Chapter 2: The Bell Test Part 2.
Sasuke and Sakura both stared at the sight in front of them.
Naruto, who was presently tied up with rope that wrapped from just above his knees to just below his shoulders, a highly inefficient and ineffective form of tying it should be noted, merely stared back at them, before shrugging, or rather attempting to shrug, and looking away nonchalantly, as if nothing was amiss.
Kakashi, sat cross legged atop the post that Naruto was tied too, was far too busy with his book to give a single damn about his student's stares, so ignored them.
In response his black and pink haired students waited for some harsh biting comment to emerge from the other side of the book, something along the lines of 'You're a pathetic waste of human flesh that should just go and die somewhere and feed the earth, that's all your good for'… so maybe their view of Kakashi was a little bit more brutal and crude than the man himself, but then that was what he had been aiming for.
He didn't expect to succeed quiet so spectacularly, however.
Kakashi decided that, before bothering with his students, he'd finish off this chapter. It was a particularly heart breaking scene, with the main character explaining to Tsusumi-chan why they could not be together, and Tsusumi-chan trying to convince him to stay.
Her impressive oral capabilities played a large part in her persuasion tactics. And by impressive Kakashi meant that she could get her tongue all the way from the sack to the back passage while still swallowing the entirety of his massive throbbing… "So…" he eventually said, finding himself at the end of a page and deciding to take the small moment where he was neither of the next page or the current to glance at two of his students "…you all failed."
It wasn't an accusation. There was no tone of failure or chastisement. Nor indeed was their humour or amusement. It was a simple statement of fact. And to be honest that probably pissed them off even more than they already had been.
Sasuke scowled darkly and looked away, refusing to spend another moment even looking at the silver haired Jonin.
Sakura said nothing and tried to keep her expression neutral and unaffected, but the disappointment from the comment that she had been excepting still weighed heavily upon her brow.
The Jonin stowed his book away and leapt down from his seated position, taking a leisurely walk that took him past the two brats before he turned sharply, now the same distance from Sasuke and Sakura that Sasuke and Sakura where from Naruto and the posts. He gestured at the unoccupied posts and Sasuke and Sakura understood and moved to stand against them, awaiting whatever else he had in store, part of them expecting to be tied up like Naruto, another berated harshly, and possibly having their forehead protectors ripped from their brows.
Sasuke took the post on the right and Sakura the one on the left and Kakashi left them to stew for a while, staring at them silently, his single visible eye giving away nothing.
Naruto looked… well quite frankly, bored. He was either that confident that he wouldn't be 'allowed' to fail, genuinely didn't care, or was hiding his own fears behind a mask of bored indifference. Or maybe he was still reeling from the emotional wounds Kakashi had rather brutally ripped open earlier and was still emotionally dead from the pain of them. It was one of them… probably.
Sasuke was impatient, his arms were folded across his chest, the index and middle finger of one of his hands was drumming on the elbow of the other arm, one foot was resting flat against the post while the other kept him planted on the ground, and his body relied on the post itself to make up for his imbalanced position. Oh, and there was a scowl on his face, but that was as obvious as a blue sky and didn't really need mentioning.
Sakura was trying to appear calm, but she was licking her lips quiet frequently, and often would look down, play with her fingers, then realise what she was doing and stand to attention, only to lapse again after several moments. It was like clockwork.
"Tell me…" they all perked up at the sound of his voice, a set of blue, green and black eyes staring at him "…did any of you figure it out?"
Naruto and Sasuke stared at him confusedly, not understanding at all. It was interesting to note how differently they expressed their confusion. Naruto stared at him confusedly with his head tilted to one side, like a little puppy. While Sasuke furrowed his brow and gaze at him intently. He would've probably raised an eyebrow, but it was hard to raise an eyebrow when scowling that ferociously.
But while Sasuke and Naruto were confused, Sakura raised her hand, hesitantly, but she did raise it.
"Yes?" he said, drawing the word out in a long taunting teasing manner.
"You… wanted us to work together, as a team" Sakura began haltingly, when Kakashi nodded she gained a lot more confidence in her answer "I first thought this when I realised that there were two bells. I mean, why two? Why not just one? Also you said that there was a sixty six percent failure rate on this test, but if two of us pass that'd mean there was a sixty six percent pass rate, and if there were only one bell then two of us, sixty six percent, would definitely fail. So the object of the two bells was to divide us and make us rivals, hoping that we would do the opposite and band together and fight as one. I think what you wanted to show us was that we should put our personal goals and glory below that of the objective… I think" she finished lamely.
"You think correctly" Kakashi told her, a small part of him ever so slightly impressed at all she had deducted "Alone none of you stood a chance against me. But together? Now together you just might've gotten the bells… But you didn't. You all went off on your own, did your own thing, and lost, on your own. And lookie here" he tapped the bells on his belt, jingling them softly "I still have the bells. Now…" he eyed smiled brightly, making absolutely sure it was as mocking as was physically possible before he said "…what have you learned today kiddies?"
Only Sakura looked willing to respond, she had raised her hand and while obviously such an action was beyond Naruto without some major wriggling, the look on his face said not only that he really didn't want to answer but also that he knew the answer. He nodded at her "That we should place the mission above our own personal objectives and desires?"
Kakashi's previously pleasant but mocking demeanour changed in an instant to a harsh and cruel one "Are you asking me, or telling me?" he demanded.
Sakura flinched slightly, but responded after taking only a moment to compose herself in a calm voice "Both."
He chuckled "Well, you're entirely correct" he told her, harshness fading like dust on the wind "The reason why I have two bells is to make you guys fight amongst yourself, in the hope that you would see underneath that and realise that you're supposed to work together…" he shook his head "Do you guys think that you were just thrown together as a team at random? The teams were designed for balance, for specialty, for teamwork! More thought went into which team you would be placed in than went into any answer you put on the written test! You guys…" he laughed humourlessly, finding a lot of humour but not wanting to show it when he said "You guys aren't worthy of being ninja."
Sasuke ground his teeth furiously, his anger burning out onto his face, his eyes blazing with the Sharingan, but he didn't try to attack Kakashi in a rage, which was good as sticking Sasuke into the dirt, again, wasn't going to be too much fun.
Easy, but not much fun.
Sakura, on the other hand, was busy contemplating the ground. Not really, but she was staring at it quite intently, and at nothing else.
And lastly Naruto was frowning, and looking confused… or maybe he had an itch at the end of his nose and was scrunching up his face like that in some vain attempt to get rid of it.
For a while he left them to stew, again, he liked his stew well done, very well done in fact, and wandered a small ways away "Hey" he finally called for their attention when he was stood in front of a stone, in full view of the posts but not too close by "brats. Here."
They all turned their gazes, blue, green and red on him in varying states, from irritation bordering on anger, to an attempt to be inscrutable but with relatively obvious interest, and vexation and boredom. That was Sakura, Sasuke and Naruto, respectfully.
"This stone, do you know what it is?" he didn't bother waiting for an answer "This here is a memorial stone, for all those heroes of Konoha… who died in the field, fighting for our village. Everyone name written here is the name of a man or a woman who gave their live for Konoha, for their home, for their loved ones… and for their teammates" he turned to look at his team.
Sasuke was looking away, but the Sharingan that had been blazing angrily in his eyes had faded away, leaving black eyes that were neither cold nor angry, but instead strangely sombre. Sakura was watching solemnly, paying close attention to him. And Naruto had leaned back his head to stare up at the sky, his eyes like deep pools of calm and still water that, although it had no reason to be, seemed sad.
"This stone is a memorial to all those ninja…" Kakashi continued slowly, taking his time to truly impress what he wished them to understand "… the name of my best friend is written here" he told them, not looking at the shocked, confused, or pitying stares of the Genin and instead looking solely at that name, carved into the rock.
Obito Uchiha.
Kakashi left a moments silence for his lost friend, then turned back to his team, his face stern and with none of the sadness he had before displayed in tone and expression "Listen up. Thanks to Sakura here's smarts, I've decided I'll give you all a second chance. You get one more shot at the bells, and one hour to grab them. But this time, I'll be coming at you seriously, no more playing around… Understand?"
Each of them nodded, their expressions completely serious.
He almost smiled at their faces, he had seen similar looks on faces before they went off to war, and while a rather grim comparison it was not such a dissimilar situation. Instead he eyed smiled bright and cheerfully "But I guess we'll have lunch first" he said in a light tone, right as their stomachs growled in unison "Here" he tossed two bento lunchboxes at Sakura and Sasuke "You give any to Naruto and you all fail."
"Hey!" Naruto whined "Why are you picking on me?"
"Because" was Kakashi's simply inspired and immensely witty answer. He tossed a kunai that cut Naruto loose and turned to walk away as the rope pooled around the blonde's feet "Don't think this is a second chance, and don't think I'm being kind" he said to them, not looking back "The test before was me playing around, the test now will be me fighting, if you don't get your act together, work together and actually become a team, then forget passing the test, you guys might not even live" he pointed over his shoulder with a thumb at the clock he had left on top of the post Naruto had been tied to "You have ten minutes to eat and get ready, then I'm coming for you" he chuckled darkly and looked back them, his single visible eye somehow resembling a deep black tunnel filled with monsters and demons and beasts of the underworld "Try to survive, kay?" then in a swirl of leaves he was gone.
Sasuke's lunch box hit the ground where Kakashi had been stood, its content spilling out across the ground.
"Well that was a waste" Naruto commented blandly, leaning against his own post and staring hungrily at the food all over the ground. He wondered if, even covered in dirt, it would taste nice, then again, right now any at all food would taste nice.
Sakura set her box to one side and folded her arms across her knees, hugging them to her chest. And for a while it went on like that, five minutes passed at least, before finally Sakura decided to try and break the silence. She looked up, glanced at her teammates, looked down, looked back up, said "Um…" then stopped and looked down again.
"…" was all Sasuke said, though the sound of his teeth grinding was quiet audible.
Naruto glanced at his teammate on one side, then glanced at his teammate on the other, rolled his eyes and kicked the post as hard as he could, hurting his ankle he hit so hard "FUCK!" he roared, his sudden outburst drawing some surprise from both his teammates "Fuck this! Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, FUCK! Fuck our lame arse sensei, fuck this shitty test, fuck not having lunch, just FUCK!"
'Fuck' echoed through the training ground for a while, once it had finally died down Sakura spoke up "We should probably lay down some traps" she started "and com…"
"What are you, retarded?" Naruto asked her brusquely, interrupting her sentence "This guy ain't gonna be taken out by traps, or did you not learn that earlier, idiot!" and given that Naruto had gotten, accidently, caught up in a few of her traps that their sensei purposefully didn't set off he knew full we the skill with which she made traps. Didn't change a fucking thing though, traps wouldn't work, the silver haired bastard had probably lived through every trick in the book, and they were expected to defeat him? It was impossible.
"Then what should we do?" Sakura asked him calmly.
"I DON'T KNOW!" Naruto wasn't anywhere near as calm.
"Then why don't you shut up and let smarter people think for you, Namikaze" Sasuke… 'asked'? It was technically a question, but the way Sasuke said it certainly left no doubts as to which answer Sasuke believed Naruto should pick.
Naruto turned a blue eyed glare on the 'Last Uchiha' "Don't fucking call me that you arsehole Uchiha fuck!"
Sasuke was on his feet in a second, his eyes flashing with the Sharingan, his teeth clenched shut, his hand grabbed a fistful of Naruto's jacket, their eyes locked and each burning with a furiously intensity of their own.
They were all on a knife edge temper, well Sasuke and Naruto were at least, and unfortunately neither Naruto nor Sasuke was particularly enjoying said knife edge which in turn caused them to take out their annoyance at each other, which in turn made them both fall over the edge and right into the burning torrent of anger.
"STOP IT!" Sakura raised her voice, screaming at them, then said in a more quiet tone "…please" and slowly but surely, they did just that. Sasuke's had loosened then let go of Naruto's jacket and Naruto backed away, his expression gone from angry to miserable in the space of her words "Listen, we need a good coherent plan to take on sensei, otherwise there's no way we can win" she told them "Traps might not defeat him, but combine together traps and us three and I think we stand a better chance, we just need to figure out a plan and then put it into action."
"Well Miss Brainbox, why don't you figure out the plan, huh? I mean, you figured to this fucking test, right? So a simple little fucking plan out be a fucking cinch, no?" Naruto asked mockingly and aggressively.
Sakura didn't respond, but stared at him blankly and neutrally.
Sasuke didn't even bother with their interaction, his own attention held by his glaring contest with the dirt.
Naruto spat, thankfully not at Sakura, and stalked away from her, muttering curses under his breath, most of them about their lovely sensei.
Sakura sighed and turned her own gaze to the ground. It really was hopeless.
When Naruto looked up and found both his teammates staring at the ground, one in impotent rage, the other in simple depression, and it was then that he realised that they were absolutely and completely fucked "We're fucked."
"I noticed" Sakura said.
Sasuke slapped his forehead with his palm, which they both took as his agreement.
Naruto shook his head "Hey listen up, I have a plan" he called to the both of them, drawing their gaze, though neither looked terribly hopeful "It's not exactly ingenious, or clever, or guaranteed not to fail or anything like that, but…" he shrugged "It's what I got."
"I'm listening" Sasuke said, Sakura nodding in agreement.
"Alright, when the Cyclops makes his appearance, I flood him, and while he's distracted by me you guys try and take the bells."
Sasuke snorted "Not ingenious… Bit of understatement, Nami…" he hesitated "Naruto" he said instead, hoping Naruto wouldn't notice the correction.
"Well excuse me for being a fucking moron" Naruto said annoyed, but not too annoyed. He had noticed the correction "You got a better idea?"
He didn't respond for a moment but eventually the Uchiha shook his head.
"Wouldn't it be better if you and Sasuke flooded him and I tried to retrieve the bells?" Sakura said, breaking the tense atmosphere between her two teammates and hopefully drawing their attention away from their anger.
Sasuke considered it, with a scowl obviously "Advantage in numbers I guess" he mused "The two of us might be able to distract him long enough for Sak…" he stopped talking as Naruto started laughing "What?" Sasuke asked angrily
"Numbers" Naruto chuckled, as if the word was intensely amusing to him "Rest assured numbers won't be a problem" Naruto told them, grinning "That silver haired bastard will be facing all the numbers he can handle… well, all the numbers I can handle rather, otherwise…" otherwise he would've won earlier and they wouldn't be in this mess, or at least Naruto wouldn't be.
Sasuke and Sakura shared a confused look, which they then turned on Naruto who sighed.
"Watch" he told them, forming his hands into a cross shape hand sign "Shadow Clone Jutsu" a small cloud of smoke burst into existence next to him, clearing away to reveal another Naruto. Both Naruto's then lifted their hands up and high fived, the resulting sound of flesh on flesh telling Sakura and Sasuke everything they needed to know.
"Solid clones?" Sakura said, staring at it. That was an impressive skill, they certainly didn't get taught that in the academy.
"Yep" Naruto said, nodding "And I can make more than a fucking few of them… And when I say more than a fucking few, I mean upwards of a hundred."
'A hundred?' the amount of chakra it would take to make a hundred normal clones, that weren't even solid, would likely leave her laying on the ground half dead, which made Naruto's feat impressive, but also made her doubt its authenticity. It took her a moment to push away her doubt, deciding to trust her teammate for the moment "Does sensei know you've got that jutsu?" she asked, her mind working furiously, her fingers toying with themselves in front of her navel.
"Yeah" Naruto said, wincing "But I only created ten or so when I fought him" he grinned again "He's got no idea just how many I can make" the clone, seeing that its purpose was fulfilled, disappeared with a poof "If they take a blow they go poof though, but they can hit, use jutsu, scout, they're pretty useful to be honest."
Sakura nodded and then all of a sudden her fingers stopped and a small smile twitched onto her face, before she wiped it clean of expression "I have some adjustments to your plan."
"Go ahead."
Sasuke turned himself so that he was facing the two of them.
"Firstly though, when you make multiple clones does it come with the same smoke cloud that that one did?" Naruto nodded "Good, then you create as many clones as you can, then Sasuke and I" she glanced at her other teammate "use the smoke screen that creates to transform into you without being seen. If you can have two of your clones transform into me and Sasuke then disappear into the woods that might give us a better advantage in surprise, you said they can use jutsu right? Well sensei might be distracted if it works, wondering where we are going to attack from" Naruto nodded again, he could do that "In the meantime, while you flood him with clones, we'll be looking for an opening to grab the bells" Sakura frowned and looked nervously at her two teammates, it wasn't exactly brilliant "So, what do you think?"
They both nodded, it was a decent plan, and better than anything they could've come up with. But one thing was bothering the resident blonde "And if it all goes tits up?" he asked.
"Then we improvise" she said simply.
The three of them shared a look that held very little hope, and silence once again took hold. They didn't have much time left before the test started though, and so Naruto quickly broke that silence "I can also create chains, like this" he demonstrated, forming a chain from his wrist "And use a chain binding jutsu, though sensei escape it easily before" he confessed "I can charge the chains with chakra to increase their impact as a whip, of sorts. I got another jutsu, but…" his wrist flexed "But it's not complete yet."
For several moments Sasuke stared intently at the blonde, then turned to Sakura "I have several fire jutsu. The Great Fireball, which speaks for its self, Phoenix Sage Fire, which creates several small fireballs, Dragon Fire which runs flames along a cord or wire or…" he glanced at Naruto "Or a chain, I guess. And also" his eyes flashed red "I have the Sharingan, my clan's bloodline."
Sakura nodded and, once she was certain he was done, spoke for herself "I can use two minor genjutsu, though sensei defeat both of them. But with you distracting him he might not notice or have the time to release them. One summons a tornado of cherry blossoms around the target, to allow for shuriken to pass by unnoticed, and I can also create a double of me that can talk and move, but it can't interact physically with anything, and I'm not bound by its movements, any more than it is by mine."
So" Naruto and Sasuke both looked at Sakura as she finished her own skill list, Naruto was grinning, Sasuke wasn't smiling but wasn't scowling either, and Naruto was talking "can you work all of this into our plan?"
Sakura felt another tiny smile twitch onto her features "I think so."
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Staring through the foliage Kakashi watched his team.
All three were loitering around the posts. Naruto had taken up Kakashi's previously position on top of the centre post, and was making regular sweeps of the surroundings. Sasuke was sat against the middle post, sitting rather sprawled out and looking very bored. Sakura was leaning her chin on her palm and was tapping her cheek with her fingers in a discernable rhythm, and was sat against the middle post on the opposite side to Sasuke.
He waited for a time, and waited, and waited, and waited, and finally Naruto spoke up.
"You know, he might not come" Naruto said loudly, drawing the attention of his two lower teammates "I mean that he might want us to find him. He did say he was gonna come for us after ten minutes though…"
"He might be stalking his prey" Sakura inputted, making her own sweep of their surroundings "He could even be watching us right now."
'Sakura's rather intelligent isn't she? Now if only she would notice me, then I'd be seriously impressed.'
"Or he might be waiting for the timer to run out, or he might have run away and gone into the village, or he might be one of us" Sasuke said grumpily "Who gives a fuck about might be's, let's focus on what is. He's not here, we don't have the time to wait forever. Time's on his side not ours, so we need to start hunting him. Try to flush him out" he said to Naruto.
"Eh? Me…" Naruto scratched the back of his head unsurely "Won't that give away our entire game plan, a bit of it at least."
"It won't matter if we've got the best strategy in whole world if we can't use it, better to bring him out into the open so that we can use it or a variation of it, than to sit and wait for the perfect moment and run out of time."
"He's right" Sakura agreed "Flush him out."
Naruto grinned "Alright, something to do, finally. I was getting bored" he formed a hand sign.
'So they have a strategy, one they're confident in, and it involves Naruto's Shadow Clones… well done kiddies' Kakashi smiled gently.
"Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
'Wait… what?' Kakashi stared blankly at the massive cloud of smoke that now covered most of the central clearing of the training ground 'Okay, now it's one thing for a Genin to be able to perform the Shadow Clone jutsu at all, it's another for them to able to create ten whole clones, but to use the Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu, a Kinjutsu, forbidden because of its tendency to kill the user, and create more than a hundred of the fucking things… just how was this guy graded a dead last?!'
"Alright bros" Naruto said to his amassed self's "You know the score. Draw out the one eyed bastard and kill him if you can" the blonde punched his fist into the air "Lets fuck him up!"
"FUCK YEAH!" the Naruto clones said in near unison, punching the air just as their creator did, before throwing all the kunai they had in their pouches at the trees around the edge of the clearing.
Kakashi, who had been lounging around in one of said trees, was thus treated to the sight of a literal wall of deadly sharp kunai flying at him desperate to stab into his soft flesh and be bathed in his warm red lifeblood.
Like he hadn't seen that before.
He dropped down behind the tree, letting the kunai thud uselessly into the trunk 'That wasn't very nice, you could've seriously hurt me with that' with roars and cheering and the sound of many feet thudding into the dirt the Naruto's had charged into the woods and almost immediately two of them were dead, hit in the back of the head with Kakashi's own kunai.
Kakashi leapt back up into his tree, just as a chain wrapped around the trunk at his former chest height.
Looking into the clearing he found Naruto staring at his directly in the woods, with a hundred odd clones stood before him, and Sasuke stood next to him his hands running through hand seals "Fire Release: Dragon Fire Jutsu!" and the tree he was stood on burst into a wild raging fire.
"Whew, that could've been nasty" Kakashi, stood in the centre of the Naruto clones.
"What?!"
"Shit how did he get here?!"
"I didn't notice at all."
Kakashi eyed smiled at Naruto and Sasuke as the chains retracted itself into Naruto's wrist "Let's go then" he then proceeded to decimate the clones. With a pair of kunai in his hands he simply sped through the crowds, slashing and dodging with ease and grace. Sasuke chased after him, tossing shuriken that tended to hit the Naruto clones more than Kakashi. Mostly because Kakashi was that good at dodging.
Cherry blossom filled his vision.
His hands came together in a hand sign "Relea…" but before he could Sasuke was attacking him again and Kakashi was forced to respond. Even without his eye he was still a potent shinobi. His ears finely honed, his nose could pick up a days old scent, and even the vibrations of the air on his skin gave him an indication as to the direction of the attack.
In other words a blind Kakashi was still worth several of a Sharingan wielding Sasuke, as Sasuke would soon learn to his pain and busted nose.
He kicked the Uchiha away and formed the seal "Release!" and his vision was clear again, and he was surrounded by Naruto's. Briefly he spotted Sasuke and Sakura jumping into the woods, or so they'd like him to believe. The real Sasuke and Sakura were in fact hidden amongst the clones, transformed to blend in to their surroundings, their surroundings being filled with numerous Naruto's. Kakashi wasn't fooled for a moment, but he had to commend whoever came up with that idea, it was definitely Sakura, the other two… well… yeah, it was Sakura.
Still if Kakashi wasn't a Jonin, an extremely skilled Jonin at that, he might've been fooled. Most Chunin would've been fooled and he knew more than a few Jonin who would be as well. But not Kakashi Hatake, he was of a higher class than the common rabble, which was a shame as Kakashi rather liked the rabble.
"Show me what you got" he beckoned for them.
And he did… sadly it wasn't much more than Kakashi had seen earlier and the clones were pretty easy to deal with despite their intimidating numbers. Intimidating to anyone not Kakashi, obviously, he wasn't at all intimidated. He was Kakashi Hatake after all, in the fact the most he felt about the clones was… bored.
Sasuke and Sakura didn't do too good at blending either as they tried to stay out of the way which was the exact opposite of what the Naruto's were doing which was charging bluntly, and so two Naruto's hanging back was a tad too obvious.
On the whole though Kakashi could quiet happily say that they had done good… obviously not to them, he wouldn't tell them that if his life depended on it. Well that was a lie, if his life depended on it he would, but otherwise he wasn't too keen on admitting it. But to anyone he respected enough to be honest to Kakashi would quiet happily say that they had done reasonably well.
The endless attack of the Naruto's continued for a good ten or so minutes… and it was then that Kakashi got really bored.
'You two have stayed out of the fight for long enough' he thought, leaping over a Naruto, then stepping on another's head and making his way across the sea of blonde like that, using skulls as his stepping stones and heading straight towards the two he knew where his other Genin.
And it seemed they realised they were being targeted, but they realised it far too late.
He grabbed a hold of each of their arms and threw them into the surrounding Naruto's, the transformation not holding up as they both suffered multiple collisions with multiple Naruto's who popped when they struck and then they continued flying into the next.
"So… that was a waste of ten minutes. Got anything else?" he asked the two of them as Naruto's converged upon him.
A circle of kunai flew from him, with barely a visible movement on Kakashi's part, and each slammed into the forehead of a Naruto. Thankfully they were all clones or else Kakashi would've had a corpse to deal with, and he really didn't want to explain to the Third Hokage that he had accidently killed his successor's son during their real Genin Test. That would not be a pleasant conversation.
Sasuke stood, his Sharingan blazing. Sakura stood with a pair of kunai in hand.
Kakashi beckoned for them to come.
A chain swept through even as they charged. Kakashi leapt over it, and Sasuke and Sakura did the same, leaping in tandem and their prior motion carrying them forwards in the air, then they were on him. The dangerous edges of Sakura's kunai flashed, her grip on the constantly shifting into reverse and back to keep him on his toes. Sasuke's skill in taijutsu once again impressed as he drew most of Kakashi's attention letting Sakura get very close to hitting a few lucky blows.
But in the end they couldn't win.
Kakashi's fist smashed into Sasuke's cheek sending the boy tumbling down, and he grabbed Sakura by her hair, tossing her away. Naruto clones were instantly on him, not giving him the chance to take advantage of the other twos weakened state.
A chain whipped at him, it was short enough to be whipped at speed but long enough to keep Kakashi at a distance while attacking. Kakashi just grabbed it and yanked the clone towards him, punching it on the top of its head when it got close. The chain vanished in his hand, and the clones vanished beneath his fist.
"These clones are starting to annoy me" Kakashi commented blandly, hitting a few carelessly and taking a couple more out of the running. There were still a good hundred odd left to go, but every little helps. Kakashi smiled "I know!" he pulled out a set of seven kunai and threw them out in a rough circle. They each hit a clone deep within the army of Naruto's, and quiet a distance from Kakashi, and exploded.
"Explosions solve everything" Kakashi said, as only ten or twenty clones remained in existence, and they were easy to deal with. In fact he could handle them with one hand, and did so tossing at speed twenty shuriken and hitting them in the legs. Why the legs? Because if the real Naruto happened to be amongst them he didn't want to end up killing him, as he previously noted that would be a hassle to deal with, so wounding him was infinite preferable. Kakashi wouldn't even be reprimanded for a wound, not officially anyway.
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"That arsehole, he used explosive notes. Is he trying to kill us?" Naruto said from his position, hidden behind a tree. Luckily Sasuke had noticed the chakra in the notes with his chakra sensitive Sharingan and they'd been able to escape, otherwise they might've ended up as crispy fried barbeque, or crispy burnt barbeque rather, it was hard to cook precisely with explosions.
"He might be" Sakura said in response.
Sasuke was silent for a moment "You know something, that's given me an idea" Sasuke said, staring at the several craters that littered the clearing they had been fighting in. Sakura and Naruto and Sasuke had all hidden behind the same tree, and given that Sasuke was the only one with any idea what had been going on when he told them 'Run' he honestly couldn't blame them. Plus it made informing them of his own personal strategy rather simple. Naruto had come up with the original idea, Sakura had modified it into something better, and now Sasuke was going to use a bit of both and some silver haired inspiration to try and defeat their sensei… or at least blow him to kingdom come "Naruto, I need you to send out some clones to keep sensei busy. Small assault groups, five or ten clones at most" Naruto nodded and created roughly fifty clones which split into groups of five to ten and all the numbers in between and spread out to attack from all sides of the clearing "Good, now do either of you have any explosive tags?"
"I do" Sakura said, reaching into her pouch.
"How many?"
"Um" Sakura flicked through them, making a rough count "Twenty or so."
"Naruto, I need you to create about the same numbers of clones again, twenty of them will be stuck with explosive tags and will try to surround sensei, and then…" he smirked viciously, thinking of the blacked corpse their sensei would become "Boom."
Naruto grinned just as darkly, the idea of the silver haired Jonin being splattered all over the training ground was as appealing to Naruto as it was to Sasuke "Sasuke, A) this is an insane plan, B) its fucking brilliant and C) what are we waiting for?"
Sakura rolled her eyes at Naruto's response, but nodded "So long as they can get close enough without sensei noticing."
"How should we do that?" Sasuke asked her, figuring that she would have some idea.
Sakura toyed with her fingers for a moment "We could go in ourselves and hope we get out in time, that out to put him off guard and he won't suspect… well, this at least. Or we could send in transformed Shadow Clones, but he'd probably notice like last time" Sakura felt someone take the explosive notes from her hand and found that there were surrounded by Naruto's. The fact that she had been so lost in thought that she hadn't noticed Naruto making his clones irritated her. She needed to be more aware of her surroundings.
"I'm guessing we're going with the former" Naruto said as his five of his clones went about sticking twenty of the others with tags. Twenty three to be exact. Sakura had started the day with thirty, but sensei had avoided her explosive tag traps completely, instead of letting them go off and dealing with them then, and she hadn't thought to retrieve them.
Sakura nodded "We go in, the real us, with the clones. If we can, let's just charge at him, us and the clones, and at the last moment we three pull back and leave sensei to get blasted. If the clones are forced to fight he might accidently kill one of the tagged clones and uncover the plan, and guarding those clones in particular will show that something is amiss. We need sensei to be unprepared for this to work."
"That's what we'll do then. You two ready?" Sasuke asked.
"Wait" Naruto said, his hands forming back into the cross shaped seal "Multiple Shadow Clone Jutsu" Naruto created another fifty odd clones "The more there are the less likely he'll hit the tagged ones" Naruto explained at their questioning looks "Sensei's just about dealt with our advanced assault party, so we need to move fast."
Sasuke and Sakura both wondered for a moment how Naruto knew that, but they put it to one side for now. Which was short for they'd put it out of their minds but try to remember to ask later, they'd then fail and forget the incident, never remembering it again until years later when the same question occurred to them and then feel like complete idiots.
"Let's go then."
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The last of this group of clones was ended in a heartbeat, and a quick sweep revealed that there were no other groups, at least not besides the rather large group just hidden behind the trees to his left.
'So, what's there plan this time' he wondered, rubbing at the edge of his forehead through the cloth of his forehead protector '…and it better not be a charge attack, those are boring. Come on brats, give me something fun and entertaining… You know what, I have a fun game we can play…' Kakashi smiled amusedly behind his mask, holding back his giggles. Now that would be fun, what he just thought of that is, and so he formed a hand seal.
And a few seconds later Sasuke and Sakura burst through the foliage, charging at him.
'What's the betting that you can land even a blow on me?' Kakashi thought, his smile not fading 'Tell you what, if you can manage it I'll challenge Guy to a marathon, and if you can't I'll fail you' he had to bite his lip to hold back his amusement. There was nothing more fun than playing around with potential Genin, well there was playing around with a beautiful and slightly dangerous kunoichi, but besides that, nothing.
The two attacking kids threw kunai and shuriken at him, which he dodged, then tried to engage him in hand to hand, where he annihilated them, then leapt back and disengaged from combat, which he let them do.
"NARUTO, NOW!" Sakura shouted.
Bright orange wearing boys burst out from the same spot that Sakura and Sasuke had come out of, charging at him with kunai glinting dangerously in their hands. They split apart before reaching him, encircling the Jonin, and Kakashi let them do so, wondering what they were going to do this time.
"Well…" he said as the circle around him close in a solid circular wall of Naruto's "…how is this going to play out I wonder" he eyed smiled at the group at large "Why don't you show me?"
Sasuke and Sakura turning tail and fleeing drew his gaze, with a Naruto, presumably the original, hot on their heels, but he didn't have long to contemplate it as the clones rushed at him.
'The clones are going to engage me in combat while they run away? But then why appear in the first place? Hmm, I wond…' a sizzling sound cut his thoughts short 'Oh… well… that's a pretty good plan, I'll give em that… Ah shit' escaping this situation alive would cause him more than a few injuries, and thus they would have landed a blow on him, and so he had to challenge Guy to a marathon.
That wasn't going to fun.
This explosion wasn't going to be much fun either 'No, wait, actually, given that…' was as far as his thoughts got before the explosion consumed him.
"Chakra Chains Binding!"
BOOM!
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They had run as far and as fast as they could, but even they couldn't reach the edge of the clearing before the explosion hit with a deafening BOOM! and the shockwave that followed hit them like tidal wave, picking them up and tossing them away.
Sasuke felt himself collide with a tree, and none too gently either, cracked open his eyes to see Naruto flying towards him, closed them again, felt the blonde hit, then felt nothing. He blinked, the explosion had deafened him, the impact with the tree had stunned him, but he managed to work out that he needed to look around.
Sakura was halfway through a bush, just her legs and rear end sticking out, and Naruto was… nowhere.
"That bastard" he muttered, despite being unable to hear himself speak. Naruto had stayed in the explosion, why Sasuke had no idea, but the one sent with them was clone, which was the only explanation for why Sasuke had felt the blonde hit but couldn't find him now, and also explained why he hadn't felt Naruto's weight on top of him afterwards, just the impact, then nothing.
Scrambling to his feet Sasuke grabbed Sakura's ankle and pulled her out, the girl's face and arms were scratched but otherwise she was unharmed, and a short sharp but not too hard kick to her side got her awake and attentive "Naruto isn't here! He was a clone…" Sasuke stopped, seeing the look of confusion on Sakura's face. She was as deaf as Sasuke, who it should be noted was deaf. Hopefully it was just temporary, if it was permanent then Sasuke was going to kill whoever came up with that idiot idea.
He had obviously forgotten it was his idea.
Jabbing a finger at the crater behind he mouthed 'Naruto'. He had say it a few times, before Sakura seemed to grasp what he was saying, and realisation appear on her face when she looked around, expecting to see the orange wearing idiot, they had sort of gotten used to in the short time they had been a team, and the even shorter time they'd been working together, lying around and finding him not.
They shared a single look, a glance towards the crater, then turned and ran towards the crater.
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Kakashi was sat relaxing in a nearby tree, with his book in hand, this was truly an enjoyable day 'So they destroyed my Shadow Clone' he mused looking into the crater that had been formed from the rather large explosion of twenty odd explosive notes going off at once 'Dammit! Now I have to challenge Guy, why did I come up with that idea?' technically speaking it was the clone that had come up with that idea, Kakashi had ignored the test shortly after he created the clone and vanished off to read his book.
He would've come up with the idea had he remained focused on the exam, but Tsusumi-chan was far more interesting than a bunch of bratty potential Genin.
'Still, that was impressive, I'll give them that. It would've been difficult to escape that alive, never mind unscathed. Difficult, but by no means impossible' and there was a time when such a 'difficult' thing like that, if not worse, would appear on a daily basis. Sadly, or thankfully rather, those days were past and the lull of peace had hooked into him. But he could still do very, very 'difficult' things, like rubbing his tummy while patting his head, or moving his foot in a clockwise circle in the air while drawing the letter six with the finger of the matching hand, very difficult.
"NARUTO!"
"Huh?" he easily located Sasuke and Sakura racing towards the crater, and wondered where the little blonde bastard had got too. He took a good long hard glance around as Sasuke and Sakura searched frantically 'Hmm, I wonder what's happened…'
"Chakra Chains Binding!"
Kakashi sat opened mouth for a while, though you couldn't tell by looking at him due to the mask, then he signed 'Oh you psychotic little shit, what the hell is wrong with you?' he searched with his eyes, seeking out what he knew/hoped would be there. And it was, 'it' being 'something' wrapped in chains from head to foot 'Using an imprisoning technique as a shield… Kinda inventive really.'
"NARUTO, NARUTO ANSWER ME!" Sasuke rushed at the chains and started pulling at the cold metal, trying to loosen the coil that wrapped around 'something', 'something' probably being Naruto, hopefully being Naruto.
Sakura rushed to join him, and together they started pulling away the chains, but they didn't make much progress, yet their panic didn't fade, even though they should've gotten down to his face yet, even though Naruto should've woken up and removed the chains himself by now…
"Oh fuck" Kakashi stared at the scene and really, really, really hoped that he was wrong 'Please tell me that Naruto isn't…' was as far as his thoughts got before his old battle instincts kicked in and he leapt. But he hadn't reacted fast enough and the kunai that was swung at his face managed to nick his finger, leaving a small gash. Kakashi spun on the branch, delivering a spinning kick into his orange clad attacker, and sending him flying into the clearing and the crater.
He glanced at his bleeding appendage "Huh?"
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"You know, you could've told us about this fucking plan" Sasuke said angrily, glaring at the blonde who had just come flying towards them.
Naruto laughed it off, or tried too.
The chains hadn't contained a Naruto, Sasuke had noticed that before he even reached them and Sakura had figured out the rest. That Naruto had some kind of plan and that the best thing they could do was hopefully worry sensei. He might've pissed off deeper into the forest and thus their act would be worthless, but that didn't seem to be his style, his style against the three of them anyway.
Kakashi landed in front of them, staring at his hand.
Sasuke drew a pair of kunai, holding them in a reverse grip, Sakura fell into a basic stance and Naruto scrambled to his feet. They were all ready.
But Kakashi didn't attack, instead he slowly reached up with his other hand, the one he wasn't staring at, and gently tugged down his mask. He placed his wounded finger in his mouth and gently sucked on it.
Sasuke's eyes went wide, so wide they almost bugged out of his skull. Sakura stared in shock, pink tinging her face. And Naruto… well he…
"This might be the wrong time to say this, but I've got an erection."
Sakura glanced over, unable to, for some reason, contain her curiosity, and checked, and indeed he had. She looked away shortly afterwards.
Sasuke just twitched.
And Kakashi pulled his finger away, checking the cut "Not that it matters" he said to them "but are you a homosexual Naruto?"
"No… at least, I don't think I am" Naruto scratched at his head "No, it's definitely no. No gay guy has a swimsuit calendar that he actually uses as his calendar… Ladies in swimsuits, obviously, not men, if it where men then it would be entirely understandable."
"I wouldn't say 'no gay guy' has one" Kakashi said, his finger having stopped it rather insignificant bleeding so he could now pull his mask back up, there being no need for access to his mouth anymore "Just that it's very unlikely one would have" Naruto nodded, that was fair enough "Still, I know a good way of getting rid of an erection, wanna hear it?"
"Sure."
"Pain" and with that he kicked Naruto in the face, then when the blonde fell over he kicked him hard in the ribs, sending him flying all the way to the stumps. He spun to block an attack from Sasuke and tossed the Uchiha away, threw a few kunai at Sakura to keep her occupied and resumed his attack on Naruto. Was he hitting the blonde as vengeance for his small cut? No, not really, in fact he was genuinely trying to help him, seriously he was, it could be hard to fight when you were… hard.
"Yeah, but you see…" Naruto said, looking up at Kakashi with blood dripping from his nose and mouth, breathing heavily, and with what would almost certainly later become a black eye around his left eye "…that won't work on me."
"Oh? Why not?" Kakashi had always found pain a good arousal killer, like when you were stabbed just before sex with a rather beautiful lady who turned out to be an enemy agent. Or even worse during sex, blue balled and stabbed, now that was terrible. So why would Naruto…
"I'm a masochist."
It took him but a moment to absorb that piece of information "Oh, sorry about that then" but when he did it was rather easy to accept. He wasn't actually sure if the kid was joking or not, but for now Kakashi would take his word "I guess I just made it worse, huh?" Kakashi apologised from the bottom of his heart, then grabbed a hold of Naruto's head and slammed it hard against the stump, with Naruto falling limply into an orange pile on the ground.
He was unconscious.
Sasuke was on him in a heartbeat, and Sakura wasn't far behind him. They engaged him as a duo for a while, with Sakura providing support in the form of kunai and genjutsu while Sasuke tried to outmanoeuvre him in taijutsu. They worked rather well together Kakashi noted, they had worked rather well as a team in fact, but the bells still jingled at his waist.
A few moments later Sasuke and Sakura were unconscious as well.
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When Naruto came too it was late evening, and he found his head pounding and aching, his hands bound, and his clothes feeling uncomfortable, like someone had messed with them while he slept. It didn't actually sound so bad when it was put like that, but it was. The pounding wasn't a 'I've been drinking all night' type pounding it was more a 'I've been hit by a baseball bat', his hands weren't bound to the bedposts by a pair of knickers but by ropes to a wooden post, and the way his clothes felt made him itch but he couldn't shift about properly to correct them.
He glanced to either side and found Sasuke and Sakura in a similar position, though they were both still unconscious. For a moment Naruto checked the ropes, searching for a way to get out. The rope binding wrapped around his wrists, then a longer length of rope ran tight around the post with Naruto's arms forced to become part of the circle that encircled the stump.
His arms ached as well now that he noticed it, they wanted to stretch, and felt like they had been stretched by how tight the rope was. While he could possibly escape by standing and pulling the rope up over the top of the post, Naruto wasn't tall enough to do such a thing, and neither was Sasuke nor Sakura so it was more an age thing than a Naruto being short for his age thing, also standing right now wasn't high on his list of 'Things I'd Like To Do'. It felt, just from a brief shuffle with his legs, like trying such a thing would be immensely painful, if not impossible, due to the unwillingness of his appendages to cooperate.
"I need a better sleeping position" he mused. He really fucking ached.
Minutes passed slowly, with the warm low orange sun setting the scene in golden light. Sakura was the first to awaken, besides Naruto. She woke with a start and panicked, but quickly calmed herself down and looked around "Naruto? What's going on?"
Naruto shrugged, he had an idea, but he wasn't certain. His idea being that the silver haired shit had left them here, probably for all night, possibly until they could escape 'To compound our failure I guess' he sighed.
Sasuke woke next, his waking was far more peaceful than Sakura's with a snort of a snore, and a bleary look around before he realised the situation "What the hell?" Sasuke asked, his voice burning with rage and he yanked at the ropes "What is going on here?"
"'What's going on'… Good question" they all looked forwards at Kakashi who was stood in front of the posts they were tied to, his hands casually placed on his hips, and his single eye locked on them three of them.
'When did he get here?' Naruto wondered. He hadn't noticed at all. He remember with a wince his personal fight with Kakashi, he hadn't noticed then either.
"Sensei" Sakura said neutrally.
'Sensei' eye smiled at her "You know something, you guys really are something. Not many Genin can claim to have ever put a scratch on me" he raised his finger where a plaster had been carefully applied "Not alone, not in threes, not in battalions. You guys" he pointed at them sharply, making them all wince, but Kakashi's face wasn't harsh or cruel, instead it was… "You guys actually impressed me."
They sat, opened mouthed for a while. He had just complimented them, and it wasn't a backhanded or mocking compliment, it was a genuine compliment as far as any of them could tell, and it was a genuine compliment genuinely even though they scarcely believed it.
"You didn't steal the bells" he said, and it was like they had all been shot through the heart. The previous stunned faces immediately changed to downturned heads, it was so fast, so instant, that Kakashi found it immensely amusing. He sat down in front of them "Tell me, whose fault is it?"
They all blinked "What?" Naruto said confusedly.
"Who is at fault for your failure, as a team, to steal the bells? And I want your honest opinion, not the truth but your truth. That is to say, who do you blame" he stared at the intently in turn, making sure they understood his demand and understood his seriousness "Ducky, you're up first" he decided to start on the left and work his way to the right, though for them, facing him, it would be the other way around.
Sasuke didn't speak for a long time, but finally he said "Those two" Kakashi nodded neutrally, Naruto rolled his eyes, Sakura said nothing "They tried their hardest, but it wasn't good enough."
"So did you" Kakashi reminded him.
"If it had been a team of me then…"
"You would have never agreed to work together in the first place" Kakashi cut him off before he could say any more. A team of Sasuke's would've been handled just as easily as this one, if not more easily as they would all have the same skillset and therefore the same weaknesses and thus each fight would make the next one easier. But he had asked for Sasuke's opinion, his genuine opinion, and he had gotten it "Whiskers?" he moved on.
Naruto shrugged as best he could while tied up "Me" Kakashi contained his surprise to a single casual blink that looked like he was just moisturising the surface of his eyeball. He gestured for the blonde to continue "My clones didn't create an opening for them before you took action, despite having ten minutes. My explosion didn't kill you, my kunai didn't cut open your neck, it was my fault."
"There is no I in team, blondie" Kakashi said "You made plenty of openings, they just didn't take advantage of them. Couldn't rather."
Naruto frowned and shrugged, as best he could with his arms tied.
Kakashi then turned his gaze to the last member of the team "And you Pinky? What do you think?"
The girl on the right stared at him intently for a while "It was all of us" she eventually said "As a team we didn't function as efficiently as we could've, we didn't figure out the purpose of the test in the first place, we didn't even consider trying to help one another. We all have personal failings in terms of matching our skills against yours, but we're Genin and you're a Jonin, and our failings as a team are more important."
"A team is only as strong as weakest member, like a chain a single weak link and the strong ones become worthless."
"Then what's the answer?" Naruto asked. He had criticized all of them, all of their answers. So what was the right one?
"Hmm?" Kakashi frowned, considering it "Well, it's your fault" he pointed at Naruto "And it's your fault" he pointed at Sakura "And yours" and at Sasuke "And you two" Naruto and Sasuke "And you two" Naruto and Sakura "And you two are also at fault" Sasuke and Sakura "And it was your fault collectively, as a group" they looked a bit confused, but Kakashi wasn't done "And it was my fault, for being too harsh on you, for giving you such a difficult test. And it was the Hokage's fault for assigning me as your sensei, and it was your academy instructors fault for passing you, and it was your parents fault for giving birth to you" he gave them an eye smile "There is no right answer, because there is no wrong answer. I wasn't asking for your answer, and I got it" they were still confused but he wasn't going to elucidate "In any case" he stood "You three pass."
The first response came from the blonde of the group who simply said "Huh?"
Next was Sakura with "But…"
Lastly was Sasuke with a nice simple "I don't get it."
He chuckled, then knelt down in front of Naruto and, fiddling with the blonde's pocket, pulled out two shiny silver bells "You obtained the bells."
They stared in shock, Sasuke and Sakura wondering when and how Naruto had gotten the bells and why he hadn't told about it, and Naruto himself wondering when and how he had gotten the bells and why he didn't know about it.
"So that's why my clothes feel messed up" Naruto said, noting the look on Kakashi face "You put them there" Kakashi nodded "You didn't do anything else did you?"
"Oh, come on, do I look like I'm interested in twelve year olds?" all he got in response was three raised eyebrows, one on Sasuke, two on Naruto, Sakura made no comment using her eyebrow or eyebrows "Okay, firstly I'm into women, secondly I like curves and maturity, thirdly you're my students and sexual relations with students are strictly forbidden and come with harsh punishments, so in answer to your question, 'No, I didn't do anything else'."
"But" Sasuke "we were supposed to steal the bells from you, if you give them to us doesn't that make the test a bit… pointless?"
"When did I say you were supposed to steal them from me?" Kakashi asked 'I really hope I didn't tell them to steal them from me' but he'd worry about that later, for now… "Your objective was to obtain the bells through any means necessary. I never said youhad to steal them just that you had to get them. Well" he dropped them on Naruto's chest "you've got them. I've given them to you, yes, but that doesn't change anything, you have completed your objective and obtained the bells, so you pass."
"Why?" Sakura asked.
"'Why?' Hmm, good question, you ask good questions in general pinky, good work. Well now" he moved back and sat down "'Why?'" to better ponder the question that had been asked "There are several reasons, and I'm not gonna tell you them all as some of them are personal. But… I like you guys. You're interesting, entertaining, and I like entertainment."
"But it doesn't properly simulate an actual mission, the enemy would never give up something they were charged with protecting" Sakura said, her fingers twitching in their bonds.
She made a good point, however… "Ah, but my mission wasn't to protect the bells. My mission was to see if you three were worthy of becoming Genin, and I've decided that you are, therefore I've given you the bells."
There was silence following that, Sakura it seemed had no more questions, Sasuke had no more comments and Naruto was grinning.
"Well in any case, I'll see you guys tomorrow" he stood and turned to walk away.
"Um, sensei?!" Sakura called before he could get too far.
"Hmm?" he looked back "What's up Sakura?"
"The ropes."
"Oh, right!" Kakashi grinned "You're all tied to posts aren't you, well… See you!"
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"That arse, I'll fucking kill him!" Naruto shouted weakly. He had skipped breakfast, been denied lunch, and now dinner had passed him by. He was starving.
Sasuke growled in agreement, and his stomach then growled in agreement as well.
"But we passed" Sakura reminded them.
Instantly Naruto's anger dampened and a grin spread over his face "Yeah, we did, didn't we? Hehe."
"Hn" was Sasuke response, but there was a look of smug satisfaction on his face, which Naruto and Sakura both assumed was his happy face.
Sakura stared up at the moon for a while, trying to ignore the gnawing sensation in her stomach "I hope my aunt and uncle don't worry" she said after a moment, drawing the attention of her two teammates.
Sasuke scowled "My brother probably won't care" he said spitefully. In truth Itachi probably knew about all of this beforehand and so had expected it, so it wasn't so much that he didn't care and more that he thought it wouldn't do Sasuke any harm. It still pissed Sasuke off.
Naruto remained silent.
Both Sasuke and Sakura winced.
They were all orphans, they had all lost their parents, but Naruto's had died moments after his birth, Sasuke and Sakura had both known and loved their parents, and maybe that was better or maybe it was worse, but Sasuke and Sakura also both had relatives who looked after them afterwards, in Sakura's case her aunt and uncle, in Sasuke's case his older brother, but Naruto… he…
"I'm bored" Naruto said, breaking them out of their thoughts "I'm gonna try and sleep my way through this, see you guys in the morning" with that Naruto shuffled in his bonds to try and get comfy and closed his eyes shut.
Sakura and Sasuke shared a look, before they both did the same.
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"So they passed then?" the Third Hokage, Hiruzen Sarutobi asked one of his most skilled and most trusted ninja.
"Where you expecting anything else?" Kakashi asked a question in response to the question.
Hiruzen chuckled "I suppose not. I expected you to give them several chances to understand the test, and I expected them to pass" he looked at Kakashi intently "So tell me, why did you pass them Kakashi?"
Kakashi frowned for a moment "Because…" he rubbed at his chin "Because they cut me" he said, showing off his plastered finger, that is to say that it had a plaster on not that it was drunk "That's impressive enough to convince me. And they didn't work together too badly I guess. And…" and I owe them all too much, but he wouldn't say that out loud for fear of making it more real than it already was. Naruto in particular wouldn't thank him for feeling obligated to help the boy because of who his father was, who his father was to Kakashi that is, Sasuke probably wouldn't be pleased, and Sakura, he honestly had little to no idea how she would react, she might just accept it, she might loathe him for it.
"I see" the Hokage nodded, closing his eyes as he did so "Very well then. Sasuke Uchiha, Naruto Namikaze, Sakura Haruno, are officially Genin and officially Team 7, under the command of Jonin sensei Kakashi Hatake. Serve this village proudly" the entire team was supposed to be here for this moment, sadly Kakashi had left his tied to the stumps in the training ground.
Kakashi saluted his leader "Yes sir, thank you sir."
Just today finished this and though I did give it a good proofread before posting there might still be a few errors lying around so if you spot them please point them out and I'll try to correct them. So it seems people like Flipside a lot more than Embers of an Uchiha, it's a more original idea I guess, still I've not decided to focus on one or another, I might do later but for now they'll both be updated when I have chapters for them finished to my satisfaction.
Anyway thanks for reading, review if you would be so kind, or don't if you're an a bit of a prick, I don't mind which (in case you're wondering in the vast majority of cases I'm a bit of a prick).
Toodles.