"Shizuka!" Naruto waved excitedly, his blue eyes sparkling brightly. "You came."
"Morning." The girl in question replied as she bounded up to her teammate. Today was the day of days: the chunin exam was starting so she had woken up bright and early, unable to sleep due to the nerves anyway.
"Oh you're here too." Naruto gave the stink eye to Sasuke, who had walked here with his cousin.
"Tch." The boy scoffed, arrogantly looking the blonde up and down. "You have toothpaste on your cheek."
Naruto's cheeks turned pink as he furiously rubbed both his cheeks.
Shizuka elbowed Sasuke, sending him an exaggerated look because there hadn't been toothpaste on the blonde's cheek. Boys could be so exhausting.
"You look fine, Naruto." She reassured him. "Let's just go get this thing over with."
Without checking to see if they were following her, she marched through the opened doors of the Academy and up the stairs until she halted in front of a sizable crowd gathered by a doorway blocked by two boys.
A boy with a bowl cut and green spandex, paired with a painful shade of orange legwarmers tried to get past the boys but was roughly shoved backwards. Shizuka had the niggling feeling that she knew exactly who his sensei had to be.
"Ha!" The brunette of the duo scoffed. "You want to become chunin but can't even get past us?"
"You should just give up now." The other guy chimed in with a sneer. "You know, before you get hurt."
Naruto and Sasuke appeared on her side to observe the spectacle right as a girl with two buns stepped forward.
"Please" Her voice wobbled delicately. "You have to let us through!"
The corners of Shizuka's mouth crinkled up as she recognized the tactic from her own time in the academy. The girls in the class had occasionally been pulled aside to be instructed in the art of deception when the boys took more combat training. Something about gender norms.
The dark haired boy rolled his eyes and harshly shoved the girl down to the floor.
"That's kinda harsh..." Someone muttered in the crowd.
"Harsh?" The brunette sneered. "You think that was harsh? The exams are gonna make this look like a fucking picnic."
The other guy tuned in with some snooty comment but Shizuka was distracted by the floor number sign on the wall. It was distorted in a way low level genjutsu appeared to her (special shoutout to her grandfather for wifing up an Uchiha).
"We're still on the second floor." She whispered softly to her teammates. When Naruto dumbly pointed at the large '3' hanging on the wall, she huffed in exasperation. "It's a genjutsu, Naruto."
His mouth made a round 'O' shape as he looked from her to the sign and back a few times.
"Why don't you reverse the genjutsu." Sasuke loudly proclaimed as he strolled to the front of the crowd with his hands in his pockets. "We can see right through it."
He was totally stealing her thunder here.
"Well aren't you smart?" The darker haired one taunted. "You noticed a lame genjutsu, so what? Let's see if you can handle this!"
With that, the guy swung his leg out in a vicious kick. Sasuke, not to be outdone (or his ego would crumble), pulled his leg back for a kick of his own.
Before either blow could land, however, the kid with green outfit jumped in between them with a speed that confirmed that Gai was his sensei indeed. He didn't even flinch as he stopped both kicks with his bare hands.
She didn't know about the stupid goon but Sasuke had landed a nasty kick on her once and she had been bruised for days.
"Lee!" A long haired Hyuuga hissed angrily as he stalked up to the spandex boy. "What happened to the plan? You were the one that said to keep low profile!"
"I know..." Lee replied, slightly embarrassed. "I got inspired by the competition."
"Well, the jig's up now." The girl with buns sighed as she joined the two boys.
So this was Gai's team?
"Must you always be in the spotlight?" Shizuka drawled as she fixed her gaze on her cousin, who was glaring at Lee for whatever reason.
"My name is Rock Lee!" The boy rushed to her as soon as he noticed her, causing her to take a step back warily. "Please be my girlfriend and I will protect you with my life."
Her jaw dropped open at the bold proclamation. Who did something like that? Her eyes darted around hopelessly in order to avoid looking into the wide eyes of the boy in front of her. Naruto was gawking at them in disbelief while Sasuke's shoulders shook slightly in what she could have sworn was a laugh.
"Uhhh no?" Came her eloquent reply.
Lee's face fell and his shoulder's slumped almost comically as he gave her some sort of puppy eyes.
"But why not?"
"Because I don't know you?"
"So then there is HOPE!" The boy cheered right back up. "I simply must get to know you first and then you'll be my girlfriend."
Oh my god.
Shizuka was left standing gobsmacked as Lee turned around and skipped back over to his two teammates while Naruto giggled manically at her side.
"Hey you." Lee's male teammate called to Sasuke, drawing Shizuka out of her daze. "What's your name?"
This again?
"It's common courtesy to first give your own name before asking another's." Her cousin replied snootily.
Since when did he know about common courtesy anyway?
"You're a rookie right?" The Hyuuga continued on. "How old are you?"
"I'm not obliged to answer that." Sasuke replied with a smirk.
"Okaaaaay." Shizuka stepped in between the boys. "How about we save the introductions for after the exam."
With that she took Sasuke's wrist and pulled him along behind her and up to the actual third floor of the building while Naruto followed diligently.
They weaved through a long hallway into an empty room when a voice caught their attention from behind.
"Hey! You with the bad attitude!"
Shizuka turned towards Sasuke with a saccharine smile.
"I think he means you, cousin dearest."
The boy took the time to jab a sharp elbow into her side, causing her to double over in pain.
"Totally worth it." She wheezed as she high fived a highly amused Naruto.
"I want to fight you." Lee ran up to them, pointing at an unimpressed Sasuke. "Here and now."
Sasuke, not one to back down from a challenge (or an opportunity to show off his skills), dropped into one of the basic academy fighting stances as he grinned darkly.
"Come on, Naruto." Shizuka put a hand on the blonde's back to steer him away from the fight, cause god help her if he got himself involved in this mess too. "Let's leave the little boys to their pissing contest."
"I'm glad all of you showed up today." Kakashi greeted them before the exam room. "For all of your sakes."
"Huh?" All three of them deadpanned at their sensei.
"Now you can all formally register for the chunin exams." Kakashi smiled cheerfully behind his mask. "Only full three-man teams are allowed to compete."
Of course this had been a case of deception too.
"Anyway." Kakashi moved on. "Good luck to you three. Go and make your sensei proud."
"We won't let you down, sensei!" Naruto promised eagerly as he pushed open the door to the exam room. "Believe it!"
That was one way of getting everyone's attention.
The blonde confidently marched into the room, either unaware or uncaring of the menacing glares thrown in his general direction.
Shizuka paused in the door frame, sending a long suffering look to her teacher.
"Can we still switch teams?"
"No." With that, the jounin pushed her through the door and closed it behind her with a resounding thud.
The room was crowded with shinobi of all ages and countries. That was a lot of competition. Shizuka nervously fiddled with her skirt as she hurried behind her teammates.
"Sasuke-kun!" Ino's high pitched voice squealed as she laid eyes on her crush, launching herself at him and throwing her arms around his neck.
Shizuka was never gonna get used to girls crushing on her cousin. Ew. He wasn't even nice to those girls.
"I was hoping to see you here." Ino blinked up at Sasuke through her eyelashes. "I missed those rugged good looks of yours."
Shizuka choked on her own spit. Rugged? The boy had barely entered puberty. The absolutely horrified look on Sasuke's face was priceless.
"So you guys are here too?" Shikamaru stepped up beside her, extending his fist for a fist bump.
She happily tapped her fist to his, already smiling as Chouji approached as well, nibbling on a bag of potato chips.
"So all three stooges are here." Naruto jeered at team ten.
"Hi Naruto." Shikamaru greeted her teammate as he put his hands back into his pockets.
"Should we do something about Ino?" Chouji questioned as he wiped his hands on his shirt.
Shizuka looked over at where Sasuke was still attempting to untangle himself from the girl.
"Nahhh." She still hadn't forgiven him for that elbow in her gut earlier. "He'll manage."
The boy glared at her, clearly having heard that. "Oh? Should I call Lee over?"
A shudder went down her spine at the thought of the overenthusiastic boy and his large hairy eyebrows. And those dreadful orange legwarmers.
"Who the fuck is Lee?"
Kiba asked gruffly as he approached with the rest of team eight.
"No one!" Shizuka yelled at the same time Sasuke said "Her new boyfriend."
Kiba's eyes narrowed at that. Something about that statement didn't sit quite right with him for some reason that he'd file away for later.
Shizuka in the mean time was preoccupied with sending hostile glares in her cousin's direction, willing him to somehow telepathically drop unconscious.
"H-h-hi Na-Naruto."
Hinata's soft voice was barely heard above the commotion the other genin were making, but Shizuka's eyes honed in on the blush on the girl's cheeks with laser focus. Her not-so-well-hidden crush on Naruto was absolutely adorable.
"Oh hey Hinata." Naruto replied without even looking at the girl, too busy picking a fight with Kiba.
"We're gonna blow you guys out of the water!" Kiba puffed up his chest. "We've trained like crazy."
"And what do you think we've been doing, huh?" Naruto got up in Kiba's face. "You don't even know what real training is!"
"O-oh surely K-Kiba didn't mean anything by that N-Naruto." Hinata spoke up, hands raised in a placating manner.
Naruto finally turned his attention on the girl for more than a split-second, causing her cheeks to turn bright red and her gaze to avert to the floor. "I'm sure he didn't, right Shizuka?"
Shizuka looked up at Kiba before taking a leaf out of Hinata's book and averting her eyes from his. The last time she had seen the boy had been when she had puked at his front porch and then bawled her eyes out for a good fifteen minutes. So sue her for feeling a little bit embarrassed to face him again.
"Uh yeah, right." She mumbled halfheartedly.
"Hey you guys!" A voice called out cheerfully as a man with silver hair pulled into a low pony tail and glasses approached the group. "You should probably keep it down a bit."
Indeed, the loud banter had drawn the wrathful eyes of plenty of other examinees. Well that was mortifying.
Shizuka slowly took steps back and away from the louder ones of the group and slotted in next to Hinata and Shino, pretending very hard that they were her team and that she didn't know the rest of the genin nine.
"My name is Kabuto Yakushi. You see those guys right there?" The man pointed to a squad of battle hardened men glaring in their direction. "They're from Amegakure and can be pretty touchy. The exams put everyone on edge so you definitely don't want to rub guys like that the wrong way."
Her attention was redirected by a tap on her shoulder. When she turned around she came face to face, or rather face to chin, with an uncertain looking Kiba. He jerked his head towards the corner, waiting for her to follow behind him timidly.
"Hey." She said lamely, not quite meeting his eyes.
"Hey..." He replied awkwardly, scratching the back of his neck with one hand.
It was silent for a moment.
"Are you mad at me?" Kiba asked with uncharacteristic hesitance. "Is it because of what I said? About you being an only child? Because I swear I didn't know and I'm really sorry about that and I shouldn't have assumed-"
Shizuka gaped with wide eyes at the rambling mess that was her usually so confident and brash friend. He thought she was mad at him?
"Kiba."
"-and I feel so bad about it but I totally-"
"Kiba."
"-and I get it if you don't want to talk to me anymore but I really hope you still want to because you're my friend but-"
Oh my god.
"Kiba!" She put her hands on his shoulders and squeezed once to get him to put an end to his word vomit.
This time it was him that was avoiding her eyes, instead staring at her forehead protector.
"Look at me." She demanded firmly, waiting for his dark eyes to meet hers before continuing. "I'm not mad at you. I was just embarrassed..."
She trailed off for a second, taking a second to recollect herself.
"I puked at your house and then cried like a baby..." She winced at the memory. "Honestly, I'm not mad at you. I could never be mad at you, Kiba, you're my best friend- don't tell Chouji and Shikamaru I said that- and you did nothing wrong."
Relief was visible on his face as her friend looked down at her with soft eyes.
"So you don't want to ignore me until the end of time?"
"You're such an idiot." Shizuka rolled her eyes as she playfully swatted at his shoulder, eyes widening when he grabbed onto her wrist and pulled her into a brief hug.
"Great because plan B was buying you flowers but I'm broke at the moment so that'd have to wait until after the next mission pay comes in."