, he would force the boy to interact with his peers and hope that he would connect to them on some level.
Next was his only female student. Again he had not gotten very far in her record but he could already tell that most of her knowledge lay in the realm of the academic and not the practical. Not that that was necessarily a bad thing but he could tell just by looking at her that she was pathetically weak in both physically and in her chakra reserves even for a kononichi. The first thing he had planned for her was too seriously up the girl's physical training. After that he perhaps he would recommend she get specialized training in either Genjutsu or medical jutsu.
Lastly was Kiba Inuzuka. Defiantly the team's tracker, but he certainly had the attitude to be a front line fighter. Unfortunately it was that same attitude that he was going to have to work on. The boy was confident to the point of being arrogant. And he had seen more ninja die because of their own arrogance than from enemy fire. He was also most likely very dependent on his clan jutsu just like most other ninja from prestigious clans, something he hoped to break him from. However of all his new genin he would most likely be the easiest 'fix' so to speak.
"All right now that we're all here I guess we should introduce ourselves. My name is Naruto Uzumaki but you will call me Naruto-sensei or just sensei. You don't need to know what I like or not I don't really have any hobbies, though I guess you might be able to count star gazing if you wanted to. As for dreams for the future ... I don't really have one nor do I feel I need one. Now you." he said pointing at Sasuke.
"My name is Sasuke Uchiha, I don't really like anything and I dislike a lot of things. As for hobbies ... the only thing I can think of that falls under that category would be training. As for a dream for the future, it not so much a dream as an ambition, I'm going to kill a certain man and resurrect my clan to its former glory." He finished with a scowl as his thought turned to THAT man.
Without even giving him a second look he turned to his pink haired student. "You next." He said in a lazy drawl.
"uh right. I'm Sakura Haruno. I like Sasuke-Kun and uh reading. I hate loud idiot baka's" she shot a glare at her K9 like teammate. "As for hobbies uh ..." at this she sent a look at Sasuke and let out a little squeal. "And a dream for the future ..." again she looked to her brooding teammate and let out and even louder squeal.
Naruto wasn't sure just what do now. Never had he been around girls his own age and he wasn't quite sure if this was normal behaviour or not. Hoping it wasn't, because his sensitive ears wouldn't be able to take too much of that it was, he moved on to his last student.
"Right my turn. I'm Kiba Inuzuka and this here is my companion Akamaru. I like dogs, hot girls and meat. I dislike cats, ugly girls and vegetables. As for hobbies well training with Akamaru here so we can be the best. As for a dream for the future, I want to become clan head and make my clan even stronger than it already is." He finished by standing up and giving the rest of his team a thumbs up gesture.
"Right, well now that we know each other I can tell you about the next part of you genin test ..." that was as far as he got when he was interrupted by cries of indignation from the three genin sitting in front of him. Deciding that he was in no mood to listen to their complaining he let loose a small bit of killing intent to shut them up. "As I was saying. The next part is a kind of survival test I suppose. In any case meet me at training ground seven at six tomorrow morning and bring all you ninja equipment." And with that he shushine'd off leaving a dumbfound group of genin still standing on the roof of the academy.
XXXXXX
It was early the next morning when Naruto walked into the clearing that made up training ground seven. Looking around he noticed Sasuke leaning against a tree with sakura not far away sending said dark haired boy love long looks. However it wasn't until he noticed the snoring did he spot kiba. There at the foot of one of the trees fast asleep was the dog like boy and his small dog sleeping soundly. Shaking his head and with a small smile on his face he slowly walked over to the sleeping boy bent down and covered the boys nose and mouth so he was no longer able to breathe. It did not take long for his eyes to snap open and dart around wildly looking for the reason he was no longer able to breathe. "Let this be a lesson if you going to sleep during practice you had better be able to detect a threat in you sleep or next time you just might not wake up." He drawled with no real emotion in his voice. He then walked away from the still prone boy until he was able to see all three genin without having to move his eye. "Now normally I would test you on your team work with some kind of overcomplicated test of some sort, but luckily for you the Hokage has all but forbidden me from failing you and in so doing freeing me from the hell that I'm sure being your sensei is going to be. So, seeing as you've basically already guaranteed to become genin, were simply going to have a spare so I can see where your strengths and weaknesses are. This is technically a team exercise so feel free to work with each other and also if you plan on even laying one blow on me you better come at me with intent to kill. Now ... begin." As he finessed all three genin disappeared into the woods. "Well at least you all know how to hide properly." He said looking around the clearing pinpointing the location of all three genin. "Well it seems I need to motivate you all to come out of hiding. So how about this everyone who can't land one clean blow on me will be doing double training for the next week, yes that sounds fair doesn't it?" he asked no one in particular. Unsurprisingly almost immediately after finishing did both kiba and Akamaru come rushing out of the bushes in a dead charge. Not even changing his stance he just stood there waiting for the two missiles that were Akamaru and kiba to come to him and just before they were about to collide did Naruto simple jump over them landing softly behind both of them before spinning on his right leg and delivered a strong kick to kiba's side sending him flying into Akamaru which in turn sent both barrelling in to one of the many trees surrounding the clearing. "Rule number one: make sure you have a plan before you engage the enemy." He said over kiba's unconscious body. However his reprieve was short lived as a barrage of shuriken slammed into him, only to revel that all they had hit was a large log.
"That was much better Sasuke. If I had been a little slower you just might have hit me." Said the silver haired man standing behind Sasuke who had thought he had concealed himself in the tree to a point where their sensei would not have been able to of hit him. "But it was a bit to strait forward, you should have tried to of gotten me to move into a better position for either another trap or an ambush. But still for a fresh genin I guess it was O.K." he said as Sasuke registered that his position had been made and jumped down into the clearing. Naruto followed him and now both were just standing in the clearing staring each other down, well Sasuke was staring at Naruto, Naruto just had a board expression on his face. "Well now what? You have my undivided attention so why don't you show me just how strong the all might Uchiha are?" he had read all their files last night and had discovered that everyone's favourite Uchiha apparently had a very short fuse.
Sasuke fumed. The man was obviously making fun of his family. Well he'll show him not to underestimate an Uchiha again. with that though firmly in place he ran through a number of had hand seals ending on tora and yelled our "Grand Fireball Technique!" before inhaling a large breathe of air and then releasing a large ball of fire that sped directly towards Naruto who just stood there and let the fire hit him. Sasuke was more than a little surprised when he noticed his sensei made no move to avoid getting hit by his fireball. However when the smoke cleared and he noticed there was no charred corpse he got back into a defensive stance and began to look around the clearing for his opponent, Unfortunately it was too late when he finally looked down there were two hand coming out of the earth pulling him under. By the time his sensei was fully emerged from the ground Sasuke was now buried up to his neck in the ground. "Well that was rather impressive for a genin, but it's far too easy to anger you, I would suggest you work on that or it may just get you killed one of these days." And with that he walked away from the now fuming head of the last Uchiha.
"Now where did pinkie get to?" he asked himself looking around the forest before heading deeper into the woods.
Up in a tree not too far away hid said pinkie. "That was close." She whispered to herself. She had seen how he had taken care of both kiba and Sasuke and she knew that she stood no chance against him and that her best chance of making it out of this clearing relatively unharmed would be too hide until the time was up. Just then she heard a noise come from underneath her and when she looked down her heart stop. There was Sasuke, her Sasuke, but he didn't look like his usual cool self. He was covered in cuts and there were even a number of kunai sticking out of his back. "Sasuke-Kun!" she yelled in shock as she jumped down from her tree to tend to her Sasuke. However just as she reached him he fell to one knee coughed u a large amount of blood and then fell flat on his face. "Sasuke-kun, oh Sasuke-kun please be ok, please be ok ...." she kept repeating this over and over until she reached his now prone body. However when she reached him and turned him over all she could see was a large number of deep cuts in this torso all bleeding copious amounts of blood. It was then that he cracked one of his eyes open and feebly lifted his head so his mouth was very close to her ear. "Why, sakura? Why didn't you help us? Where were you?" the accusation in his voice was like a knife to her heart. Then just as he finished his head fell limp and his breathing stopped and for one brief moment the world fell silent before one single pain filled scream scattered the birds up in the trees and then sakura knew no more.
"Heh, maybe I over did it?" thought the silver haired man to himself up in a tree overlooking the pink haired girl down on the forest floor. "Oh well nothing I can do about it now anyway. Besides if she can't throw off a simple D-class Genjutsu that that's her own dam problem." And with that he jumped down out of the tree and picked up his pink haired subordinate and began to walk of towards the rest of the team.
XXXXXX
When kiba awoke it was quite a surprise to find himself tied to a post along with both Sasuke and Sakura. Then he noticed his silver haired sensei standing in front of them, his monster of a sword rested against his left shoulder. "Well I must say that was pathetic. Not only did none of you even come close to landing a hit on me, but even when I go out of my way to tell you to work together you still go off and do your own thing. Honestly was it because of my age? Did you think that because were the same age that we must be close to being the same power level? Is that it? Or did you just think so highly of your own power that you thought you could take on a jounin level ninja on your own? Because if either of those are what you think that you're going to be in for a rude awakening. Now, normally I would fail you on the spot and send your asses back to the academy for another year, but unfortunately I don't have that option. So instead were doubling you work out routine for the next week. That mean you will arrive her at five in the morning and you won't leave until seven that night, or if you pass out I guess I can let you go home, if I'm feeling charitable. Now get out of here and you better be here on time and you better be awake." He shot kiba a glare at the end before swinging his sword and cutting all their bindings at the same time. All the genin could do was sit there and look at the person they had no doubt would now be firmly secured in their nightmares for years to come walk away.
XXXXXX
He was lying on the roof of his apartment watching the sun set of in the west when he felt the familiar chakra signature of one of his 'friends'. "Hello sempi. Come to check in on me have you?" he asked.
"Well, more like to make sure that everyone on your team is still alive, but I guess I can make time in my hectic schedule to check up on you to. Speaking of which, how did things go? And seriously they are still all alive right?" he asked with a straight face taking a seat beside his fellow silver haired friend.
"If it makes you feel any better they are all still alive and in relatively good health, though I make no promises' about their health in the week to follow." He said as he watched the last of the suns light fade away and the first of the stars start to shine.
"Ha, yha I heard about what you got planed for them in the coming week and I can't say I envy them. Most anbu would balk at training at your level for a week; I doubt that a couple of fresh genin will last all week."
"Oh I agree, but it's a good way of showing the difference in our levels, I don't have age on them so I need them to understand that as of right now I'm still considerable stronger than them. They need to understand that I'm the one in charge and that it's in their best interest to do as I tell them." He said while mentally naming of constellations, as more and more stars began to shin in the night sky.
"That's a good plan, just make sure that you don't accidentally kill one off, I hear there's quite a lot of paperwork involved in accidental genin deaths." Kakashi chuckled at his own joke. Like most shinobi he had developed a rather dark sense of humour. "Anyway, now that I know you got through the day with what little sanity you already possessed I was wondering if you wanted to go out with me and the other jounin sensei's to grab a drink or two. And before you flat out refuse me remember that for immediate future the only company you have to look forward to is that of your genin squad." Kakashi shuddered at the thought of being surrounded by a bunch of green brats all the time, and he could only imagine what it was going to be like for his shorter friend.
Naruto thought about it, kakashi had a point, as uncomfortable as he felt around other anbu and jounin it was nowhere near as bad as trying to be around people his own age and it wouldn't hurt to at least try and be around people who in comparison to his earlier company made at least a bit of sense. "All right, I guess a few drink would not kill me, but I do have a busy morning so I can't stay out all night."
Kakashi was a little shocked, this had hardly been the first time he had tried to get the silver haired kid to come drinking with him but he had always flat out refused him in the past. Maybe he hadn't given the Hokage enough credit. If after just spending one day with a bunch of brats his own age had opened him up to the idea of at least mingling with some of the other people in the village, even if it was only because he felt more comfortable in comparison to doing things with the younger crowd than that was fine with him. "well then let's go, and don't worry too much it really is going to just be you me and maybe three or four others, hell the bar we go to is usually pretty empty in the first place."
"You don't have to baby me. Though I do appreciate your sentiments I assure you I'll be fine now let's go, unlike some people I could mention I would rather not be late." And with that he stood up dusted off his pants and jumped of the side of the building.
XXXXXX
Despite his insistences that kakashi did not need to baby him he was still glad that the bar was almost empty when they arrived. In fact the only people in the room were three people of sitting around one of the larger tables in the room, the head bands as well as the extra two seats lead him to believe that this was the group of other genin sensei kakashi was talking about, the bartender and two men sitting at the bar. Letting out a small sight of relief at the small number of people he would have to be around he let himself be lead by kakashi over to the table and took a seat between him and the only female at the table. Immediately it became painfully obvious that kakashi had not told the others that he was coming, not that he could blame him, he had turned him down so many times before that he obviously had felt that today would have been no different. However it was and now he had three strangers giving him funny looks. Unfortunately only kakashi had ever served in anbu so he was unfamiliar with the other people at the table.
Sensing his friends growing unease and not wanting to ruin what was probable his first night out in many years kakashi decided it was going to be up to him to break the ice. "Well then, let me make the introductions. Naruto this is Maito guy, but you can just call him guy and to his left is the thirds son Asuma Sarutobi and the lovely lady to your left is Kurenai Yuhi. Everyone this is Naruto, we served in anbu together for a while and now he's the sensei for team seven." The silence was almost defining. He had hoped that the others would try and start up a conversation, something simple to help ease the boy out of his shell, unfortunately hi introduction had the opposite effect and all the others were able to do was stare at the silver haired kid. Thankfully the silence was broken when the bar tender came over to take their orders. Much to the surprise of everyone else Naruto ordered the same sake that kakashi had. Unfortunately just before he was about to take his first sip a hand shot out across the table and stopped him. "Oh woe is me; I cannot stand to watch such an unyouthful act and stand back and do nothing. Truly someone who is youthful enough to make anbu at such an age must truly of embraced their spring time of youth and to now to see someone dull that youthfulness with such unyouthful things as alcohol dampens my own fires of youth." Blurted out guy, still keeping an iron grip on Naruto's arm.
It was all Naruto could do to not cut the man's hand of and run screaming from the room. He had honestly never heard someone yelling about youthfulness and the spring time of youth and all he really wanted to do was to get away from the obviously insane man as fast as he could.
Thankfully kakashi was there to run interception. "Let him go guy, he's still new to our little group and we don't want to scare him of after the first night, besides, there's nothing unyouthful about it, after all Naruto here can't get drunk isn't that right Naruto?" it wasn't easy to get the boy to say much and kakashi knew before even coming her that he was going to have to be the one leading the conversation.
Naruto sent one last apprehensive look to the odd man dressed in green spandex before shaking his head and turning to look at Asuma and Kurani. "You are correct. The kyuubi filters all impurities in my blood, this also includes alcohol." He noticed that everyone around the table flinched when he said the name of the beast he had sealed inside of him. Not that it bothered him any, it had been there almost from birth and most likely if it were to be somehow removed now it would feel like he was losing a part of himself.
Now he remembered why Naruto never came drinking with him, it wasn't just that he was uncomfortable around people it was also the fact that people were uncomfortable around him. well then it looks like we found the person whose job it is to make sure we all make it home in one peace at the end of the night." Kakashi joked before throwing back a saucer of sake.
The night went on like that, most of the time Naruto would stay quiet and sip his sake, though occasionally kakashi would direct the conversation over to him, he would give a few answers and slowly drift away from the center of the conversation until he was able to safely continue to sip at his sake.
"Well that wasn't a complete bust but it could have gone better. By the way I'm sorry for not warning you about guy earlier, he ... takes a bit of getting use to." Kakashi apologised.
"That's all right. Although I would not say I 'enjoyed' myself, it really wasn't as bad as I though it was going to be. And I guess that over time some of the ... uneasiness I felt round them would dissipate, and hopefully visa versa." Said the silver haired kid as he walked beside his much taller friend.
"Am I to take it that you'll be joining me the next time we get together for drinks?" kakashi asked unable to hide the hope in his voice.
"I can't make any promises but I can see the benefit of associating with my fellow senseis. If that means accompanying you for drinks then so be it." he answered
XXXXXX
A/N: well there's chapter two. Got to see a bit more of Naruto's character as well as how he interacts with others. And as you can see he does have emotions, kind of, he just doesn't have the emotional range that a normal person might. Also introduced his genin team, mostly I picked kiba because he reminds me the most of cannon Naruto and I need that kind of personality on the team, though I will admit I was tempted to use shino for a while there but whatever. also I'm sure I got the spelling of some of these names wrong, but don't worry about it I'm working on it and you should be able to guess who I'm talking about anyway. Well the that's it for this chapter next one will probably be the wave arch, thinks aren't going to change to much until after the chunin exams that's when everything's going to go pear shaped.
Anyways till next time read and review.