The day of team placements I stared in the mirror long and hard. I hated this face. I found so many flaws in it, even though I'd heard gossip that seemed to lean towards being jealous of me, though others were hateful. I couldn't help but hate it, too. This face still didn't seem like mine. But I got over it for the day, putting on my now standard outfit, falling into the ninja habit of wearing the same sort of thing every day. After a few instances failed training I'd learned that it was less laziness on the manga author's part and more that it was easier and cheaper to buy the outfits in bulk for when they were eventually ruined with either rips or blood.

For one final time we walked to the academy together, Naruto and Sasuke arguing with one another and generally just being themselves, but I felt like I was walking the green mile. No matter how this went, it was going to suck. If I got on the same team as them then I was going to be close enough to help, but I was going to fuck canon over. The other option was that I be put off with a bunch of other kids that came from civilian backgrounds and our little family would be broken up. The best that could happen to me from there was that I could somehow find a mentor to keep me out of the Genin Corp or from repeating yet another year at the Academy. If I was lucky I could get someone relatively important. If I wasn't I was going to rot in the Corp while Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura went on with canon events outside of my reach.

When we entered there was a bit of a hush from the Sasuke fangirls, during which Kiba decided to start yelling.

"Oi, Naruto, what do you think you're doing here? Only those who passed were supposed to come back."

Well, that was rude. And uncalled for. I wanted to stick my tongue out at him but the adult in me wouldn't allow for it. So I settled for standing in the background while Naruto yelled at him.

"Don't you see this headband, I passed, beleive it!"

I grabbed Naruto and Sasuke by the elbow and dragged them to an empty row of seats. I contemplated excusing myself to sit elsewhere so that Sakura could claim my seat and the anime would be fulfilled, but they would never have let me get away with it. Shikamaru sighed,

"How did you manage to do that, Naruto?"

The kid in question immediately started his nervous head scratching, while Shikamaru shot me a look, obviously suspecting I was behind whatever it was.

"Ah, well, you see, I earned it, Iruka-Sensei gave it to me."

I heard Ino scoff,

"Whatever Naruto, you were the Dead last, how did you manage to pull together a passing grade?"

I was unable to hold in my own Shikamaru-like sigh.

"Really, Ino-san, why do you insist on belittling him? I always thought you had a thing against bullies."

It was true, she had always said how much she hated bullies, usually a jab at Ami and her crew, but this made her wince, a if she hadn't realized that Naruto did indeed count as a person. She, and everyone else, didn't seem to have any respect for the kid, what with dropping the honorifics without the appropriate relationship, or permission. Some of the other girls whose names I didn't know, because I honestly didn't have a chance to interact with them before, glared at me for seemingly insulting their ring leader. Before they could really react Iruka-Sensei arrived. I realized that at this point the Jounin were probably looking at us through the Hokage's creepy crystal thing. Ew.

Everyone dispersed to take a seat, those sitting already watching Iruka-Sensei warily. It was then that it hit me, I'd accidentally robbed Sasuke and Naruto of their hilarious first kiss scene. I resisted the urge to facepalm, aware that we were being watched and it would seem more than a bit odd. I couldn't remember where they were watching from, I did a quick scan of the walls where they met with the ceiling, unable to pinpoint any area that housed slightly more chakra than the rest of it. That was one bitchin crystal ball. Probably used nature chakra or some shit.

I waited rather impatiently with everyone else while Iruka got his shit together, ignoring what he

was saying for the most part, but keeping an ear peeled for my name. I almost felt ill, waiting for it.

"Team 6, Nakajima Yuichi, Asuka, and Takahashi Satoru. Team 7, Uzumaki Naruto, Sakura Haruno, and Uchiha Sasuke."

A little piece of my soul spiraled into the abyss when I heard it, even as Naruto was praising what sounded like a ramen god that he got his crush and the kid that was practically his brother. Sakura was in a corner somewhere squealing, and Ino was complaining right over Iruka-Sensei's reading of the list. I could barely stomach all of it, even as Sasuke elbowed me in the side,

"You alright?"

I met his blank look, knowing him well enough to recognize worry, and snapped my shit together, smiling crookedly.

"Yeah. I mean, I knew we wouldn't be on the same team, but two out of three is better than nothing I guess."

He scoffed, bumping his shoulder into mine and smiling slightly.

"It doesn't matter if we're on the same team or not, we're still family."

It was the kind of anime-worthy moment that was heart wrenching to be in the middle of and I couldn't help but smile genuinely. I managed to keep that smile through standing up and surrendering my seat to a flushed and victorious looking Sakura, and even managed to keep a small version of it when I settled in between the two boys I'd been assigned to a team with. I knew both of them vaguely from taijutsu practice, where we would all be pitted against one another based off names in a hat.

Yuichi was tall, gangly and awkward he didn't know where his limbs were going, only that it wasn't quite where he was telling them to go. His brown hair was cut close enough to his head that I could only barely tell the colour and his eyes were large watery, as if constantly on the verge of tears. He was a year older than everyone else, having failed the year before and decided to retake a year at the academy rather than be sentenced to the genin corp, where dreams go to die. While his taijutsu level was at the bottom of the class he was third in line when it came to theory.

Satoru on the other hand was a clan kid, of sorts. While there was no Takahashi clan Kunoichi class gossip had informed me that his father had married an Akimichi. The Akimichi were a laid back clan, so it didn't surprise me that he didn't have their name, it happened like that with some clans. Even if his name didn't give him away his size certainly did. He looked the part of an Akimichi, and I took that to mean he had learned the clan ninjutsu despite not having their name.

After going through what I could remember of their skills and performances, and discreetly checking the class rankings still displayed on the wall, an epiphany hit me like a freight train. Satoru's name was at the bottom. Close enough that it was a slight surprise he was sitting next to me. I suspected politics at play. Clan kids didn't fail. It just didn't happen. There wouldn't be Nara shinobi outside of wartime otherwise, they'd fake stupid right through the test to get out of work. But with Satoru at the bottom near Naruto, Yuichi near the middle like Sakura, I could see where this was going. They had followed the same damn formula and put me in as Sasuke.

I stewed over that while the rest of the teams were announced, and observed my new teammates, keeping an eye on Sasuke and Naruto as I did. Naruto was pestering Sakura, while Sakura was attempting to talk to Sasuke, who was shooting Naruto desperate looks that we knew to be pleas for salvation, but that anyone else probably mistook for annoyance. Uchiha expressions are a difficult thing to gauge. I snorted under my breath at their antics before Jounin began to arrive and collect their students. Ours was right at the front of the charge. Standard Jounin uniform, black hair tied back in a low pony tail, green pupil-less eyes, he was unfamiliar.

'Ota Isao', as he had introduced himself before snapping for Team Six to follow him, was an unimpressive individual. He was ranked as a Jounin, and given a genin team, so he had to have something to him, but his chakra was foreign, so he most likely wasn't Anbu, and had happened to not be in the Hokage tower whenever I'd followed Naruto when he was on a Hokage bothering crusade. Satoru was surprisingly the first to leap out of his seat and follow the jounin, dare I say it, swaggering out of the room. Yuichi followed after him, not exactly enthusiastic, but confident, he knew vaguely what was going to happen next after all. I couldn't help but hang back for a second to look at the newly formed Team Seven, taking in their squabbling for only a moment before turning away and following the rapidly moving chakra signature of my new sensei.

He led us silently through Konoha, directly to a deserted training field, and I couldn't help but wonder what the hell he thought he was doing. We hadn't even had time to speak to one another, let alone him. Isao-sensei stood in the middle of the training field, eyeing us for a few seconds before pointing to Yuichi,

"You, Nakajima. This is your second time being assigned a genin team, why did you fail before?"

The jounin's voice was scratchier than I expected, and a quick chakra-enhanced whiff confirmed the suspicion, he was a smoker. A surprisingly common vice among shinobi. One would think they'd hate the scent clinging to them, but I suppose they probably have ninja ways of getting rid of it. During my inane thought spiral Yuichi jerked to attention, managing to force out a steady answer after a half second of pause for breath.

"We were assigned endurance training as our test, one of my teammates quit halfway through and the rest of us failed by default."

Isao-sensei sniffed and shook his head absentmindedly,

"I dislike those sorts of tests. Endurance. As if that's what makes a shinobi."

His eyes next hit Satoru, and I knew something was up. Body angles, slight differences in expression, they knew one another. It was part of kunoichi training, the sort of undercover mission women went on as the 'fairer and weaker sex', we were give preliminary instruction on how to read people. What I could read from this was a conspiracy. But fine, so what if Satoru knew our sensei, now he had to share.

Isao-sensei didn't hold back questioning the kid, though.

"You, Takahashi . You failed almost all of your practical exams. Why?"

Satoru was taken aback, but not for long, shrugging and running a hand through shoulder length bushy hair, grinning up at the man.

"Because I didn't see the point in practicing the jutsu. They're useless to me, they don't fit in my fighting style, so I didn't waste time on them."

"I see."

I wasn't exactly dreading what he was going to say to me, because as far as I was concerned my bases were covered. Was he going to ask why I didn't surpass the Uchiha? Really? It was expected for everyone to trail behind the guy, it wouldn't cross his mind. And frankly I didn't think I'd done anything stupid in the public eye lately, doing life over again with an adult brain meant that I was pretty chill for a twelve year old. I probably shouldn't have met his eyes so calmly though, because the moment I did I sensed irritation.

"And you..." After a second of thought he skimmed over my lack of surname and went straight to his question. "How did you convince the taciturn Uchiha to tutor you to such effect?"

That is one hell of an assumption, was my first thought, but my second was that it was understandable, in a way. These people were used to clan kids excelling, I hung out with the best of all of them on a regular basis, practically lived with him. It would be possible that someone could believe that my success was entirely because of that association. It still irked me.

"I received no tutoring."

"Hm. You're a good liar, there were no outward signs of it at all. I would recommend not wasting that talent by being blatant."

Fucker. I scowled at him, but couldn't hold it against him too much, it wasn't like it was a usual thing for an orphan with no name to rise up and excel. I tried to ignore the names Orochimaru and Jiraiya floating around in my head, for all I knew they had surnames, unlike myself, because for a while I hadn't known Tsunade had belonged to some grand clan with Uzumaki blood to boot. Sometimes a first name is enough when you're talking about legends.

Isao-sensei sighed, crossing his arms over his chest and watching us calmly with those oddly Sakura-like green eyes,

"I have my doubts, like every jounin sensei, so like every jounin sensei I'm going to assign a test of my own to search for what I believe to be core shinobi values or skills."

With his left hand he reached into his kunai pouch, and I took note of the dominant side, though he most likely was trained equally with both sides, it pays to know which one someone leans to. I easily caught the scroll tossed in my direction, feeling with invisible, neutral chakra fingers and finding a few of the familiar signs of seal work, keeping half an ear on his explanation.

"Your 'mission' is to see that scroll safely to the end point in training ground three. Your opposition is me. Open the scroll only if you feel like dying today. I'll give you a three minute head start. Begin."

I didn't hesitate, shoving the scroll into my own kunai pouch and grabbing my teammates by the arm and tugging them out of the clearing, judicious application of chakra to my muscles made sure they came with me, and I didn't dare take to the trees without knowing first what they were capable of. Instead I started running, turned East and pulling my chakra down tight, near my core, wincing a bit at how blatantly my teammates shown in comparison still, a beacon for the opposition.

Satoru was tugging his arm away instantly,

"What the hell, who put you in charge? We're not even going the right way!"

"It could be argued I was put in charge when handed the scroll, the reason for our mission. And we were headed this way because of the time of day. Training ground six is in use right now, I don't think I need to explain why it would be a bad idea to run straight through that."

Satoru kept pace beside me, with Yuichi slightly behind on the other side, at least keeping in formation even if Satoru wouldn't. The clan kid rolled his eyes at me, thrusting out a hand and making a 'gimme' motion with his fingers.

"Hand it over. Everyone knows that you're curious, and you know the phrase about the cat and all. You're probably going to open it and trigger some explosive seal."

"Oh please, it's only a marker seal. It'll tell him how many times it was opened, with a chakra sample of who did it, but that's it."

He snorted,

"Well excuse me if I don't believe you on that."

Understandable really.

"You know if we're going to be on a team together you'll need to learn how to trust me."

"Oh, I doubt I'm going to have that problem."

I glanced at him, honestly confused. There was a very obvious trust problem, so what the fuck? I looked over at Yuichi, who was looking resigned, as if he knew what Satoru was saying and had expected nothing less. Before I could even form a question to ask he sighed,

"I'll hang back and set some traps, I had the highest score in that, of the three of us, I believe."

I let him go, or, well, I didn't protest him leaving. I was well aware I had no say so in this 'team'. I was the highest scoring, but that was it, and shit like test scores didn't matter in the 'real world'. Even if I regularly kicked their asses in taijutsu I had no idea how I would fare in a no holds barred melee. For all that I had been taught Sasuke's fire jutsu, and regularly dabbled in relatively advanced seal work, I'd never had to use it in a spar against anyone but the two boys I was stupidly familiar with. It's hard to say what was me knowing how they think, and me knowing what to do in a fight.

I kept a metaphorical eye on Yuichi's progress, as well as Isao-sensei, frowning when Yuichi stopped. It turned to a full on grimace when Isao-sensei entered the same area as him, but descended into confusion when Yuichi moved closer instead of fleeing.

"I think Yuichi-san is speaking with sensei, I don't know what he's up to."

Satoru gave me a strange look and I was briefly reminded of how few people actually knew I was a sensor at all, never mind my range and accuracy. Yuichi had started leaving the training ground areas by the time Isao-sensei started moving and I could feel my expression falling. Did Yuichi have something in mind, like trying to lead Isao-sensei away, or was he under a genjutsu? His chakra didn't feel out of whack, but it was a good bit of distance to try and feel that over.

I kicked up our pace, trying to fight Satoru's grabbing hands even as Isao-sensei approached, the speed of a jounin is no small thing, and I could feel terror encroaching even as I reminded myself it was just a test, just training. I wasn't sure how I was going to get Yuichi back with us anytime soon, there was nothing left for it but to just hope he made it back on his own. Satoru didn't cease reaching for the scroll, right up until Isao entered the training ground we were passing through. My teammate turned towards our sensei, stopping and I couldn't help but let out a quiet curse. There was no way he was going to hold a jounin off for any stretch of time. The jounin reached for a kunai and leapt for Satoru, who stood there dumbly leaving me no choice but to attempt something slightly experimental.

The replacement jutsu was meant to be used with an object of more or less equal size of mass with the person doing the jutsu. Living things were capable of resisting, so using another shinobi was usually a bad idea, and logs were the widespread choice of the shinobi who lived in forest areas like we did. That said, I had run the calculations of roughly how much air it would take to replace with a human being of my size, and it was a lot. So with a tug of chakra I was between Isao and Satoru, the air displacement causing a sound like a gunshot from another world, and taking roughly three fourths of my chakra reserves. Wind whipped around for several seconds in the place I'd vacated, sending all of our hair flying around our faces.

It would take a lot of refinement, and even then it most likely wouldn't be very useful to anyone other than a Sanin or an Uzumaki in regular combat, and they wouldn't even need it what with having shunshin. But for a spur of the moment 'shock the hell out of somebody' move, it worked like a charm. I caught Isao's blade on my own kunai and just managed to deflect it when he stepped back, momentary look of surprise fading into his previous neutral expression. Before I could do more than draw a senbon and prepare for something else hopefully surprising he spoke.

"I had hopped you would make the right choice." I was hoping it was just trash talk, until he replaced his kunai and crossed his arms. "You fail."

The ache from sudden chakra expenditure almost completely disappeared at the burst of disbelief that flooded me, my protest drowning in my throat and dying unheard as he continued, my grip on the senbon tightening.

"No matter your proficiency in jutsu or chakra control your core values are nonexistent. You failed to listen to your elders advice when they requested to hold the scroll, and you failed to follow the most important rule, 'Complete the mission'. You risked everything for nothing, and I can't condone passing a child playing at being a shinobi. The team had already failed, but I had hoped I could recommend you for an apprenticeship. I was wrong. My only recommendation is the same I gave Nakajima-san. Learn to abide by shinobi rules, or remain a civilian."

With that he stalked away, Satoru following without hesitation. It was that motion that sent klaxons blaring in my mind and fury bubbling. It was just like Kakashi's previous non-teams, failed because he didn't want to become a sensei. Isao hadn't wanted a team, Satoru had needed an apprenticeship, so Yuichi and myself had become casualties of politics. Isao had been actively looking for an excuse, not a reason, to fail us, and I'd handed it to him on a silver platter by assuming all shinobi must work like Hatake Kakashi. Probably one of the stupidest assumptions I'd made in my life, along with thinking I was the Sasuke of this team. Satoru was the Sasuke, I wasn't even ranked as the Sakura.

~TimeLordOfPie