Title: Slow Burn
Chapter: 16 Choked
Author: Killaurey
Word Count: 7,506
Disclaimer: Naruto doesn't belong to me. It's Kishimoto's and I just play with it. AU immediately after the Sasuke Retrieval Arc. Part 16 of ? Unbeta'd.
Notes: So, uh, I haven't updated this since 2012... well... better late than never, right? (Is anyone still reading this?)

Asuma would lie to his dying day if anyone asked him about the sigh of relief he gave as his team (and extra member; sorry, Sakura) showed up with less than two minutes to spare. He leaned against the glass of the wall, with the other Jounin sensei doing the same, and watched the teams.

Down to thirty, he thought. That's not bad.

He wished he was closer, so that he could see them better, but the sensei weren't permitted any closer. The only consolation was the fact that none of them were allowed closer, while they all wanted to be. Irritation shared wasn't irritation halved, but it was… something.

We raise them and it's hard to just let them go, he thought, wishing idly for a cigarette. Asuma refrained from pulling one out. Not only was he unlikely to be allowed to smoke it inside but he didn't want the nicotine tugging at his senses just in case.

In case of what, he didn't know, but it was best to be prepared. This wasn't Konoha after all.

Some of the teams looked beat up. His team looked utterly filthy. But they also looked like they were all in one piece. Sakura seemed tired, Ino was stiff and Chouji was the calmest of them all.

He couldn't tell anything more than that.

How had the exam gone? Asuma wanted answers-all of the Jounin sensei did-after the entire building had shaken and rattled for more than an hour. He strongly suspected that something had collapsed underground and the dirt on most of the teams supported that theory.

He closed his eyes and decided to be thankful that his team had made it out. He didn't want to imagine them trapped under there.

And it would be like Cloud to refuse to let us go search for them. It was a cold thought but one that felt true. He could imagine that easily. It didn't impress him.

Asuma pitied the Genin sensei whose teams hadn't made it up. They'd have to struggle to find out what had happened to them and all of the sensei knew the most likely answer.

Death was no stranger in the Chuunin exams.

But normally failure wasn't an automatic death sentence. His heart clenched. Faith in his team was one thing, but this was another thing entirely. Asuma didn't like the thought that, if they failed here, that their odds of survival were very, very low.

Worse, he didn't like the part of him that approved of it.

The exam was meant to substitute for war. And in war, death happened.

But in war, he added broodingly, I'd be able to be there with them. Or else I'd be somewhere different entirely. None of this standing around and watching and being unable to do anything.

He couldn't decide if war would be easier than this.

The dread of coming back from a mission to find that someone else hadn't managed to do the same… or standing around and watching his team as they struggled to keep their lives..

No, he thought, definitely not the time for a smoke.

Ino rather thought that Maki's announcement that they'd passed the second part of the exam did nothing to relieve anyone. Distantly, she was aware of the fact that they should be relieved-after all, that meant that they'd made it out of the darkness and the tunnels-but she couldn't muster up the energy to care. They'd made it. More of them hadn't.

They're either dead or dying, she thought grimly, casting her gaze downwards. Ninety Genin left. Thirty teams.

How many teams had there been before? The exact numbers escaped her but she was sure that it had been over a hundred.

They'd been whittled down less than a third of what they'd been before the exam. While that was good for the severity of the exam...

All those people-lost. Ino felt the trembling in her body start up again and she breathed deeply and steadily in an attempt to block it out. She knew that she shouldn't be thinking about that. Knew she shouldn't be focusing on the fact that in their last, desperate run, she'd been able to hear, like a whisper in her mind, the cries and last thoughts of people.

Her father had told her to keep her shields up.

She wondered if he'd be disappointed in her for not having been able to manage it. Ino wondered if she'd ever forget the thoughts of those who were dying. Ino studied her feet, studied the platform she, Sakura and Chouji stood on as the entire arena waited in breathless silence for Maki or the next exam proctor to tell them how they'd have a chance to die next. Ino wondered, if she reached out, would she be able to still find those who were under there?

Ino carefully subdued the urge to shudder and said nothing. Even just thinking that brought the faint cries of panic and fear into focus. She wrapped her shields around her mind tighter and higher and tried not to throw up.

If she spoke up, they might be able to save some of them before the darkness and death came for them.

If she spoke up, it would place her in jeopardy because Genin weren't supposed to be able to read minds and Kumo would be within their rights to demand her death if she made an issue about her powers and what she was picking up with them. Her shivering got worse. Ino knew her father would tell her to close her mind and get on with the exam.

But I hear them, she thought bitterly, and if I don't help them, who will?

But… she didn't dare say anything.

If it had been in Konoha, she would have. But this wasn't Konoha.

Konoha's Chuunin Exam had been hard.

This was a death trap.

"Ino?" Sakura's voice was sharp with worry and Ino glanced her way apathetically, most of her thoughts still with the dead. Even if she couldn't be there, she thought, it was right that she think of them. They weren't from her village-thank god-but that didn't mean she couldn't mourn. Even if their countries wound up at war, they'd never done anything to her.

"Hey," Sakura continued. "Are you okay?"

Ino tried to find the words to answer that, she really did, but anything she could think to say died on the way to her lips and she didn't have the energy to try and convince it to come back. She wasn't as tired as Sakura was-she could tell that, just by the brush of Sakura's chakra against hers-but Ino thought that emotionally she was far more exhausted.

All those dead, she mourned. All the dying.

"Leave her alone," Chouji said, after a long moment. "Sakura, look after yourself first. You need to eat something. We don't know how long we're going to be on this platform."

Throughout the room noise was breaking out as Maki stood at the head of the room and said nothing.

There were at least a hundred platforms scattered about, raised off the ground-one for each of the teams that might have made it through-and only thirty of them were occupied. They room seemed very loud for all that it was rather empty.

The lights were harsh on her eyes. Ino was glad for it as Sakura gave her a long look and then turned to dig a rations bar out of her pack.

It didn't surprise her when Chouji's hands, warm and comforting, fell on her shoulders. "Are you alright?" he asked her quietly.

She still couldn't find the words but she managed to reach up and clasp his hand with one of hers. She squeezed it and then let it go. She would be, Ino thought, eventually. Her lips trembled a little before she stilled them. She knew they couldn't afford to have her break down crying here.

"You don't have to talk," Chouji said, still in that gentle voice. "But I want you to eat something, okay?"

Ino managed a tiny shrug which he took as consent because the next thing she knew he pressed a rations bar into her hands and then left her. Mechanically she unwrapped it and took a bite.

Her gaze scanned the other teams while her mind whispered the voices of those below her. Watching the living teams didn't drag her mind over to them and she bitterly wished that it would. She could handle hearing the voices of the living teams.

They had to be better than the screams of the dead.

Chouji ate his rations bar and wished he had a bag of chips. He had a few, for safe keeping, with Asuma-sensei so that when this portion of the exam was over and pass or fail there was a month of waiting and training facing them, but he hadn't packed any for the exams themselves.

He knew that the rations bar was doing a more than adequate job of replenishing his energy-better by far than the chips would do, being only empty calories and not designed to boost him-but the chips were familiar and he craved a little bit of that right now.

"She's so not all right," Sakura muttered to him, biting at her own rations bar viciously, like she was destroying it in lieu of destroying something, anything, else.

Chouji chewed and swallowed and watched as Ino toyed with a bit of her hair, absently, like she did when she was thinking. He watched as Ino shifted uncomfortably, a closed off expression on her face, as she glanced at the ground beneath them. Her eyes were almost glassy, they were so blank. He looked at Sakura, who was watching him watch Ino anxiously.

She feels out of place, Chouji thought, feeling a bit of pity for her. This isn't her team even though she cares.

He should reassure her. Say it was fine.

The problem was, Chouji knew, that he had never seen Ino like this. It might not be fine. It worried him. Scared him a bit because if there was one thing you could count on with Ino, it was for her to laugh in the face of the odds and manage to find enough luck to make it through.

This was neither laughter nor luck. "She'll be okay," he said, hoping that he wasn't making a liar of himself. Not about this. "She's just shook up from the last exam."

Sakura nodded, like she wasn't convinced, and they both watching Ino from the corner of their eyes. "Can I ask another question?" Sakura asked, her voice so quiet that he doubted anyone, even with advanced hearing would be able to hear them.

And would they even want to, when everyone was tired and everyone was waiting with sickening anticipation for the next exam? The second exam, he thought, had been something most of them hadn't counted on. Not on so many deaths.

But was that really different from the exam that Konoha had given the last time? It had seemed different but, then, they'd been in their home territory and had had the comfort of knowing that, if all else failed, their own Jounin were unlikely to just have them die in droves.

They had no such reassurance here.

"Sure," Chouji said quietly. Ino was nibbling on a rations bar, he saw, and felt comforted by that. Even if she wasn't doing well, she was eating, and that would help her keep her strength up for the next exam. "What is it?"

"That jutsu you taught me," Sakura said carefully, clearly not wanting to be too specific as she picked her words out. Prudence would keep them alive, he thought and agreed, even though he didn't believe they were in much danger yet. "Was it really shadow?"

Chouji took another bite of his rations bar and thought about that. "No," he said, after a moment. "I don't know any shadow jutsu. Ino doesn't either."

That was Shikamaru's job. Chouji missed Shikamaru rather badly right then and there.

Sakura looked at him, waiting for more.

"It was an earth jutsu," he explained, picking his words as carefully as she had been. "The reason it appeared to you as a shadow jutsu was because we," he glanced at Ino, "felt that it would be easier for you to visualize walking through shadow than through earth given our time constraints."

Green eyes narrowed as they thought about that, Sakura frowned, and took another bite of her bar. She chewed and swallowed before even trying to answer that. "It was all a trick?"

"No."

Sakura stared at him impatiently before asking, "Then what was it?"

"I'm thinking," he told her. "You're worse than Ino." That made her huff, crossing her arms over chest, as he tried to sift through the reasoning he and Ino had worked through in seconds. It had seemed clear then. It was harder to explain now, when Sakura didn't have any background in earth jutsu. Neither had Ino but she'd been in his mind and, in those moments, had known everything he did about them.

"It's like this," Chouji said. "You've studied some genjutsu, right?"

Sakura made a face as she tapped the rations bar against her arm. "Not really," she said slowly. "Kakashi-sensei said I had an aptitude for it, but Tsunade-shishou is a medical ninja and I've more of an aptitude for that. I've got the basics from the Academy down pat about genjutsu and a few other things but I haven't studied it."

He grimaced a little. Asuma-sensei would have insisted that she learn some genjutsu no matter how skilled she was in another field, had she been on his team. Chouji didn't say that. "You know that genjutsu are built on illusion," he began, ignoring the way she narrowed her eyes at the Academy-level explanation, "and the simplest genjutsu are those that are built on an illusion of sight."

She nodded.

"There's a lot of things you can build a genjutsu on," he said, "but that's the one that's most commonly used. Even if we train our other senses, there's always going to be the dominate one-our sight."

"Not all ninja rely on their sight as much," Sakura pointed out. "I think Kiba would be blinder if you took away his nose than his eyes."

"True," Chouji admitted. "I'm speaking in generalities. There are always exceptions."

Sakura subsided, still frowning at him.

He watched at Ino raised her head and stared in the direction of what looked like a platform that jutted from the wall. "Consider what we had you do to be an extension of a genjutsu," Chouji told Sakura. "It wasn't an illusion but the important thing for you, for the caster, was to believe that the wall had become like shadow. In believing it, you managed to do it. Would you have managed the same feat if you'd had to believe we could walk through solid rock."

Sakura opened her mouth, ready to respond, and then shut it again, scowling ferociously at the rations bar.

"That's why we told you to think of shadow," he said quietly. "All jutsu is powered to some extent by belief and intent. By believing what you did, you convinced the jutsu to act the way you believed it should, and we managed to get through."

"I've never heard that before," she said, subdued.

"It's not taught in the Academy." Chouji frowned as Ino began shivering, like she was stuck in a storm of snow. To him the temperature hadn't changed one bit. "It's dangerous," he added, "and simpler to teach us one way, one use for the few jutsu they cover."

Sakura nodded again, looking thoughtful, then frowned. "Is it just me," she asked, "or is it starting to get really cold in here?"

Chouji frowned. "Are you sure?" he asked quietly. "I don't feel anything."

Sakura shook her head, pink strands of hair flying everywhere as she did so, and Chouji frowned harder, looking past her, over to Ino. "No," Sakura said, "I'm definitely getting colder. But if you're not, then I don't know what's going on."

"You're not the only one," he said, nudging her. "Look at Ino."

Sakura turned her head, subtly, enough that someone who didn't, wasn't paying attention wouldn't know that she was moving just to look at her teammate, because it looked more like she was scanning the room. "She's practically shaking with it," Sakura breathed. "I'm cold, but not like that. What's going on?"

I don't know, Chouji thought grimly. But I don't like it. "Maybe a special effect for the proctor of the third exam? Remember how Anko was in our exam with the Forest of Death? The whole licking blood thing? And that was after she showed up in that room all flashy-like."

She grimaced. "That's just what we need," Sakura said, sounding disgusted and apprehensive.

"I don't think we're going to get much of a choice," Chouji said, turning his glance to see how the other teams were reacting.

She could hear Chouji talking to Sakura behind her but didn't try to listen to their conversation. It wasn't any of her business and while she might have listened any other day, she was hearing enough to make that something she didn't want to do.

Let some people keep their words to themselves, she thought, fumbling for her canteen. The water was lukewarm against her throat and she swallowed only a little.

If they weren't getting a chance to stock up, she didn't want to waste what clean water she had. Ino watched the red-head's team from Kusa, with her attractive teammates. The red-head was saying something Ino couldn't make out and looked bored except for the light in her eyes.

Across the room, she spotted her so-called friend, Midori, with her bright orange hair. Midori was eating-which reminded Ino to take another bite of her ration bar-and when she looked up, waved at Ino.

Ino waved back, feeling a bit surreal. Maybe, she thought, they were friends for the moment. That was just strange. But it was better than dwelling on worse things.

Midori's teammates looked to see what she was waving at. Ino wondered what their expressions were like. She couldn't read them very well, but they seemed far more closed off than Midori's.

That made sense.

Neji, Tenten and Lee were all sitting on their platform, looking relaxed. She couldn't spot any signs of injuries or any sign of dust. They must have gotten out, she thought, before the place had started collapsing. Lucky them. Across from them was Gaara, Temari and Kankurou. She thought that Kankurou was bored and talking from the expression of exasperation on Temari's face.

As she studied the room she realized that there were more Kumo teams who'd made it through than anything else. Which made sense, Ino thought, because they'd had the most teams involved in the exam.

It was getting terribly cold in the room. Was it just her? A side-effect of being unable to close her mind?

She nibbled on her bar and considered the teams that were left. After a moment she nodded to herself.

"Of the teams left," her voice was distant and abrupt and she knew it, "only Konoha and Oto have all their teams remaining in the exam."

Four Konoha teams. One from Oto.

All that they'd been permitted in Konoha's case. And Oto had only sent the one team.

There was silence behind her for a moment and she suspected that Sakura, at least, was checking to confirm that.

"That's amazing," Sakura breathed a moment after. "If anything, Suna and Iwa had the edge in this exam. Under all that rock-both of their villages have more of an emphasis on earth jutsu."

"That just shows," Chouji rumbled, "that people can't be judged solely on what village they're from."

Temari-san nodded her head in greeting, which prompted Kankurou to turn around and, when he spotted them, he nodded as well. Ino wondered what that meant. They weren't friends.

But they weren't enemies either, she reminded herself. Even if this exam pitted them against each other, they weren't enemies.

Ino closed her eyes as a panicked wail floated through her mind and swallowed hard. She pressed her shields up higher and drew them tighter around her and tried not to think about what she'd do if they weren't strong enough to stop the voices.

But someone was dying below them. Someone was scared out of their mind.

It was hard to open her eyes again. "Konoha picked the teams they sent well," she said, after a pause that was a few shades too long. "And Oto wasn't going to send a substandard team. As for the other teams... did either of you really think that Gaara-san's team wouldn't make it through?"

"No." Sakura's voice held something that was close to a laugh. "But I have to admit that I thought another of the Suna teams might as well. It seems peculiar that they didn't, you know?"

"Midori's team made it as well," Ino said quietly. "And she's from Iwa." The rock on her team's hitae-ate's gave that away. "The best teams made it out."

She wasn't sure how she felt about that. In her estimation, Midori was rather silly to be amongst the best of the best Genin.

And yet, Ino thought, wasn't that what people are thinking about you and your glasses?

She didn't speak up on that matter. There was no point. All of them were busy with their own thoughts as Ino finished eating. She had to admit that physically she felt better from having eaten, though it had done nothing for the cold that made her shiver.

Mentally, though, she felt like one big bruise.

Ino tried and couldn't imagine the fear of the people below her. If she'd been down there, she'd have gone mad.

She wished, forlornly, she could talk to Asuma-sensei. He wasn't the same as her father and she wanted her father so bad it was like an ache, but he was her sensei and he'd be able to help her, even if it was only to offer comfort.

"How long is she just going to stand there?" Sakura asked irritably. "We can't do anything while she just does nothing. We passed-so where is the next proctor?"

"Its fine," Ino said, her voice quiet. "They're coming now, can't you see that?"

See wasn't the right word and Ino knew it but she didn't want to get into a discussion of what she was hearing at the moment. The people living, the Genin in the room weren't the voices she was hearing. She didn't know why.

But she could hear the voices from below.

And she could hear the steady tick-tick-tick of a Jounin whose mind felt as cold as ice coming to the exam room. Ino didn't know how they were getting into the room, but they were coming and she could feel their intentions against her mind like a slick bit of winter.

She shivered as Sakura frowned and looked where she was looking. Chouji looked as well.

It was a moment before Ino realized that Neji was looking that way as well. She couldn't see him, but the release of chakra and his thoughts brushed against her mind like a feathery touch for a bare second and she knew that if she glanced at him, he'd have his head down, like he was meditating.

His hair would cover his eyes. And his eyes would be activated.

Nor were they the only two teams that were reacting to something. Another team, Ino saw, were rubbing their hands like they were cold. Midori had come to a stop and wasn't moving a muscle, everything in her screaming intent to hear.

The red-haired girl's team had turned to look at the direction where the Jounin was approaching.

Ima was twirling a bit of hair around one finger and fingering a kunai with her other hand as she looked the way everyone else did. Nobuko looked apprehensive.

"What is that?" Sakura breathed.

Ino couldn't find the words to answer her. It was chakra, but more, it was the force of their will pounding against all of them. She could feel that much from the mind. Goosebumps had sprung up on her arms and she rubbed at them, wishing she had something warmer on.

If they had to do an exam in the cold, she thought, then most of the teams were doomed. Most of them were dressed for warmer temperatures.

And even those, she thought, who knew how to deal with the cold, weren't dressed for it. Kumo wasn't that cold, compared to some villages, and all of them had come prepared for that.

A door opened in the wall, where no door had been a moment before, and the Jounin proctor of the third exam came striding in.

They didn't look like much, was Ino's first thought as she studied them critically. Long dark hair, dark skin, dark eyes, and wearing nothing that would look out of place on any ninja-sandals, fingerless gloves, a mesh shirt under a vest... and yet the way he exuded power made her tremble despite herself. She couldn't pinpoint why he made her feel that way.

Except, she thought, that his chakra felt like ice.

He stared at them all for so long that Ino felt the urge to scream rising, just to have him react to something rather than just stare and stare and do nothing else. She clamped her mouth shut and breathed deeply, trying desperately to ignore the ice that was emanating from his mind. It made her feel achy and cold, so much so that her skin was cool to the touch.

What sort of power does he have? she wondered.

"Wow," Sakura breathed and Ino could only agree. Wow was one word for it. She didn't know if it was a show put on for their sales or not, but Ino had to admit that even if it was... she wouldn't want to deal with this man.

"Hey, cupcakes," Maki said comfortably, when the silence dragged on to the point where Ino could tell from the pressure of other peoples' thoughts against her battered shields. "This is Jun, he's your proctor for the third exam, so you'd better give him your utmost respect."

Ino swallowed hard, feeling like she'd been forced to eat a lemon. She didn't think there was anyone in the room that would dream of not respecting this man. She shook her head minutely and the movement was enough to let her see that other people were doing the same. The message was the same throughout the room: all of them were in agreement.

No one would cross this man.

Why is he leading an exam? Ino wondered, shifting slightly, as her thoughts skittered against his icy mind and then away. He should be doing something more important. He's not a proctor type.

Even with Ibiki-san, who'd lead one of the exams in Konoha and been the head of Torture and Interrogation... Ino could see why he'd wanted to lead an exam. What better way than to make sure the Genin were able to deal with pressure under fire? Was this exam going to be something along those lines? Ino looked at the platforms each team was on and wondered what would happen now.

Just don't send us back into the dark, she thought, please, anything but that.

If they sent her back, she knew she would go mad. Even now, while petrified under the gaze of a powerful Jounin, part of her was curling up and whimpering about the voices she could hear down below. Desperate voices, scared voices, the voices of the dying. Ino blinked away sudden tears and clenched her fists.

She had to be strong here, even if it tore at her heart.

"Chuunin," Jun said, his voice low and deep and a peculiar contrast to the blasting feel of his chakra. He sounded like he wasn't out for anything more strenuous than an early morning stroll. He felt like a Jounin in a war zone might. "Who can tell me what Chuunin are?"

A perplexed silence rang through the room at that question. Ino blinked, baffled.

What was a Chuunin?

Why would he ask that?

Around her she could feel the other Genin muttering to each other. What sort of question was that for a proctor of the Chuunin exam to ask?

Ino's mouth felt like it was full of cotton.

She could think of one answer to his question and she hated it. Loathed it. Suspected from the feel of his thoughts that it was one that he wanted.

"What's that supposed to mean?" demanded a boy.

"Chuunin are mid-ranked ninja," said a girl indignantly. "You don't even know that?"

"Leaders!" Midori chirped. "To handle the command of everyone below them and to know enough to work on equal status with other Chuunin."

"The backbone of a shinobi village's force," Kankurou said, sounding surly. "Jounin handle the toughest missions and Genin handle the easiest. Chuunin's jobs are more varied."

Jun gave no indication he heard any of the answers. Ino suspected he was waiting for something.

"Bodies," Ino said, her voice shockingly loud to her own ears. A sudden silence fell and she couldn't tell if the silence was in her head or outside of it. "That's what we are. We just haven't had the decency to lie down and die yet. Any active ninja is that."

Jun stared at her and Ino shivered, feeling cold, from the force of the mind behind the gaze. To her side she heard Midori chirp, 'That's my friend!' proudly. It didn't matter. Little did, except that she had the sinking, swooping knowledge that she was right.

"Very good, Kunoichi-chan," he said, at last, tilting his head to her in acknowledgement. "A well-scored point to Konoha. Congratulations."

Ino swallowed hard. He could have said something as innocuous as 'the weather is fine today' and made it sound threatening. This sounded like a death wish.

But it felt like he was pleasantly surprised.

She lowered her eyes, clenching her hands, and he went on speaking over the murmurs that had erupted around the room, like scattered starbursts of noise.

Sakura leaned towards her. "Are you okay?"

Ino rummaged in her reserves for a smile. It was a pitiful one, she thought, from the way that Sakura's eyes tightened. That was too bad Ino thought dispassionately. She didn't have the energy to give any more of herself to the smile right now. As Jun carried on, his attention off of her, she could hear the voices underneath her, still screaming. It was the last thing she needed at this junction.

But if this exam was so easy... That had never been her luck, in her meager experience. "As good as I can be," she replied, her voice barely a murmur. "Just... uncomfortable."

Sakura didn't look convinced but then, really, had their places been switched, neither would Ino have been. That was pretty pathetic, all told. "I'll let you get away with that for now," she whispered back, "but seriously, we need to pull it together. We got through the last exam by the skin of our teeth."

"But we got through," Ino pointed out, almost reassured by that fact as she spoke it. "And we'll get through this. Besides," she added, "luck runs in the family. Ain't you never heard that before?"

That heard her a wince from Sakura for her butchering of the language. Ino didn't much care.

"...all right," the proctor of the third exam was saying, "now on to the main event. Pardon me the digression but you'll see why it was necessary."

Ino felt a moment's fleeting panic. What had been necessary? She exchanged a glance with Sakura, who looked equally wrong-footed, then glanced further back to Chouji. He mouthed the words 'I'll explain later' at them and some of the tightness in her chest eased. It was alright. Even if she didn't know what was coming next, one of them did. That was fine.

It was sloppy.

She didn't care. It was as good as she was going to get for the moment. Until they either put more distance between her and the dying shinobi below or the same shinobi stopped making noise. If she was at home, she'd have been able, and maybe even willing (though she doubted this, even as she thought it) to bow out of the exam, voluntarily disqualify herself, and put her mind in her father's hands so he could help her.

But her father was countries away from her and she couldn't let Konoha down, in anyway but especially not voluntarily, by walking out on the exam. Not here, not now. Ino grimaced slightly. Truthfully, she did not think it would do her any good. Midori was still bubbling-Ino could hear her, but she could see the way the other girl was bouncing on her feet and using her hands to emphasize her words as she talked-on about something and Ino had a funny feeling that if she walked out now, it would be ugly.

In many senses.

"You're tired," Jun announced, "or most of you are. You're unsettled. You're dirty and sweaty and most of you want to do nothing so much as shower and sleep right now. Congratulations, we're just beginning and you're going to wish for more by the time we're done." His smile was as sharp and cold as his mind. "Maybe you'll even have the decency, as Miss Konoha Kunoichi-chan said, to lie down and die."

Ino flushed miserably. Sakura grimaced.

"We'll make it," Chouji told the both of them.

They nodded in unison. Ino wondered if Sakura believed it any more than she did.

She didn't ask.

She didn't want to know that badly.

Even after the proctor entered the room, Neji kept his head carefully bowed, his loose hair (he'd taken it out of its hair-tie) falling forward to mask the fact that his Byakugan was active. He doubted it would be taken well if someone saw him using it freely and prudence was, if not always, then frequently, a guest he entertained.

There was plenty to be seen that was unseen to most eyes. He studied the way that Ino's chakra coils were pulsing irregularly, wondering what it was that she had active, to do that to them. It was obviously a jutsu of some sort but he had no way to ascertain what she was using.

The chakra signatures that he could, just barely, see beneath the ground were filed away with a silent prayer. They'd done their best and failed and were paying the price even now. It was a harsh one, but as Jun went on to explain about how all shinobi balanced one kunai away from death at all times, Neji thought it was one that, if they understood this, they would understand their deaths the same way.

Though perhaps that is easier to think when it's not you, left to contemplate your death by suffocation… Neji conceded that had merit. He hoped they found some sort of peace and turned his attention to studying the proctor's chakra.

The proctor's questions flew, like darts, and Neji let them pass over his head. If his goal was to unsettle the prospective Chuunin then he was doing, Neji thought, an excellent job on a number of teams but it was nothing to him.

Though Ino's answers to the questions and the way her chakra was still tangled and out of control intrigued him.

"He's putting on a show," Tenten murmured, too quietly for anyone but him and Lee to hear. "But what for? That question's no joke."

"The Chuunin Exam isn't a joke either," Neji said, his voice as frosty as the room was becoming. Tenten looked the worst off, though he could feel the creeping chill as painfully as she could. Lee, with his poorly developed chakra coils was unaffected by the jutsu.

"No," she said. "It's not. But what requires this much preparation?"

"A test that will be worthy of our skills," Lee offered and Neji didn't have to turn his attention to him to know he was grinning at the thought. It was right there in his voice. "One that will leave only the best standing."

"That's the whole point of the exam, idiot," Tenten snapped. "Of course it'll be like that. The question is-why is he doing it this way?"

"Who knows?" Neji said, keeping his head lowered and the Byakugan active. "It doesn't matter, though. We'll get past this."

Tenten and Lee both nodded the affirmative to that. In this, there were no arguments between them. Neji let them discuss the cold quietly, Lee trying in vain to feel it, and Tenten trying to figure out how to damp down her chakra enough that she didn't feel it.

Neji ignored the cold, though he suspected he'd be stiff once he stood up, and kept watching the other teams. Ino's chakra was a bright star in his vision, Sakura's looked muted-she was tired-and Chouji's steady and strong. He rather thought that they had a good chance of making it through the next exam. He hoped they would. There would be no time to talk to Ino about her chakra until they had made it through, one way or another. But I don't think her chakra is supposed to be doing that, he thought. And while I should take advantage of her weakness, I will not.

If they'd been in Konoha, it would have been different. But the Hokage had been right when she'd picked out these teams. They were Konoha's strongest chances of making it through the exam. As much as possible they were to refrain from sabotaging one another.

If our team comes across you, Neji thought at Ino, never suspecting that she might be able to hear it. Then we'll take you out. But if we don't, we'll not hinder you either.

And across the room he watched as Ino nodded. He wondered if she'd heard him then dismissed it as she turned to Sakura and Chouji-no doubt one of them had said something.

But he couldn't ignore the fact that, as she turned, she watched him.

Neji's words, directed specifically at her, were like nails being hammered into her head. She nodded, more out of a desire to keep him from still talking to her, and then looked at Chouji and Sakura, though her gaze lingered on Neji for a few moments as she did so.

"Sakura, Chouji," she said, through lips that were tinged blue, that was how cold she was, "do either of you know anyway to tamp down chakra?"

Neji's thoughts had been intent. She'd heard them like he was shouting at her. Ino didn't, couldn't, know what else he was thinking of talking to her about, but what she'd gleaned from his mind could be put to use. She had no intentions of letting it go to waste.

Ino kept half her mind on the proctor. He seemed content to watch and wait and study them than actually giving the exam. It was unusual but she was glad for the chance because it would give her the time to, maybe, fix this.

"Like what?" Sakura said, frowning. "To hide it? You know how to do that."

Ino shook her head. "Not that," she said. "More... to interrupt it."

"Why?" That was Chouji, of course, cutting to the heart of the manner.

She tried hard not to read either his or Sakura's thoughts. It was one thing to get Neji's when he was practically shouting them at her. It was another thing to steal them from two of her friends.

"I need to interrupt my chakra flow," she said through gritted teeth. "I've got something active and I don't know how to close it down."

"How is that even possible?" Sakura hissed.

"Ino," Chouji said, "what's active?"

She ignored both their questions. "Do either of you know how to interrupt it?"

They were silent for a moment, and another, while Ino struggled to keep her mind away from them. Neji's thoughts were no longer directed at her. The proctor was amused.

The Genin under her feet were still screaming, still pleading.

The proctor snapped his fingers. Genin all through the room snapped their gazes around to stare at him.

Ino kept her gaze on the floor and swayed alarmingly.

The Genin below her feet had all been silenced. Dead, she thought weakly. But all at once?

Who would kill so many of their own like that? Ino wondered, staring down in horror, even as Chouji steadied her on one side before her weakness could become too obvious to other teams.

"What is it?" Chouji murmured.

Ino just shook her head, mouth clamped shut. She didn't dare open her mouth right now. Instead, she leaned into him, shivering and was glad when he let her. He felt much warmer than she did. So much so that it was unfair, Ino grumped with the part of her that still could think about such trivialities.

Sakura watched them with a closed off expression on her face. Ino tried hard not to read her mind, looking away from her before catching her eyes, in case that helped. There was no getting away from the overwhelming feeling of loneliness, though, and Ino wished she could help and knew she couldn't.

After all, she still had a team.

"Chouji," she said, when she thought she could speak without thinking too hard about what had happened beneath their feet, "I really need to interrupt my chakra. Right now."

She could feel his concern and his doubt and his voice was somewhere between the two when he spoke. "Ino," he said, his eyes scanning the room, "we're being watched by everyone. If we do that, everyone is going to know."

Ino grimaced. It was a good point. One she should have thought of herself but thinking her own thoughts was becoming increasingly difficult—why was that girl over there, with the long dark brown-red hair mulling over some Jounin named Takahara Jun?—Renjiro was upset about something; he could join the club-and Midori's thoughts were more like paint-splatters of neon colour; bright and senseless and deeply terrifying—the Jounin Proctor was amused, deeply.

And there was nothing, no one, beneath their feet anyone longer that had anything resembling thoughts. They'd been silenced. Murdered.

She knew all of that. As well as she knew her own name.

Sorry Dad, she thought, knowing he wouldn't be able to hear it at this distance. I'm calling this a total fail in shielding.

The worst part was, she didn't know how to stop it by anyway other than totally fucking with her chakra system.

"I need to," she insisted, "as soon as possible. I can't explain why, Chouji, it's so far under the Confidential, even this is skirting the edges."

His face went grave. Neither of them would lie about something concerning the Clan Confidential, even when they'd lie, with good cause, about everything else under the sun. It was too important.

"As soon as possible," Chouji said, narrowing his eyes at the exam proctor, who had fallen silent and was just observing the Genin while they with varying degrees of stealth observed him back. "Once the next exam starts. Hopefully that'll give us enough freedom that something like that won't be immediately noticeable." He looked at her. "Can you hold on that long?"

No! Ino thought. Out loud, though, she said, "I'll don't really have a choice, do I?"

Which wasn't a proper response and he squeezed her arm sympathetically before a loud gong rang through the room, shaking through her body from her head to her toes and setting off echoes in the thoughts as she tried to deal with hearing everyone else experience the same thing.

Chouji's grip was hard enough to bruise. It was a good thing—otherwise she'd have fallen. They turned, like the rest of the Genin, to look at the platform where the proctor was.

The Chuunin Exam Proctor sat down, smiling thinly, and said, "Welcome to the third part of the Chuunin Exam."

He said nothing else as murmurs erupted all around the room, Ino wrapped her arms around herself and tried not to think about anything but the fact that while it had been cold already… it was getting much, much colder.

Colder with every heartbeat.

Ino shivered uncontrollably as Sakura blew on her hands.