At 6 o'clock Naruto sent 20 clones under the Disguise Technique to the training ground while she got ready and ate breakfast. She arrived shortly before they were due. Both of her teammates were already there. Half of her clones dispelled to let her know the layout of the training ground and to let her know they had not found any traps.
"What are the odds he's on time today?" she asked.
"Not good," Hinata said poking her fingers. "A girl in my clan who has a brother who is a chuunin warned me he has never passed a genin team and that he likes to play head games."
"What else do we know about him?" Naruto asked. "He did say yesterday that he dislikes those that abandon their comrades."
"His nicknames are 'the Copy Nin' and 'Sharingan no Kakashi,'" Hinata said. "He's rumored to have copied a thousand techniques."
"Sharingan!?" Sasuke asked incredulously. "He's not an Uchiha."
"I asked about that too," Hinata responded. "Evidently it was given to him by a dying Uchiha teammate and he keeps it under his Leaf Badge while he's not using it."
"What does the Sharingan do?" Naruto asked.
"It's the Uchiha bloodline ability," Sasuke asked. "It allows its bearer to predict movement, including hand signs, and to remember and reproduce techniques that it sees. It also helps with making and dispelling genjutsu."
"Wow, that's useful," Naruto said. "I bet the copying aspect of it made your clan really unpopular though."
He just smirked as if he did not care what the peons thought.
"Well, once you awaken your Sharingan, we'll be Team Doujutsu," Naruto said thoughtfully.
Hinata brought out a couple of bentos. "Have either of you eaten yet?"
Naruto laughed. "I forgot that he said not to."
Sasuke shook his head.
"I think you should eat, Sasuke-kun," Hinata said. "Like I said, he's known for playing head games. I think it's more likely that you'll need the energy than that you will vomit."
Naruto and Hinata chatted on and off for the next three hours with Sasuke occasionally joining in. Finally, Kakashi appeared in a swirl of leaves.
Kakashi placed a clock on one of the posts. "The alarm is set for noon," he said. "Which means you have about two hours to complete the exercise." He held up two bells. "Whoever gets a bell passes the tests. If you don't have a bell, then you'll be sent back to the Academy or dismissed from the program." He pulled out a couple of bentos. "I also brought some lunch to share with those who get bells. If you don't get a bell, I'll tie you to one of the posts. Any questions?"
"Umm, Sensei," Hinata stuttered, poking her fingers together, "why are there only two bells?"
Kakashi hummed to himself. "I don't really feel like teaching, so I decided to make it easier on me and harder on you guys."
Naruto could not help but wonder if the lack of a third bell was a plot to avoid passing her. The whole thing seemed off, but she could not put her finger on why. She looked at her prospective teammates. Hinata seemed thoughtful, but Sasuke just seemed excited in his understated manner. Naruto decided she needed to talk to Hinata. If she had to choose a teammate she would rather have her anyway.
"Ready, set, go!" shouted Kakashi.
Hinata and Sasuke ran off to find a spot to hide. Naruto did the Shadow Clone Technique, keeping her plan in mind. One of her clones immediately dispelled. She felt chakra from one of her clones engulf her and she let it take her. She saw that she was now hiding in the bushes. Her plan to have one of her cones do the Replacement Technique with her had worked. She activated her Byakugan so that she could find Hinata while her clones tried to loudly distract Kakashi.
She quickly located Hinata and made her way to her. "Hey, Hinata-chan," she said quietly. "Do you find something fishy about this test?"
By this time, Naruto was getting memories from dispelled clones. Kakashi was not taking them seriously at all. He was reading from an orange-covered book rather than paying attention to their taijutsu fight.
"Yes," she said shyly. "There are never any teams with less than three genin. Also, didn't he say that he hates those that abandon their comrades, yesterday?"
"Yeah," Naruto said, "and how could he be our teacher if we could already beat him?"
"It seems reasonable that we're supposed to work together. He never said that we couldn't team up and share a bell," Hinata said with a small amount of confidence. "Should we go find Sasuke-san?"
"I don't think he will work with us," Naruto said doubtfully, "but I guess we should at least ask."
By this time all of Naruto's visible clones had been defeated and one of her hidden ones had formed a clone which had dispelled to let her know which way he had gone.
Naruto, who had kept her Byakugan active, searched her field of vision until she found Sasuke. He seemed to be buried in a hole up to his neck. Kakashi was taunting him. As she watched their prospective sensei walked off.
"He's this way," she said, pointing.
Hinata also activated her bloodline ability and the two of them walked toward Sasuke, avoiding Kakashi who was wandering between the trees of the training ground with his nose in the book. After a few minutes they approached Sasuke.
"Hey, Sasuke-san," Naruto said, deciding to be polite for once. "Hinata and I've talked and we think there's something fishy about this test. We've noticed three inconsistencies: first, yesterday he said he hates those that abandon their comrades; second, there are never any teams with only one or two genin, it's always three; and last, if he could really be beaten by a single fresh-from-the-Academy genin, do you really think he would be a worthy teacher?"
Sasuke grunted in annoyance. "Very well. Dig me out."
Naruto summoned a bunch of clones and they started to dig him out.
"How should we do this?" Naruto asked once they had freed the Uchiha boy.
"Even with the three of us, I think this will be hard," Hinata said nervously. "Kakashi-sensei is one of the top jounin in Konoha."
"We'll need a distraction," Sasuke said.
"Distractions are one of my specialties," Naruto said. "I can make a bunch of Shadow Clones. If I disguise a third of them as each of you, then you guys can sneak into position more easily. Hinata, I practiced the Byakugan with Disguise last night and got it down, so you can use yours."
"How many clones?" Sasuke asked.
"Thirty each?" said Naruto. "I can make more, but I don't want to swamp the place. I recommend you don't go in right away, since when I tried before he went through my clones very quickly. I can also disguise my clones as cats or some other smallish animal to sneak up and make a try at the bells."
"Dead Last," Sasuke lectured, "even if you manage to make a clone look like a cat, it will still be the same size as you."
"It won't," Naruto protested. "I do things like this all the time. It's one of the techniques I use to hide when I prank. Sneaking into small places is very useful."
"Dead Last, why do you think it's called Disguise Technique?" he retorted.
"Oh," she replied, "I've always wondered about that. Now that I think about it, doing a human-sized Disguise takes me as much chakra as a Shadow Clone and doing a rat-sized one takes ten times as much. If what the Hokage told me was right then most Academy students shouldn't be able to do it. Now that I think about it, I couldn't ever get it to work and no one would help me, so I just kept adding chakra until it worked."
"Can you do the technique now?" Hinata asked.
"Sure."
Hinata activated her bloodline ability and Naruto changed into a cat.
"Even though the hand signs are the same as the normal Disguise, your chakra is compressing oddly at the end and you're using much, much more than for a normal Disguise. I can't tell how you're compressing the chakra though, so I couldn't reproduce it. The Byakugan doesn't work that way."
Sasuke grunted. "Leave it to the Dead Last to stumble into a new technique. She can't do anything simple, but can evidently do hard things easily."
Naruto stuck out her tongue. "I'm too awesome for the standard Clone or Disguise, Jerk."
"Are you going to rediscover Hiraishin while botching a Replacement, Dead Last?"
"Maybe I will, Jerk!"
"Umm," Hinata interrupted nervously, "I think what we've talked about is a good idea."
"Okay," Sasuke said. "We'll send in the Dead Last's clones six at a time. I'll be hidden in the fourth group and do a Fireball Technique. After it dissipates Hinata-san will come in with the next group and try and use the Gentle Fist on him. Check for Replacement use. He used it on me when I almost got him with a Fireball before. While he's busy with Hinata-san, the Dead Last will send in a couple of cats to try and cut the bells and grab them. You might want to be one of them, but probably not the first one."
"Sound good, Jerk," Naruto said.
"I agree," said Hinata.
Naruto made 183 clones. Three of them Disguised themselves as cats. A third of the remainder Disguised themselves as Hinata and a third as Sasuke. About half of the Hinata clones activated their Byakugan.
"Hey, Naruto-san," said Sasuke, "do you know the Fire Lord's wife's cat, Tora?"
"Yeah. I've seen genin chasing her. The only time I've heard shinobi complain more than that is when they were chasing me." She smirked.
"Can you make one of the cats Tora?" he smirked. "Maybe with a genin team chasing her?"
"Not bad, Sasuke-san. I'll make a prankster out of you yet!"
He grunted in response.
"Do either of you know a genin team that I can impersonate?"
"Umm, my cousin is a genin and I've seen his teammates," said Hinata.
"Can you Disguise into them, one at a time, Hinata-chan?"
Hinata changed into a tallish boy about their age with long dark hair and Hyuuga eyes. "This is my cousin, Neji. He fights using the Gentle Fist."
One of Naruto's clones changed into him.
She changed into a boy with a tight green jumpsuit and bushy eyebrows. "This is his male teammate. I don't know his name, but I think he's also a taijutsu expert."
"Whoa, eyebrows!" commented Naruto as one of her clones transformed into him.
Lastly, she changed into a girl with her brown hair done up in two buns wearing a pink sleeveless blouse. "I don't know her name either, but she seemed to specialize in thrown weapons."
A Naruto clone changed into her as well.
"We ready?" asked Naruto.
Sasuke grunted and Hinata nodded.
Naruto said, "We'll split into six groups so we can come at him from all sides."
The clones all split up with half of those appearing as each genin gathering together. The three real genin candidates went with one of the groups of clones that looked like them. They surrounded the clearing where Kakashi was reading his book.
Naruto realized they had forgotten to make a signal to start, so she rapidly made and dispelled a clone to let the other groups no to start in 10 seconds. After she had counted 10, one of her clones ran forward. Naruto saw that five other clones were rushing in too.
Kakashi made quick work of the clones, but a second group was already starting in. After the third group, she sent in Tora and the mock genin team. The Tora clone ran right at Kakashi with the 3 fake genin running after her. Kakashi jumped out of the way, but the fake cat changed directions and ran at him. By this time the fourth clone group entered the fray. One of the Sasukes opened up with a Fireball which Kakashi escaped via Replacement, but it took out cat and team clones. This allowed Hinata in the fifth group to get a hit in which closed one of his tenketsu. Kakashi quickly recovered and was easily holding his own against her. The sixth group of clones went in and Naruto changed into a cat.
The three cats ran toward Kakashi's back. One of them once again looked like Tora. The first cat jumped at the bells and swiped at the strings tying them, but cat claws are made to puncture and not cut, so she ended up batting the bells. The second cat grabbed a bell in her mouth and managed to break the string, however, Kakashi dispelled her and the bell dropped. The real Naruto made a dive for it but was batted away.
The remaining clones kept coming in their groups and Sasuke made another try to cook Kakashi with a Fireball, but they did not get any closer. They stopped to regroup, but the alarm sounded and time was up.
"Well now," said Kakashi with his closed-eye smile. "That was refreshing. Come with me and we'll debrief the exercise.
Naruto dragged herself back to the posts where they had originally met, following Kakashi and the others. She was feeling discouraged. Hinata looked like she was about to hyperventilate. Sasuke looked irritated.
"So, do any of you want to explain what you did wrong?" Kakashi asked lightly.
"Nothing!" snapped Naruto. "If all three of us working together couldn't get them, I don't see how this is a legitimate test! Did you make it impossible because or me?"
"Do all of you think that?" asked Kakashi.
"Yes, minus the Dead Last's delusions about her own notoriety," drawled Sasuke.
Hinata nodded.
"What do you think the purpose of the test was?" asked their sensei.
"So it wasn't the bells?" asked Hinata nervously.
Kakashi shook his head.
Naruto's pulse quickened as she realized they still had a chance. "It was teamwork, wasn't it?" she blurted out.
Kakashi nodded. Sasuke grunted.
"You object?" Kakashi asked Sasuke.
"Teamwork won't help me with my ambition," he replied.
"That is manifestly false," Kakashi said. "You were much closer to beating me with Naruto and Hinata than you were by yourself. It would be the same with that man."
Sasuke growled. "It's something I have to do myself. I have to prove I'm better than him. If I have help, it won't be me avenging my family."
Kakashi sighed. "I'll be honest with you, Sasuke-kun. That man is one of the top ten, if not top five, shinobi that Konoha has ever produced and he hasn't stopped getting better since that night. If you work hard, you could equal or surpass him in five or ten years. If you have a team that you can trust, you can easily reduce that time by half or more."
"But he was only 14 when he slaughtered our clan!" Sasuke shouted.
"Sasuke-kun, he didn't defeat them in open combat. He caught them unawares. I know you want him to know you are the one to kill him, so the same conditions don't apply. Plus, Konoha made a conscious decision to not allow people to advance when they are that young after Itachi went rogue in order to prevent another tragedy. You don't want to be another Itachi, do you Sasuke-kun?"
Sasuke grunted and then turned his head away. "He said I didn't have enough hate to defeat him."
Naruto reached over and bopped him on the head. "Idiot, why are you listening to him? You can't trust that he isn't trying to sabotage you!"
"What do you know, Dead Last?" he snarled.
"I know about hate! I've been hated my whole life. I didn't even know why until a couple of days ago! When I was five, I got sick of it and started hating everyone back. I noticed that when I snarled back at someone who was rude to me they had a satisfied look in their eyes, like I was confirming that I deserved to be hated. Then Jiichan took me to Ichiraku's and they treated me well, so I let go of my hate while I was there. I saw that I felt better when I was at Ichiraku's and I decided that I wouldn't let the haters ruin my life. I still get back at the worst of them, but I don't let it stop me from being happy. And do you know what? Living well really is the best revenge. Instead of the satisfied glint in their eyes, I saw frustration when they realized that they weren't going to keep Uzumaki Naruto down!"
"So you think I should be a cheerful idiot like you?"
"Well, the idiot part is optional. Let me put it this way. Itachi wants you to obsess about him. When you can't stop thinking about him, you're doing what he wants. Sure, get vengeance or justice for your family, but don't do what he told you to do. If you want help, Hinata-chan and I have got your back. Right, Hinata-chan?" Hinata nodded shyly. "And when Kakashi-sensei shows up two hours after Itachi is dead, he'll totally take us out for dinner. Right, Sensei?"
"I haven't said whether you've passed or not, Naruto-chan," Kakashi admonished.
"Ah, come on. We showed awesome teamwork," she protested.
"Well, I don't know about awesome, but you did work together. I guess. . . you pass!"
Naruto jumped up and shouted. Hinata smiled. Sasuke smirked.
"I suppose I can let you share these." He handed them two bentos. "Meet here tomorrow morning at 8 o'clock." He disappeared in a swirl of leaves.
The three newly confirmed genin shared there lunches. Hinata and Naruto talked to each other with an occasional comment from Sasuke before they separated and went back to their homes.