I drew the number five, putting me dead center, at the very middle desk at the front of the room. I was the poor Genin sentenced to sitting right in front of Ibiki. To my right was a Genin from the Hidden Grass village who wore his hite-ate as a bandana. Ibiki very obviously scared the piss out of him. The guy on my other side was from Konoha and at least in his thirties, wearing glasses and possessing a full-blown mustache for some reason. The sweater vest really completed the picture. I was more scared of that vest than I was of Ibiki, honestly. It practically screamed 'responsible adult'.

There would be no way for me to send information to any of the other Konoha genin, not being right under Ibiki's nose. It was probably my own fault, showing earlier in the week that I believed we should stand together. No doubt he'd heard about it and decided there would be no rigging of the exam under his nose. I wasn't worried about it, so long as the trick remained the tenth question, and the key was trusting in one's comrades, then no one important to me was going to fail.

I expected to have some sort of issue with the questions on the test, I vaguely remembered that they gave Sakura trouble in that other reality that I was getting all of my information from. Apparently dabbling in dimension-bending sealing arts all the time is the ultimate way to keep the brain in top shape because it took me ten minutes to finish. That left me with a little over half an hour to kill until the tenth question was dropped on our heads. I decided against turning my paper over, following the glare of Tenten's ceiling mirror and placing my paper in a better spot for her with a casual slump and slide of my elbow.

I stayed in that position, elbow planted on the corner of my paper, chin in hand, staring into space. There were chakra strings crisscrossing the room from several sources and out of the corner of my eye the chuunin with bandages over his eyes only smirked, no doubt a sensor as well. Next to him, Izumo was calling kids out every five minutes with the throw of a kunai. When a student was disqualified for a reason that I couldn't figure out I closed my eyes. There was no way that they were going to toss me out for some imaginary reason, I had entirely too much shit to do. Seeing as I wasn't a Yamanaka they likely assumed that I was actually napping during their exam. I couldn't remember if the jounin sensei were watching this part of the exam somehow, either through CCTV or the Hokage's magic crystal ball. No matter how they were doing it, if they were doing it, Genma wasn't going to be the one to lecture me about anything he saw here. He'd likely get a kick out of the irritation I could feel coming from Ibiki.

The man finally roared out the instructions for the next half, succeeding in starling the hell out of me, but I was mostly able to hide it. As students filed out, chuunin plants among them, I cracked my neck and twirled my pen between my fingers, lounging back in my chair. There was no declaration from Naruto. I resisted the urge to turn in my seat and look at him, to make sure he was alright. His chakra was burning brightly with anticipation, and I could feel Ichiyo's in the row directly behind him. Could he have…? I pushed down the warm and fuzzy feeling of my teammate helping my family, instead paying attention to the rapidly approaching chakra signature.

I did the calculations, once more making a mental note to apologize to Iruka-sensei, and moved my chair back a few inches as silently as if I were attempting to hide from Anbu. Ibiki saw the movement of course, and he frowned for a split second before Anko burst through the window with her banner, landing on the desk directly in front of me, beaming at the room in general and announcing her status as our next proctor. There was no comment over how many of us were left, I'm assuming a good many more left without Naruto's words to stop them.

"-I'll tell your squad leaders where you're to report in the morning."

I had to wonder who I was going to hear the location from. 'Team Sai' would likely get the information from Kakashi.

Genma was waiting for us outside of the Academy, proving me wrong. Yamanaka-sensei was there as well, sweeping Ichiyo off to the side to talk to him about something. I kept half an ear on what Genma was telling us, the rest of my attention went to reading the woman's lips as best I could. When Genma stopped speaking I darted over to Ichiyo, grabbing his arm and forcing a grin.

"Sorry to interrupt but we'll be late for our team dinner. Pleasure as always, Yamanaka-san."

I dragged my blonde teammate through the streets, Sai following behind us automatically. I fell back for a second to loop my arm through his, picking up the pace and leaving Genma to follow behind us.

"So, Ichiyo, anything you have to share about the exam?"

"...I may have entered the mind of the man to your left in order to look at your paper and memorize the answers."

"And give said answer to most of the rookies, huh?"

He huffed, looking away from me and turning slightly pink.

"Not that I'm complaining, but why not just hop straight into my mind?"

"...from the way you sense genjutsu, and really all chakra in general, I have little doubt that entering your mind would be a complete hassle. I didn't need someone fighting me and launching my soul halfway across the country or something."

Sai hummed, bobbing his head agreeably, his bland smile widening slightly to something that almost looked warm.

"You have also been resolutely against letting him practice any of the Yamanaka arts on you during training."

Of course he'd noticed. I beamed at him, shaking off the awkwardness that came from the seeming slight against the blonde's entire clan.

"Well, my mind is the only thing I really have that I can say is completely my own. I'll admit that I guard it jealously."

Genma huffed from behind us.

"You're going to be a right terror to the psych division once you make Chuunin."

I ignored all of that but the last bit, grinning widely,

"Ah, you think I'll make Chuunin? Thanks, Sensei!"

It was lighthearted through dinner, with Ichiyo throwing a piece of barbeque at Sai after he'd finally had enough of being picked at, only for the kid to catch it with his chopsticks and proceed to eat it. I was still laughing from the image of Ichiyo's affronted look when Sai turned to me, head tilted and face serious in a way it rarely was around us.

"Asuka, what did you mean when you said there was a faulty seal on the Kazekage's son?"

Genma paled, going from seemingly carefree to absolutely terrified in no time at all. His head snapped to me, expression grim.

"What?"

I shrugged, suddenly wary.

"Yeah, it's the shittiest seal I've seen in my life and I once saw Konohamaru bumble through an explosive seal."

Genma slapped down money to pay for the bill, leaning across the table to grab my arm as he motioned at the boys with his free hand.

"Training Ground 44, Eight o'clock tomorrow morning, don't be late."

With that, he body-flickered us away from there, and one teleportation jutsu later I was standing in the Hokage's office, head spinning slightly, but experience with Anko's little tricks kept me standing.

"Hokage-sama, you need to hear this."

There were jounin in the room, a few chuunin as well, and Anbu hidden under genjutsu as always. The Hokage stopped in the middle of what looked like his evening cup of tea, sighing explosively and motioning with his hand.

"Go ahead, Asuka-chan."

"...Gaara of the desert is a jinchuuriki, and his seal is absolute shit."

There was a small uproar and the Hokage blew out a long stream of smoke, head tilted as his eyes darted from me to my sensei and then back again.

"I was already aware of the boy's status. How is it that you can gauge the state of his seal?"

I wrinkled my nose, trying to convey how I felt about the subject and remain respectful.

"He's kind of leaking essence-of-bijuu everywhere. The seal placed on him is actually meant to seal something into an inanimate object, like a jar, rather than a person. The demon's consciousness is conflicting with his own because according to the seal there should only be one in existence."

The Hokage hummed, rolling his pipe between his fingers.

"Will it hold for the duration of his stay in Konoha?"

I should have known that there was no way that he would fix it. It's not like Suna would let us if we offered, the only thing the old man could realistically worry about were his own people, and let Gaara be someone else's problem. It still stung.

"...most likely. It's held this long, the demon isn't likely to break free any time in the future, and there's no component included for the...vessel to release it, seeing as the seal treats him as incapable of thought and interaction."

"Very well. I trust you will inform someone should you notice a change in it."

I nodded, "Hai, Hokage-sama."

Genma excused us after that, clearing his throat the moment we were out of the tower.

"Sorry about that, it's just...we've got a bad precedent set for faulty seals."

He was alluding to the Kyuubi, though no doubt he knew the truth behind the reason the seal was weakened (minus the Akatsuki and Madara bits, obviously) seeing as he'd apparently been part of the Hokage's guard at the time, according to his old stories. I nodded anyway,

"Of course, sensei."

Anko held up the two scrolls, demented grin in place, and I knew that they'd made no effort to keep this fair to the other villages. It would have been simple to place small seals on the inside to keep the chakra more contained, leaving most sensors blind. Other villagers contributed sensors to the mix of this nonsense. But none of them were going to spread the information to all of the Konoha genin. Minus Kabuto. Because fuck him. As we were waiting for the ridiculous waivers to be signed I worked my way among the Konoha genin, slipping small sheets of paper to at least one person in each group detailing what team had which scroll, with admonitions to keep away from the sand team and the grass one that contained Orochimaru. Or would. Because the lady he would inhabit was not yet taken over. Most likely because Anko would have known in a heartbeat if she was within normal sensing range of him.

The waivers were turned in, nonsense things that only served as an excuse to give people a chance at reconnaissance, and we were sent away to our individual gates. I should have known Sai would notice something was up. My shifting from foot to foot wasn't exactly subtle after all.

"You should not be concerned. We have the most experience between us of almost all the genin present."

Ichiyo nodded encouragingly.

"And if anyone of the undesirables come after us you'll sense them coming in time for us to hide!"

I didn't want to burst their bubble that Orochimaru was likely good enough at suppressing his chakra, that his Sanin speed would make up for whatever range I had that I could use against him. And I also didn't have a way to explain that I knew that level of opponent had infiltrated the exams. So instead I gave them a small smile,

"Of course. What's the plan?"

Sai tilted his head at me, his false smile disappearing as he thought it through.

"We do not know how long we will have between this phase of the exam and the next. We should head for the closest scroll and immediately depart for the tower. The quicker we finish the more rested we shall be for the next phase."

Ichiyo nodded in agreement, playing with the end of his long ponytail as he thought.
"Or we could just take out as many people as possible. Better in the long run."

Sai nodded slightly in assent.

"A good tactic. Asuka, direct us towards the nearest team of low strength."

It was an order, not a suggestion, and I rolled my eyes.
"A please would have been nice, but whatever. There are some idiots from Kusa bumbling about at our 10 o'clock."

Sai didn't even blink at my sass, instead taking point and leaping into the trees. Ichiyo followed and I took up the rear, boxing in our least experienced member. I resisted the urge to protest our choice of action, beating down the instinctive fear I had at staying in this forest with Orochimaru frolicking about. It wasn't like he was after us. Then again, Orochimaru might ignore us, but would Gaara?

The first group was easily dealt with, a barrier around them and a distance triggered explosive seal in the middle caused immediate surrender. The second and third groups we encountered on our way to the tower, neither of them being the Earth scroll we needed. The fourth through seventh groups had a mix of scrolls to add to our collection, including a water jutsu thrown in from some Kiri ninja we caught in one of Ichiyos genjutsu. They likely didn't even notice their shit was missing until we were long gone. The next few were equally as depressingly easy to overcome. It was nearing nightfall when I felt it.

I stopped dead, yanking back the fabric of Ichiyo's shirt to keep him on the same branch as me. Sai noticed immediately that we were no longer following and blurred back to us, one hand on the handle of his tanto.

"Report."

His face was blank, Root training showing full force. I shook my head, swallowing twice before I could manage to get it out.

"Chakra. Wind Jutsu. Massive reserves. Definitely at least Jounin. Tastes like snakes. Not Anko. Team Seven."

Ichiyo immediately blanched,

"Then we need to help them! Six of us could take a Jounin!"

"Not this one."

Sai frowned, likely an exaggerated expression for our benefit, but I appreciated the effort.

"We should stay clear. But we cannot allow another Konoha team to be sabotaged like this."

I suppose without my knowledge it may seem like another village was trying to sabotage us. Made sense to do it to 'the Uchiha', too.

After a second of silence, he took his hand away from his tanto.

"Guide us to them, if nothing else we can perform an extraction."

I shuddered, trying to reign in the instinctive fear. It was only the thought of my little family that started me running.

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