Disclaimer – Kishimoto owns Naruto and the characters therein.
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Memories Of Others
Chapter 31
A Genin's Support
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"Hyuuga Hinata and *cough* Hyuuga Neji, please come down." Hayate said and Neji stepped towards the stairs.
"Proctor, I forfeit." Hinata called and Nei froze. "My cousin is more skilled than I am and has served Konoha longer. He deserves the chance to become Chunin, I still need more experience before I can even consider myself to be ready for the extra responsibilities being a chunin brings. I choose to let Neji progress."
"Very well." Hayate said after exchanging glances with the Hokage. "Hyuuga Neji wins by forfeit. The next match has been chosen.*cough* Would Aburami Shino and Kankuro of…"
"Hell no!" Kankuro shouted. "I'm out! No way am I going up against an Aburame! I've read the histories and a normal Aburame Genin can destroy a Chunin Puppeteer! I want to keep my puppets intact, thank you very much!"
Shino stood motionless, yet somehow radiated a sense of aggrieved triumph.
"Two forfeits… I hope this doesn't *cough* become a pattern."
Naruto smiled at Hinata and gave her a reassuring hug.
"Next time, you'll blast them away." He whispered.
"Unless either Gaara of the Desert or Akado Yoroi wish to forfeit…" Hayate snarked and both named Genin glanced at each other before descending to the main floor.
"Gaara has a great deal of chakra surrounding him, like a suit of armor over his skin, more than he had in the first stage…" Hinata mused, then she stiffened. "That gourd he's carrying is full of chakra… in two different colors!"
"Two colors?" Naruto repeated distractedly as he looked round in an attempt to spot where Orochimaru could be hiding. "Who has two different colors of chakra?"
"You do, like he does." Hinata whispered and Naruto froze.
"Shit. Jiraiya said that he was a… that would explain it."
"Interesting." Kakashi mused. "If I remember the histories correctly, the First Hokage handed the Tailed Beasts to various countries to try and keep the peace. Suna received the One-Tail, which would make Gaara the Jinchuuriki of the Ichibi. He is probably one of the most dangerous Genin in the room… we may need to prepare for a rapid evacuation."
"Should we try to warn Yoroi?" Naruto asked as the two genin squared off against each other, then Yoroi lunged forwards.
"I'll drain you dry of chakra!" Yoroi snarled as his hands slammed against Gaara's shoulders.
"Fascinating." Kakashi said, slightly lifting his headband. "Yoroi seems to be draining chakra from Gaara at quite a rate. He'd be able to drain a genin in a matter of seconds and a chunin within half a minute, but Gaara has more chakra than almost anyone else in the room, even me."
"How fast is he draining him?" Naruto asked and Kakashi shook his head.
"Not fast enough and his coils will overload if he keeps this up. Uh-oh…"
Gaara smirked, then the cork of his gourd popped out, followed by a cloud of sand which flowed to surround the two of them.
"Not good." Naruto commented as he stood up. "Yoroi! He's got too much chakra for you! Get clear!"
"Shut up, I can do this!" Yoroi yelled, then he glanced at his hands. "Huh? What's with all the sand…"
With a sudden surge, the sand formed into a rising spike between Yoroi and Gaara, the impact flinging the Konoha genin backwards, then the spike turned into a wave of sand that engulfed Yoroi, cutting off his yell of shock.
"Sabaku Kyu." Gaara intoned, lifting one hand, then he clenched it with a sudden bloodthirsty grin. "Sabaku Soso."
The pile of sand encasing Yoroi compacted to a quarter of its previous size, sending a fountain of blood and gore arcing halfway to the ceiling. Several of the genin watching began throwing up and Naruto caught Hinata in a comforting embrace.
"Winner… Gaara." Hayate finally managed. "You… can go back to your team now."
The sand rippled and flowed back into the gourd, pulling the cork back into place as Gaara turned to make his way back to the stairs, uncaring of the smear of blood and liquidized flesh remaining. Hayate motioned and an ANBU appeared, unleashing a suiton jutsu that washed the gore into one of the drains set into the floor at the edges of the hall.
"Well, the next *cough* match is Momochi Haku and Tobio."
Naruto concentrated on hugging Hinata, gently rubbing her back as she shuddered.
"You don't have to stay." Naruto whispered. "Kiba and Shino have both had their fights…"
"I… I'll be okay." Hinata mumbled. "I… It just came as a shock…"
"I know." Naruto agreed. "That boy's a psycho… I wouldn't want to fight him. Heck, as soon as I find out who's going up against him in the finals, I'm going to warn them. They need to know."
"Begin!" Hayate commanded and Naruto shifted slightly to get a view of what was happening. Below, Tobio unleashed a wave of shuriken that curved around to slash at Haku from a dozen different directions, only for them to be blasted away by a wind technique.
"Damn." Tobio grumbled. "I thought futon users were supposed to be rare? Oh well…"
Sprinting forwards, Tobio slashed with a kunai, only for Haku to counter with a trio of senbon, blocking the strike. For a moment, Tobio strained against the block, then he dropped and kicked at Haku's knee, only to roll back with a yelp of pain as a senbon embedded itself into his thigh.
"Shit." He hissed, hurling the kunai at Haku, only for Haku to catch it by thrusting a senbon through the pommel ring in a startling display of speed and accuracy.
"I would advise you to surrender." Haku commented as he flicked his wrist, sending the kunai screaming across the room, embedding itself in the stone tiles less than inch away from Tobio's groin.
"Hell, no!" Tobio snarled. "I'm not gving in that easi-hurk!"
Tobio started to reach for the pair of senbon sprouting from his neck, then he collapsed in a boneless heap.
"Tobio!" Sakura screamed as Hayate darted forwards, but Haku was there first, gently extracting the senbon.
"I placed him in a false-death state." Haku explained. "He will recover, but I would advise having him rest for a week at the very least."
Hayate looked at the approaching medics and the lead medic nodded to show that he had overheard what Haku had said.
"Winner by knockout, Haku." Hayate confirmed as the medics placed Tobio on a stretcher and carried him to the medical room, one of them already using a healing jutsu on his neck.
"The next contestants *cough* are Uchiha Sasuke and Kinuta Dosu."
Naruto grinned as Sauke started down the stairs.
"Good luck.. teme." He called and Sasuke shook his head.
"I don't need luck, I've got skill… dobe." He shot back before continuing down, leaving Naruto grinning as Hinata looked between the two genin in confusion.
"Naruto?"
"Meh, he's hired me as a sparring partner a few times to test new moves on." Naruto shrugged. "Area effect ones, distance ones, that sort of thing. Being able to pump out Kage Bunshin all day comes in handy."
"Oh…"
"Huh, and I thought that it was my teaching that led to him improving so much." Kakashi mock-sulked, causing Naruto to roll his eyes.
"Yeah, yeah. How many techniques have you let him copy, by the way?"
"Only a few." Kakashi shrugged. "I've been working on building up his speed and chakra levels. Knowing a thousand jutsu doesn't do much good if the other person can do it faster than you, after all."
"Don't think I didn't see him slip off his weights before heading down." Naruto smirked, nodding to where Sasuke's armbands lay on the ground, along with a second set of bands that had appeared to be part of his sandals. "That dude's in for a shock if he thinks duck-butt will go down easy."
"He hates that nickname." Kakashi pointed out.
"Then he should style his hair differently." Naruto shot back. "Whup, they're starting!"
Below, Dosu flipped his right sleeve back to reveal that his arm was encased in a metal contraption studded with holes.
"My melody gauntlet." He said, his single visible eye narrow. "Let's see if your fancy eyes can match this."
Drawing a kunai, Dosu struck the gauntlet, causing the world to seem to flex and distort for a moment. Naruto grabbed onto the railing as his inner ear rebelled before settling while below, Sasuke dropped to one knee, his eyes turning red.
"You're helpless against my techniques." Dosu gloated and Sasuke shook his head, then fired a small spray of fireballs at Dosu, forcing him to dodge.
"That's new." Kiba noted.
Before Dosu could recover, Sasuke blurred forwards, his kunai clashing against the frantically-interposed gauntlet and Sasuke staggered backwards, shaking his head.
"Hah! The closer you are, the greater the effect." Dosu taunted and Sasuke growled, firing another spray of fireballs, but with less precision. Dosu responded by throwing a punch which somehow knocked Sasuke back, despite the distance between them being almost two dozen feet.
"How…?" Naruto asked as Hinata deactivated her byakugan.
"He's using his gauntlet to create chakra-enhanced attacks." She said. "But… it's not like any futon technique I've ever seen before."
Sasuke rolled to one side as Dosu swung his fist again, then threw a dozen smoke bombs to engulf the area in shifting eddies of darkness.
"That won't help!" Dosu sneered. "I can still hear you…AAARGH!"
The smoke seemed to be illuminated from within even as a barrage of incredibly loud cracks and bangs echoed, causing everyone to clutch at their ears, then Dosu was propelled upwards out of the smoke, bent double and with Sasuke launching himself into the air after him. At the top of their arc, Sasuke grabbed Dosu's foot and used it to slam his feet into Dosu's stomach before pushing off and spinning round to deliver an axe-kick to the back of Dosu's head. The Sound nin fell back into the dissipating smoke, landing with an audible thud and Sasuke landed lightly next to him, pulling out a kunai and resting it on Dosu's neck.
"Winner, Sasuke." Hayate announced and Sasuke staightened up, returning the kunai to his pouch before almost strutting up the stairs, a triumphant smirk on his face.
"Not bad, teme." Naruto called out.
"Glad you think so, dobe." Sasuke shot back as he rejoined his team, picking up his weights and reattaching them to his arms and legs.
"Could Temari and Tsurugi Misumi please come down?" Hayate called and Naruto's gaze darted to the Kunoichi from Suna.
"What's that on her back?" He wondered.
"I'll look forwards to getting close to you." Misumi sneered and Temari unslung the weapon that she was carrying. "What, you think a club will help? I'm a taijutsu specialist, I can easily get past a weapon that clumsy."
"No, you won't." Temari stated as she spun the weapon, unfolding it to reveal that it was a giant fan.
"Going to do a fan dance?" Misumi chuckled as Hayate took a step back.
"Begin!"
Temari leapt backwards, spinning round to build up momentum and sent a blast of air at Misumi, picking him up and ramming him head-first into the wall. The genin slumped to the ground and for a long moment, no-one moved.
"Winner… Temari." Hayate finally said and Kiba groaned.
"Man, that has to have been the lamest fight ever! That dude's a disgrace to Konoha."
"I've heard of a couple of other one-hit fights." Kakashi supplied as the final two genin started down towards the arena floor. "One where someone trash-talked the other and ended up knocked out with a broken jaw while the other was knocked out by a kick that was meant as a means to buy a couple of seconds to prepare for the expected counter-attack."
"Still lame." Kiba shrugged, looking down at the two genin.
"A swordsman versus a weapons mistress." Kakashi mused. "This could be interesting."
Below them, Chojuro unslung his sword, holding by both handles and letting the bandages wrapped round it drop to the ground while Tenten reached behind her to unseal a Chokuto from a storage seal inscribed on the back of her belt.
"Huh, they're both going for kenjutsu." Kakashi noted. "I wonder how skilled she is. Gai is primarily a taijutsu specialist…"
"Which is why I asked the youthful Yugao to help fan Tenten's flames of youth with the ways of the sword." Gai said from behind Kakashi, startling everyone except the silver-haired Jonin.
"Then this will be very interesting." Kakashi said as the two Genin squared off against each other.
"Final Match." Hayate declared. "Begin!"
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Authors Note – Yep, another cliffhanger!
Regarding Kakashi's comment, the broken jaw match was a reference to the story Team 8 (Naruto vs Sasuke, Naruto won in half a second).
I can't remember what story the other one was, but it was Naruto vs Ino with Ino being KO'd.
Edit - Apparently the story was Mischief Fragment Mjolnir by Greylle, story ID 5989309. Thanks Random Guy.