Chapter 12
After their confrontation with Rock Lee, Team 7 goes to the Room 301, where the first part of the chunin exam will be held. As the room comes into view, they see their sensei in front of the door.
"Sensei, w-what are you doing here?" Hinata asked
"Glad you all came together, now you can formally register for the chunin exams"
"Huh?" The students said
"Sensei, I thought w-we were already registered for the exams" Hinata confusedly said
"Well, you see only groups of three are allowed to apply for and take the exam. That's the way it's alway been" He stated
Naruto stared at him confused "Huh? But you said it was voluntarily, that it was up to us to choose"
"That's right, I did"
"S-So, was that a lie?" Hinata asked
Looking out the window, Kakashi spoke "Well sorta, this decision is up to each of you but it effects all of you. I didn't tell you because I didn't want you guys influencing each other. At the same time Hinata, I didn't want you feeling obliged to participate because of any feelings you may have towards Sasuke or Naruto. I wanted you to come to a decision of your own free will"
"S-So they wouldn't be able t-to take the exams if I hadn't come" Hinata said
"Exactly, I couldn't let the others in if you weren't here" Kakashi said
I'm glad I made the decision to come for myself... Hinata glanced at her teammates But I can't help but wonder if they would have resented me for not coming..
"But it's a moot point, you're all here and for the right reasons. Hinata, Naruto, and Sasuke..." Kakashi smiles through his mask "..I'm proud of you, couldn't ask for a better team" He moves out of the way "Good Luck"
"We won't let you down sensei, Believe it!" Naruto said approaching the door with the others following him
"Oh, by the way..." Kakashi started
They all turned to him
"Sasuke, why are you holding Hinata's hand?" He asked
Both of them looked down and saw that they were holding hands and instantly separated, blushing in embarrassment, trying to look anywhere else besides each other.
I-I didn't even notice that we were holding hands all that time... Hinata thought twiddling her fingers
I remember her holding my hand not to fight with her cousin then I let go to fight Rock Lee, but when did I take her hand again? Sasuke thought rubbing his neck
But s-still...
And yet...
...It felt right to do They both thought looking at the hand that held the others hand
Naruto looked at both his teammates, thinking What's with them? Hinata always blushes and plays with her fingers, so that's nothing new... He focuses his sight on Sasuke But he's acting so weird, He's cold to everyone else except her, he's alway silence but when it comes to Hinata, he talks and talks. Naruto kept thinking about it, after a while a lightbulb went off in his head and he starts grinning Oh so that's why, actually has a soft spot
"Let's just go, we don't have time for this!" Sasuke said strongly, hoping to clear the awkward silence and march to the doors. Hinata and Naruto were to his left and right as they opened the doors.
"Gee uh I guess we're not alone, guys" Naruto said shocked at what he saw
Oh my god was the only thing Hinata thought as she looked around the room filled with ninja from every nation and every village in the world and they all looked pretty strong and really scary. T-There is so much tension, I don't think anything can break it..
"Oh Sasuke! Where have you been?!" A voice said excitedly
Hinata turned to see that the voice came from Ino, who had pounced on Sasuke, wrapping her arms around his neck. ...Maybe I spoke too soon
Tightening her hold a little, Ino smiled "Boy, you have no idea how much I was hoping you'd show up here. I've missed those good looks of your!"
"Hey, you porker back off! He's mine!" Another voice said
Hinata didn't have time to look in the direction where the voice was coming from as a blur of pink ran pass her and pounced on Sasuke too, giving him a bear hug. Only then could she see that the pink blur was Sakura. I really spoke too soon... She thought as she saw Sasuke looking more annoyed having two of them on him
"Sasuke, I've missed you so much! I'm so happy to see you've decided to take these exams too!" Sakura said excitedly as she snuggled against his chest
"Mrs. Forehead, they let you in?! Still got those big frown lines on that billboard brow I see" Ino said mocking her
"Leave me forehead out of it!" She said glaring at her former best friend
"Ah! Hey Sakura, how's it going?" Naruto asked grinning at her
Sakura looked at him with an annoyed and angry expression on her face "Shut up, Naruto! Can't you see I'm busy?!"
I guess things between them still haven't worked out in Naruto's favor Hinata thought as she pat the back of a now gloomy Naruto.
From behind Ino came her team that consist of Shikamaru Nara and Choji Akimichi "Ohh its you guys, I knew this was gonna be a drag but I didn't know it would be this lame" Shikamaru complained
"Oh so all three stooges are here?" Naruto said still depressed
"Hey! You know what, pipsqueak?...Oh forget it, you're a waste of time!" Shikamaru replied
"Well well what do you know? Guess the whole gangs back together again!" A voice said. Walking up to them was Kiba and Shino, they were slightly sweating as if they rushed there.
"You guys too, huh? Man, everyone's here for this stupid thing" Shikamaru said annoyed
"Yup, here we all are, the nine rookies!" Kiba laughed, then turned his sight to Sakura giving her an annoyed expression " Geez Sakura, you can be fast when you want to be and all because of some guy" Kiba said to her upset that he had to run around the building to look for her.
"Oh shut up! You should have been right behind me since you go on about how fast you are!" Sakura glared back at him as she tighten her hold on Sasuke "Besides you may not have to worry about that soon"
Kiba just stared at her, confused by what she said, What does she mean by that?
Unlike Kiba, Both Hinata and Sasuke knew what Sakura was talking about. I taught Sasuke and I were pretty clear last time when we said we refuse to change our team, guess she thinks we would change our mind Hinata sighed
She is so annoying, doesn't she know when to give up? Sasuke thought getting out of Ino and Sakura's hold, goes to Hinata's side.
Kiba shook his head and smirked, looking at Sasuke "This is going to be fun, at least for those of us good enough to make the cut, right Sasuke?"
Sasuke smirked back "Kiba, careful you don't get over confident"
"Ha, just you wait! We're gonna blow you guys away, we've been training like crazy" Kiba said
Getting over his talk with Sakura, Naruto give Kiba an annoyed look while pointing his finger at him "What do think we've been doing?! Sitting around picking daisies? You don't know what training means!"
Kiba ignored Naruto and went up to Hinata and smiled, wrapping his arm around her shoulder, much to Sasuke's displeasure "At least there's one person I look forward to seeing, man it's been so long Hinata, how ya doing?"
Hinata looked and felt uncomfortable with Kiba's arm around her but tried to stay casual "I'm fine, K-Kiba. It's nice to see you too."
Kiba just stared at her and with each passing second, Hinata became more and more uncomfortable "Um, s-something wrong, Kiba?"
"You hardly stuttered! You alway stutter like crazy when you talk but now you barely do! What happened?"
Getting out of his hold, she said "I just I gain a bit of c-confidence in myself since the last time y-you saw me"
To both Sasuke and Hinata's dismay, Kiba wrapped his arms around her again, laughing with delight "That's great! Man, I wish you were on my team instead" He starts whispering to her "Between you and me, Sakura really gets on my nerves, always lecturing me and going off on her own, she's driving me crazy!"
Sasuke was glaring intensely at Kiba as he kept holding Hinata close in his arms, when clearly she didn't like it. He reached his limit when heard Kiba said he wanted her on his team and how close they were to each other, so he went up to them and pulled her out of Kiba's arms, which made Hinata sigh in relief, and kept her at his side "Kiba, focus on the team you have now and not on the one you don't. She's not going anywhere"
Hinata blushed at the last statement as she looked at Sasuke and felt that maybe what Naruto said before was right He doesn't want me to go...can it be that...I really am special to Sasuke? Thinking about it more, made her blush darker
"Hey you guys!" A voice said
All nine rookies turned to see a silver haired young man with glasses walking up to them "You might want to try to keep it down a little. I mean, no offense, but you're the nine rookies, right? Fresh out of the academy, I wouldn't go making a spectacle of yourselves, just cool it. This isn't a class field trip."
"Well who asked you?! Who are you?!" Ino said harshly as she was annoyed with the newcomer's words
"I'm Kabuto Yakushi, but really look around you, you've made quite an impression"
The rookies looked around them and saw all the other exam participates glaring and frowning at them
"See those guys?" Kabuto asked looking at the ninjas with the 4 lines on their headbands "They're from the rain village, very touchy. They all are this exam makes everyone tense and you don't want to rub them the wrong way right now." He gives an understanding smile "But you can't help it, I mean how could you know how things work? You're just rookies, you remind me of myself a while back"
"Y-Your name is Kabuto, correct?" Hinata asked
"Yeah it is" He answered
"This isn't the f-first time you're taking these exams, is it?"
"No, it's...my seventh"
"Huh?" Shikamaru said
"Well they're held twice a year, so this will be my fourth year" He explained
"Cool that means you can give us all the inside tips" Naruto said
"That is i-if you want to" Hinata added
"Yeah, some expert he is, he's never passed" Shikamaru stated
Kabuto gave an nervous smile and rubbed the back of his head "Well seventh times the charm, that's what they say"
"So I guess all of those rumors about the exam being tough are true. Oh man, I knew this was going to be a drag" Shikamaru sighed
"Hang on, don't give up hope yet. Maybe I can help you kids out a little" Kabuto said pulling out orange-white sided cards "with my ninja info cards"
"What the heck are those?" Sakura asked
"It's hard to explain but these cards have been chakra encoded with everything I've learned the past four years" He knelt to the ground and pulls out a card "I've got more than 200 of them, so you see I haven't been completely wasting my time. They may not look like much to the naked eye, in fact they appear blank. Don't want just anyone seeing this stuff" He lays the card face up, revealing the white blank side of the card. Using his finger he spins the card on the ground.
"What are you doing?" Sakura asked confused
"I'm using my chakra to reveal their secrets, like this for example" He said as the card showed a map of the nations and some kind of graph.
"Awesome!" Sakura said what some of the other rookies were thinking
Hinata looked closely at the map "Is this a-a map of all the nations?"
Kabuto nods "Yes it is but it shows more than that. It shows the geographical distribution of all the candidates who have come to take the Chunin exam. What villages they come from and how many from each village." He looks up at the rookies "Why do you think they all come here to take the exam together at the same time?"
"From what I've h-heard, it's the foster friendships between all nations" Hinata answered
"Exactly, it's about international brotherhood and all that and it's true enough as far as it goes"
Sasuke spoke "But there's another reason"
"Yeah, you see the important thing is that this way they can carefully regulate the total number of shinobi that end up in each village. Thereby maintaining the balance of power" Kabuto explained
Naruto fold his arms, trying to look like he understands "Oh yeah..balance of power.."
"Balance of power, big deal it's all a drag" Shikamaru said
Kabuto lays his hand over the hand, making the information on it disappear "If the balance isn't maintained, one nation could wind up with more shinobi than it's neighbors and it might be tempted to attack them. So they try to maintain the status quo, it makes sense I suppose"
Sasuke steps up to Kabuto "Do those cards of yours have any info on the other candidates, individually?"
Kabuto smirks "They might, you have someone special in mind?"
"I might" he answered
I think I know who Sasuke is talking about Hinata thought as she remembers the fight between him and Rock Lee
"Well I can't promise my information is complete or perfect but I've got something on just about everyone, including you guys of course" Kabuto smirks, pulling out a card "So which one is it? Tell me anything you know about them, a description, where they're from, whatever. Anything at all"
"He's Garra of the Desert and there's another one, Rock Lee of the Leaf Village while you're at it" Sasuke said
Besides him, Hinata was trying to recall where she's heard that name before, Garra of the Desert...an image of the red hair sand ninja popped into her head...the guy with the large gourd on his back. She couldn't help but remember his eyes, they were so empty, no emotion in them at all.
"Aww that's no fun, you even know their names, that makes it easy" Kabuto reshuffle the deck and pulls out two cards "Here they are"
"Show them to me" Sasuke said
"Ok, first is Rock Lee" Kabuto said using his chakra to show Lee's information "He's a year older than you guys, mission experience is 11 C-ranks and 20 D-ranks, his squad lead is Guy and in the last 12 months, his taijutsu has radically improved. But his other skills are pretty shaky, last year he got a lot of attention as a genin but for some reason he chose not to participate in the chunin exam. This will be his first time as a candidate same as you guys, his teammates are TenTen and Neji Hyuuga"
Sasuke eye twitched at the last name, remembering the cold eye Neji was giving Hinata.
"Ok next is Garra of the Desert. Let's see mission experience, 8 C-ranks and get this 1 B-rank as a genin. There's not much information about this guy, he's a rookie from another land originally but there is this, he survive every mission without getting a scratch on him"
Shikamaru looked shocked "The dude done a B-rank as a genin and has never even been injured?!"
"What the deal with this guy?!" Naruto asked
Kabuto pulls out the card with the nations again "Leaf, Sand, Rain, Grass, Waterfall, and Sound. From the looks of it, they've all sent exceptionally skilled candidates to the exam this time around" He looks at the crowd, then back at the rookies "Of course, the hidden sound village is small, it spring up recently. No one knows anything about it, those guys are a mystery." Putting away his cards, he smiles at them "You get the point, the competition's going to be intense this year"
"So it would seem, it's almost enough to make you l-lose your confidence" Hinata said sighing
"That's a fine time to start talking like that!" Ino said harshly
Hinata bowed her head, her bangs covering her one. She knew the exam was going to be difficult but she never thought it would be like this. She was starting to lose a bit of confidence in herself. A hand came on her shoulder and she looked up to see it was Sasuke. They looked into each other's eyes as if they were talking to one another. Hinata couldn't help but blush as her heart was racing as she was looking into his eyes. The look he was giving her told her that she had come far, that she could do this and that he would be by her side all the way. She smiled at him and nodded in agreement and in thanks. Sasuke gave her a small smile too, happy to see she understood.
"Do you really think it's going to be tougher this time?" Sakura asked Kabuto, she didn't miss the moment Sasuke and Hinata were having and it really bugged her but for now she needed to focus on the exam
He nods "We got our work cut out for us this year"
Besides her, Hinata saw Naruto shaking but wasn't worried If I know him, he'll burst with excitement and declare something but now wouldn't be a good time considering the dark looks we're getting "Naruto, maybe y-you should-"
As excepted, Naruto burst out, pointing his finger at all the other candidates "My name's Naruto Uzumaki and I'm gonna beat everyone of ya! Believe it!"
Too late but Hinata couldn't help but smile at the confidence she admired in her teammate
"Hey! Are you trying to get us killed?!" Ino shouted frantically at him
He grins, putting his hands behind his back "Yeah, I feel a lot better now!"
What an idiot Sasuke thought half-heartily while smiling
"Ah could you say that a little louder? Didn't quite catch that" Kiba asked
"You moron! Are you trying to get everybody in the place to hate our guts or what?!" Shikamaru asked
"Hey, can't you control that bigmouth teammate of yours?" Sakura angrily/frantically asked Hinata
Hinata just kept smiling while shaking her head "I don't think a-anyone can"
From the crowd, the same sound ninja that were watching the conflict between Team 7 and the sand ninja heard what Kabuto said about them and were not happy about it. They moved swiftly through the crowd and attacked Kabuto. Kabuto dodged all their attacks, but somehow ended up throwing up. Naruto and Hinata knelt next to him, checking if he was ok.
"Put this in your cards, the genin of the sound village will be chunin by the time this exam is over" one of the sound ninja said
"Alright, you baby face degenerates pipe down and listen up!" A voice said
All the candidates turned to the front of the room and saw a group of chunin appear. The one in front of the group was a man with long scar that spread across his face, he smirked and began to speak "It's time to begin, I'm Ebiki Marino, you proctor, and from this moment your worst enemy"
A/N: I'm so sorry, I made you guys wait. I've been super busy with college starting again and my aunt passing away. But don't worry I don't plan on stopping this story. Thank you so much for waiting, I'll try not to make you wait long.