Me: Hah! You guys have to do D-ranks, you guys have to do D-ranks~
Team 7: *eyes twitch*
Me: You guys have to do D-ranks, you guys have to do D-ranks~
Team 7: ...*bam*
Kasumi:...so sorry. Author-chan is unavailable right now. She does not own Naruto and would like to thank all of her reviewers.
Hinata18809: Thank you, sweetie!
Rosy Fire: Thank you! I'm tryin.
Oops
Sasuke arrived precisely on time to the bridge the third day to see his female teammate on the river underneath him. Literally.
Barely keeping his expression from displaying his outright shock, he stared at Kasumi, who was standing right on top of the water, eyes closed and brow furrowed in concentration. She had her hands outstretched for balance and, even as he watched, a sudden shift in the water currents sent her sinking down into the depths.
Frowning with annoyance, Kasumi pooled her concentration, and pulled herself back to the surface of the stream. He could tell she was still battling the current's pull though.
Sasuke watched with a twinge of irritation and envy. Why did Kasumi know something he didn't? He had to be strong, damn it! And how the hell did she know how to do this anyways? Kakashi hadn't taught her, he knew that. The lazy, perverted guy had just sent them on worthless D-ranks for three whole days. Sasuke had never known that rebuilding houses was considered a mission before.
A gasp caught his attention and he didn't have to turn his head to see the dobe had arrived. Especially, when a moment later, Naruto called out, "KASUMI-CHAN! HOW ARE YOU DOING THAT?! IT'S SO COOL!"
Really loudly.
As in, Sasuke wouldn't have been surprised if people a mile away had heard him, loud and clear.
Kasumi's eyes snapped open in shock, her concentration, obviously, broken. Immediately, she fell into the water, letting out a small shriek. The river swept her up and began to carry her downstream and Sasuke saw to his alarm that the pressure was keeping the girl from coming up for air, much less getting out.
"Damn." He muttered, running to the other side of the bridge and leaping off. In the back of his mind, he heard Naruto's frantic call of, "Kasumi-chan!" and the sounds of the dobe following after him, but he wasn't exactly concentrating on the idiot right then and there.
Kasumi was not obsessed with him, very smart, and knew techniques that he didn't. Like hell he was going to let her drown and have her replaced with a useless fangirl on the third day of being an official team. That would be bad for his record and would speak poorly of his abilities. He especially did not need any more nightmares of blood and guilt in his sleep.
Wet
"N-N-Naruto-san... y-you... id-diot..." Kasumi managed to get out, gasping and coughing between the words. Thoroughly soaked, she had been unconscious when the boys dragged her ashore and recovering from almost drowning was no easy feat.
He had the grace to look guilty and sheepish. "So-sorry... Kasumi-chan." He was panting, too.
"H-hmph... dobe..." Sasuke scoffed, out of breath as well.
Naruto attempted a glare, but lacked enough energy to make it truly vicious. "Sh-shut... up."
"Pl-please... wo-would... you two be... quiet?" Kasumi groaned out, turning on to her back with some effort.
The boys fell silent, deciding to obey the girl's request for once, Naruto because he was feeling guilty and Sasuke because he determined Kasumi needed time to recover.
For around 30 minutes, the trio laid in relative peace, their heartbeats and breaths gradually slowing down. It was a restful time, as the lack of noise was rare. The day was beautiful, the skies a brilliant cerulean with the sun bright and warm. In no time at all, they were dry once more.
Kasumi simply loved the quiet. The antics and arguments of her teammates were fun and entertaining, but they were also exhausting. To be with them in such a calm atmosphere was something new... and she found the calmness further endeared Sasuke and Naruto to her. They had never taken a time before to simply bond.
Naruto was uneasy with the void of silence and lack of movement, but found himself relaxing nonetheless. Neither of his teammates had unfair opinions of him and prejudices. It felt great to be with people who wouldn't look at him with fear or hatred or call him 'demon'. Sure, Sasuke was still a teme and Kasumi-chan was still a bit distant, but they were his teammates.
Sasuke found the serenity refreshing. He rarely took a moment to just lie down and relax. He was always training and running away from his screaming fangirls. The lack of expectations felt wonderful after the constant pressure from the Council and the 'sympathies' of the villagers who only wanted him for his clan's power and influence.
Naruto was too pure-hearted and idiotic to truly plot for power or money. In all honesty, all Naruto wanted was Sasuke's acknowledgement and he knew that. Kasumi didn't want anything at all from what he could tell and Sasuke prided himself on his intellect. To be suddenly free of all demands felt as if someone had just lifted a weight off his shoulders that he didn't even known was there. Not that he would ever admit that out loud to anyone, no matter what torture he had to undergo.
The tranquility was broken by Kasumi who sighed and pushed herself to her feet, having fully recovered. The boys looked at her curiously and she smiled wryly at them.
"Want to learn?" She asked and was abruptly pinned with two very interested gazes.
Practice
"You have to start with tree-walking first." Kasumi explained to them softly, leading Naruto and Sasuke to some trees by the bridge.
"Tree-walking?" Sasuke repeated, skeptically. That didn't sound too hard.
"Yeah, that'll be easy!" And now he was agreeing with the dobe... Wonderful.
She smiled coyly. "There's a catch though."
He narrowed his eyes.
"What catch?" Naruto exclaimed.
Her smile widened. "You can't use your hands."
"..."
"Wait! What?!" Naruto tilted his head to the side dumbly. Sasuke refused to admit it, but he was just as confused.
"Basically, you direct a small amount of chakra to your feet. The chakra fills in the space between the bark of the tree and your shoes and you end up sticking to it. A too small amount of chakra will cause you to fall off. Too large will blast you off. When you can get to the top and stay at the top, you'll have mastered this practice." She told them and handed them two kunai. "Use this to mark your progress. I would suggest getting a running start."
"Oh. Alright! I'll master this! Believe it!" Naruto proclaimed for the world to hear, while tightly gripping his kunai.
"Hn." Sasuke narrowed his eyes at the tree.
"I'll be practicing my water-walking," She informed them, already walking back. "Please don't startle me again."
And then Kasumi left the boys to the beautiful frustration that was chakra control.
Late
"Ohayo." Kakashi greeted as he appeared out of nowhere. Literally.
"Gah!" Kasumi lost her concentration again and began to fall. Sighing inwardly, she gulped in a large breath of air and prepared herself for a thoroughly cold dunk.
Before she could, a deft hand grabbed her coat and Kakashi calmly bought her to land, chuckling softly at the mingled look of annoyance and gratefulness she shot him.
"You're late!" Naruto accused at the very base of his tree, having more than a few lumps on his head. Kakashi glanced fleetingly at the trunk, noting to his amusement that the blonde had, evidently, not gotten far.
Sasuke said nothing but gave him the Uchiha Death Glare of Doom. Considering that the Ice Prince hadn't gotten far either, it wasn't very effective.
"Mah, mah." He rubbed the back of his neck. "An old lady needed some help with her groceries, you see..."
"Don't lie!" Naruto shouted, pointing an accusing finger at him.
Kakashi sweatdropped slightly and hurriedly changed the subject. "Well... I see you little minions have been hard at work."
"Yeah! Cause you don't teach us anything!" Naruto's voice was obnoxiously loud.
"Hmm? What's that? You think we should take more D-rank missions today? I suppose we could do that..." Kakashi whipped out his Icha Icha book to the sounds of his students' dismay.
He smiled. Such cute little ducklings they were.
Weeds
"Look guys! I'm all done!"
"..." Naruto received a thoroughly disgusted look from Sasuke.
"Naruto-san?" An exasperated Kasumi sighed.
"Yeah, Kasumi-chan?" He said with a wide grin.
"... Those aren't weeds."
"Eh?!"
"You damn brat! How dare you pull up my hard-grown tomatoes?!" Said the outraged old woman while waving a frying pan threateningly.
"Ahh!" And Naruto went sprawling into the dirt as the frying pan crashed into his head.
"Hn. Dobe."
"Wha wa tha?!" The blonde spit out the soil, making a disgusted face. That tasted awful.
Spars
"Ugh! Where the hell is Kakashi-sensei?!" Naruto raged at the sky in vain.
"You know he's always late, Naruto-san." Kasumi said as she turned a page in her book resignedly.
"Yeah, but it's so annoying!" Naruto complained. "He's supposed to be our sensei and actually teach us stuff!"
"Hn." To both of their surprise, that was agreement. From Sasuke. To Naruto. It was mind-boggling. Maybe the D-ranks were rotting the Uchiha's holier-than-thou attitude, Kasumi mused.
Kasumi raised an eyebrow and Naruto's jaw dropped open. The Uchiha graciously ignored both, giving them an arrogant look. On second thought, probably not, she corrected herself quickly.
Quickly getting over her shock, Kasumi sighed and considered the matter. Reading for two or three hours every day when she could be doing something worthwhile was rather annoying. She made a point to be as productive as possible in her life. She supposed... yeah, that would probably work.
Firmly, she closed her book, the loud noise drawing the attention of her teammates.
"Kasumi-chan?" Naruto questioned, tilting his head in an adorable way.
Hiding her smile, she suggested calmly, "Why don't we spar? It'll make the time go by faster and help us grow stronger."
Naruto had no problems and Sasuke's attention had immediately been caught by the word 'stronger'.
Kasumi put her book away and led the three to the training grounds.
Naruto vs. Kasumi
"Last time, Naruto-san fought Sasuke-san so how about this time I fight Naruto-san?" Kasumi said once they were all there and had finished stretching.
Sasuke didn't reply... which was the same as an affirmative. Naruto grinned at her excitedly. "Let's go, Kasumi-chan!"
Her smile only had the slightest of edges. "You're on, Naruto-san."
And with that, Naruto put his hands together in a familiar seal and shouted, "Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
In a puff of smoke, a few dozen Narutos were charging at Kasumi with loud war cries. She tilted her head to the side and waited patiently.
5 feet... 4 feet - the Narutos started to hesitate... 3 feet - the Narutos were visibly hesitating now - ... 2 feet-
A flicker of a smile and Kasumi was suddenly a blur of movement.
From the sidelines, Sasuke's eyes widened exponentially. Kasumi was damn fast. Faster than the dobe and maybe faster than himself. She darted through the crowd of shadow clones, twisting, kicking, punching and causing mass havoc easily. But... his eyes narrowed. She wasn't as physically strong as the dobe and nowhere near his own strength.
His quick eyes caught some struggle when several clones tried to catch her and when one actually tried to tackle her. Kasumi had had to wrestle with that one for a bit before she managed to get a kunai out and stab it. His mind on auto-pilot, Sasuke mapped out the strengths and weaknesses of the team he previously thought weak and pathetic. He noted that Kasumi needed to work on her body as, physically, she wasn't quite up to par with the dobe or himself.
Not that it truly mattered in this fight, as she was thoroughly kicking the dobe's ass.
Despite himself, he had to admit the dobe was rather creative. Must be because of planning all those pranks, he scoffed to himself. The idiot rapidly caught on to Kasumi's weakness and the clones began trying to bombard her with sheer numbers and strength.
She narrowed her eyes and jumped straight up into the air, going up at least 15 feet to the shock of her teammates. Sasuke made a note to work on that damn tree-climbing some more. He still hadn't mastered it, to his frustration.
Landing on the other side of the clearing, Kasumi decided that this strategy had to be stopped. Now.
"Get her!" One Naruto shouted, breaking the others free of their trance. With a great roar, they started to rush forward again.
Not bothering to hurry, Kasumi brought her hands together and went through several hand-seals and stopped on snake. The Narutos saw far too late to react.
"Oh shit." One muttered. The others were inclined to agree with them.
This time, Kasumi's smile was just a tad evil. "Wind Release: Great Breakthrough!" She called out and slammed her hands forward.
The gust of wind tore across the training field, taking all of the Narutos with it. They collided with the trees, the ground, and each other, and one after another, dispelled in a burst of smoke. Finally, only one was left. The real Naruto had crashed into a tree quite harshly and was fighting off spinning stars.
Kasumi crossed the distance between them in a flash of chakra and gently placed her kunai at his throat. "My win, Naruto-san." She said gently.
He pouted but said good-naturedly, "Yield."
She let him up and he grinned at her. "You did a great job, Kasumi-chan!"
Kasumi smiled back easily. "You did as well, Naruto-san."
And then she turned to Sasuke and her smile turned challenging. "Your turn, Sasuke-san."
He smirked. Fine. Challenge accepted.
Sasuke vs. Kasumi
Sasuke was impulsive, but nowhere near as reckless as Naruto. So the fight between the top shinobi and top kunoichi of their year started off with the two eyeing each other cautiously, each waiting for the other to start the first move.
Sasuke moved first. Reaching into his pouch, he grabbed three shuriken and sent then flying with a flick of his wrist and deadly precision. Kasumi casually leaned her body to the side, dodging the flying projectiles easily.
Not that they were really meant to hit. As soon as they had left his hand, the Uchiha had been moving, crossing the field with startling speed.
Not that Kasumi had ever taken her eyes off him. When he reached her, she was ready for him.
A punch to the left and she dodged smoothly. It was followed by a vicious kick to her shoulder that she weaved under and she was on the offensive now.
She sent a hard jab to his solar plexus that he blocked and aimed a strike to his neck that he avoided. Twisting with the momentum, she almost swept him off his feet in a single move. Sasuke jumped at the last second and she took the opportunity to glance a punch off his blocking left arm.
Sasuke scowled. Kasumi wasn't very strong, but hell if she wasn't precise and vicious. She knew all the places that were vulnerable and would hurt. Unless he could get the chance to use his superior strength against her, close combat wasn't going to work.
He leapt back and went through rapid hand-seals. Time to see just whether or not his female teammate was bluffing when she had said she knew some good ninjustu. "Fire Release: Grand Fireball Jutsu!"
The large fireball blew straight towards the lithe girl and she frowned thoughtfully going through some hand-seals of her own.
Dragon. Tiger. Hare.
She sucked in a deep breath, calling out, "Water Release: Wild Water Wave!" A large stream of water gushed out of her mouth and met the fireball head on.
Immediately, a layer of water vapor coated the field and visibility went down to almost zero.
Naruto frowned, peering into the fog closely. Where were the teme and Kasumi-chan?
He could hear grunts and noises in the fog, but he couldn't see anything!
Slowly, way too slowly in his opinion, the fog began to disperse.
"Yield?" That was the teme's voice!
Finally, the fog cleared away and Naruto's jaw dropped. His two teammates were in the middle of the field and sometime in the commotion, Sasuke had pinned down Kasumi with his own body. One hand had both of her wrists in an iron hold and he was letting most of his weight rest on her to keep her from moving. His other hand held a lethally sharp kunai to her throat.
Kasumi blinked slowly, her brown eyes staring straight into unyielding onyx ones. A pleased smile softened the brown orbs to melted milk chocolate with specks of caramel. "Yield." She agreed.
Sasuke got off her and offered his hand. He had been raised as a gentleman, though he didn't bother being one most of the time.
She took it, letting him pull her to her feet. "Nice match, Sasuke-san."
He grunted and headed off towards the bridge. Naruto bristled with anger at his rudeness.
Sasuke didn't trust himself right at that moment to not open his mouth and tell her she smelled like an intoxicating mix of fresh linen and warm fires in the dead of winter. It reminded him of a home that, long ago, had been filled with happiness; a home that had been brutally torn away from him. It hurt... the memories that her scent invoked. It wasn't fair.
It just wasn't fair.
Analysis
"I suppose we should go over our fights now." Kasumi said as they all settled back on the bridge. She was looking down into the fast flowing water, her mind obviously elsewhere.
Sasuke lifted his eyebrow a fraction and Naruto frowned. "What do you mean, Kasumi-chan?"
"Hmm?" She looked up, her eyes distracted. "Well, go over what we did right or wrong. Strengths. Weaknesses. Areas of improvement."
Naruto pouted. "But that's boring!"
Kasumi smiled patiently, somehow maintaining a patience that Sasuke had a feeling he would never gain. "Yes, but Naruto-san, if we don't know what to improve on, how can we improve?"
Naruto thought this over, scrunching up his face in obvious concentration. He sighed and his shoulders fell. "Fine. I still don't like it though." He said decidedly.
Sasuke grunted when she looked at him and she decided to take that as a yes.
"Alright, I'll start first." Kasumi volunteered herself as Naruto was still sulking and Sasuke was... antisocial. "Naruto-san, your use of clones were good, but you may want to work on your taijustu and long-range capabilities."
Naruto nodded, eyes serious for once.
"Sasuke-san, your taijustu is excellent, but you may want some improvisation. Ah, and maybe some more ninjustu."
The Uchiha frowned, but accepted the criticism.
"Naruto-san?" She prompted when the blonde continued to remain lost in thought.
"Oh!" He jumped a little and rubbed the back of his neck. "Right, sorry. Umm, Kasumi-chan, you're really fast, but you're not all that strong, you know." She nodded. "Yeah and teme, you suck!"
A vein popped in Sasuke's forehead.
Kasumi sighed and rubbed at her temple. "Naruto-san, that is not proper feedback."
Naruto crossed his arms petulantly. "But it's true."
Her sigh was deeper this time. "Naruto-san..."
"Fine, fine. The teme should work on his left side. He isn't good on that side." Naruto scratched his head. Both Kasumi and Sasuke blinked.
'Maybe he isn't as idiotic as I thought...'
"I know cause that's how I got him tied up." He added with a satisfied grin.
Kasumi suppressed a laugh and Sasuke's eyebrow twitched. 'I take it back!'
"Sasuke-san?" Kasumi prompted once more.
The brooder frowned, but said, "The dobe really needs to work on his taijutsu and he needs some more ninjutsu. He's horrible at both. Kasumi, you need to work on your strength and your hand-seal speed."
She hummed softly. "Alright, thank you."
"Stupid teme," Naruto muttered under his breath.
Sasuke narrowed his eyes. "What did you say, dobe?"
Kasumi closed her eyes and counted slowly to ten. 'Must not lose temper, must not lose temper, must not lose temper...'
Mystery
"Oi, oi, what happened here?" Kakashi asked when he showed up an hour later. He looked over at the messed up training ground curiously and back to his students.
Kasumi looked wrung up. She was leaning against the railing, face drawn.
One look at the boys told him why.
They were glaring at each other, the animosity coming off them almost amusing.
Almost being the keyword.
Kakashi eye-smiled and cheerfully whipped out his orange book. "Mah, mah, there's so much tension in the air. I think we should take some more D-ranks today."
He was pinned with three glares.
Two were riddled with anger and annoyance and one was filled with exasperation and exhaustion.
He smiled. Such cute little students they were.
Next Time:
"Oh." Naruto frowned, brow furrowing deeply in his concentration. "The hunter-nin are the dumpster people...?"
Review~
Ah and thanks to my awesome brand new beta, Chaos Emperor Nex.
Question: How would you describe Kasumi-chan right now?