Puppets of the leaf
Puppets of the leaf
Chapter 8
Naruto lay on his bed staring up at the ceiling. Team 7 had been given a few days off despite their insistence that it wasn't required. Naruto had fixed all of his puppets and was feeling restless. With a frustrated sigh, he pushed himself up and stomped out the door, looking for something to do. Normally he would be practicing with his puppets, however the hokage had expressly forbidden it or else he would burn the rest of the scrolls that Chiyo had given him.
On the way back from the Wave country Naruto had asked Kakashi about the special abilities he'd discovered about the Kage Bunshin technique, and had been told that it was as he'd figured out. When a clone is either destroyed or dispelled, any knowledge, it gained is transferred, along with any remaining chakra, and experience back to the others that were left along with Naruto. The drawback was that it also transferred back its exhaustion. He was also told that it was originally used for information gathering, and he was the first person who had enough chakra to use it to its full potential. He had wanted desperately to begin experimenting, but again the Hokage's threat hung over him.
At first he had thought about going to build a new puppet, but the source of all his materials, the kind old man at the weapon shop, had also been told of his restrictions, and laughed silently to him self as Naruto stormed out of the shop, cursing the hokage as he left.
And so he now found himself wandering around the town looking for something to do and someone to do it with. He had reached the area known as the Uchiha Sector and decided that if all of his restrictions left him without things to do, he might as well hang around someone with similar restrictions.
He walked through the area, looking at all of the abandoned houses, and overgrown gardens. The boy was suddenly reminded that he never saw or heard his teammate talk about his family, and wondered if he had one. Finally he found the object of his search, standing on a dock in a large pond, forming seals. The Uchiha put his hand to his mouth and blew out a large fire dragon. It swept around the water before diving in, extinguishing itself in a large plume of steam.
Sasuke's breathing was labored; he must have been at it for a while. He turned sharply as he heard someone call out to him.
"Oy, Teme! We're not supposed to be training, remember?"
The boy smirked at his loud teammate.
"He doesn't have a whole bunch of scrolls from an old hag to hold over me, Dobe."
Insulting Chiyo in front of the boy was sure to get to him every time, even if it was only in jest, which Naruto knew it was. It didn't stop him, however, from tossing a handful of Kunai at Sasuke.
As they continued their mental spar, the third member of their team arrived, waving to them to follow her. On the way to their training ground, she told them that Kakashi had found her and sent her to tell them to all meet at the small bridge which was their usual spot.
When Kakashi finally showed up, after his customary excuses, he informed them that he was nominating them for the Chunnin Selection Exams, and the reason they had been given time off was to allow them to rest up. They would need it.
The decision to enter was completely up to them, however, so there was no pressure if they thought they weren't ready. This brought snorts of amusement mixed with a little contempt for the comment, even from, surprisingly, Sakura.
After the Jounin left to report in to the Hokage about their entry, at least that's what he said he was doing, Naruto suspected that he was just going to read his porn, Sasuke left to go back to his training, and Naruto found himself walking down a street with Sakura, about to get some lunch, though it was strictly not a date. That much they agreed on, even if they couldn't decide where to go.
Sakura looked over her shoulder for the fifth time in as many minutes, to see a small square rock following them. "Uh…hey, Naruto?"
They boy sighed, then smiled. "Yea I know…just play along."
His smile spread wider, reminding her of a fox. "Hey Sakura, you want to see my new rock destroying Jutsu?"
Sakura picked up on where this was going. "Sure, but where will be get a rock suitable to pulverize."
By this point the 'rock' began to tremble.
Naruto walked up to the 'rock'. "Hey here's one that should do nicely." He began to run through random hand seals, without molding any chakra. He brought his hand up. "Better back up Sakura, this is going to send pieces everywhere. SUPER ROCK CRUSHER NO JUTSU!" Naruto brought his hand down and slammed it onto the top of the 'rock' with a loud slap. From within the box, there came several yelps and some cursing. The rock then exploded into plumes of multicolored smoke.
When the smoke cleared it revealed three coughing children. "You used cough too much cough Konohamaru-kun."
"Aww Shut it cough Udon!"
The three straitened themselves up and glared at the older boy before them.
"Hey, Boss, you managed to see through my disguise, just as I would expect from the person I consider to be my rival."
Sakura was trying to process that. 'Boss…Rival…That's the Thirds grandson…'
Naruto just chuckled at their antics. "Well it wasn't hard. Rocks aren't generally square, nor do they follow you down the street."
"Yea yea, hey you promised you'd play ninja with us today!"
Sakura completely forgot about her earlier thoughts. "A ninja, 'playing ninja'?"
The three kids all looked at her as if just noticing her presence. "Hey Boss is she you're… this?" Konohamaru held up his pinky.
"WHAT?!...No no no no, As if I would…" he words died in his throat and all color drained from his face, as he heard the distinct sound of cracking knuckles. Slowly he turned around to see Sakura slowly walking towards him. Her eyes promised a lot of pain.
"BAKA! You'd be lucky to even think of me like that!" Naruto couldn't make heads or tails out of what she was saying, but decided he'd live longer if he just left it alone. Konohamaru, however, had no such survival instincts, and so called out after her as she was walking away.
"What the hell is that supposed to mean you HAG?!"
Sakura stopped short and her head seemed to rotate without her body moving. She made eye contact with the boy, and in those green eyes he saw his own brutal death.
Naruto crept right up next to the kid's ear. "…run…"
They both took off running in the opposite direction of the pink haired kunoichi who was now chasing them. As they rounded a corner, Konohamaru started to pull ahead of Naruto and as a result, crashed headlong into an older boy wearing black.
"Oww, hey brat that hurt."
The ninja picked the child off the ground and held him in the air by his shirt. Naruto stepped up next to them. "Hey we're sorry, about that, but could you please put him down? You're hurting him."
"Not nearly as much as I'm going too." He pulled his fist back and prepared to strike the terrified academy student, despite the warnings of his female teammate. Naruto threw out his hands and attached thick chakra strings to the foreign ninja's arms, effectively holding them in place.
Naruto twitched his fingers, and Konohamaru fell to the floor, and scurried back to his two friends. 'Ch…chakra Strings?!'
Naruto released the strings, and started to usher the kids away.
The older Gennin started forward, gritting his teeth, and reaching for the large bundle on his back. He pulled his hand back however when it was hit hard, with a small stone.
"It's a very bad idea to attack the Hokage's grandson like that, an even worse idea to attack my team." All eyes looked up, following the stones path to see Sasuke sitting in a tree.
Kankuro had been halted in his tracks twice now; it was enough to send him over the edge of reason. "Like I care who they are, I'll take on all of you at once!"
"Stop it Kankuro." Sasuke's eyes widened as he turned around to see a red haired youth upside down behind him. 'I never sensed him, when did he…'
The boy vanished in a swirl of sand and appeared between the leaf nin and his now terrified teammate. "If you embarrass the Sand like this again, I'll kill you."
Naruto looked at them sharply, his eyes going wide with apprehension. 'Sand…they're from Suna…Chiyo-sensei…'
The red heads voice was even and calm, but they way the larger nin reacted one would think someone had plunged a kunai into his back.
"Sasuke leapt down to join the others. "What are foreign ninja doing in Konoha?"
It was the blonde Kunoichi who responded, by holding up a sheet of paper. "We're here for the Chunnin Exam, but kids like you probably wouldn't know anything about…"
"Actually," interrupted Sakura, "we're also entered."
The blonde gave her a quick once over, before dismissing her as the fan-girl she was.
During the whole exchange Sasuke hadn't taken his eyes off the red head. "Hey what's you're name?" "I'm Temar…" Not you, the one with the gourd."
"It is customary to give your name first."
Sasuke smirked. "Uchiha Sasuke"
"I am Sabaku no Garra. I will surely kill you in the exam, Uchiha Sasuke."
Garra led the foreign ninja away, but Kankouro hesitated and turned back to Naruto. "I'm Sabaku no Kankuro, what's you're name?"
"Uzumaki Naruto."
"Uzumaki Naruto…" he nodded. "…and interesting technique you have there."
With that he too turned and walked away.
The boy's just stood and looked after them for a minute, before the silence was broken by Sakura.
"Hey, doesn't anyone want to know my name?"
Konohamaru didn't miss a beat. "No."
The pink haired kunoichi punched him on the back of the head and started walking away.
Naruto forgot them all as he approached Sasuke. "Ne, there's going to be some strong competition in this exam huh Teme?"
The boy nodded before smiling. "Yea, you'd better go train. It's going to take more than your dolls to make through this Dobe."
To his surprise Naruto didn't rise to the bait. He simply nodded and walked off towards his apartment. With the arrival of the Sand Gennin, these exams were becoming bigger for him by the second. 'Chiyo-sensei…'
Ok so here's chapter 8...i wsn't too happy with it, even after a few rewrites, so i've waited until chapter 9 was nearly done so i could post them both.
With regard to some reviews i've been getting lately. I know that i've been following the Cannon story line pretty closely up till now, the reason for this is that when i began envisioning this story it was prety musch all either during or post exams, a few events aside, however i couldn't just start him at the exams with puppets and i really didn't want to tell the back story through flashbacks. So in essence the other chapters wee, for me, filler chapters setting up the rest of the story which is going to deviate greatly from cannon with inceaseing frequency. Major events might still take place, but only remotely, and possibly to other characters.
I don't mind any negative critisism, please continue to review and i promise the next chapter will have a few suprises.
