Chapter four

Seven years after Naruto's recruitment, Naruto age: twelve

Naruto crouched, considering his next moves carefully. He had three opponents, each watching his every move as surely as he was watching theirs.

This was bad. He was severely handicapped in this free for all battle about to take place. His eyes fell on the eyes of the one holding the target.

She winked, a pretty little gesture. That was good. If she was on his side then the prize was as good as his.

He was forced to re-evaluate the situation when the fist passed inches from his face. Naruto snarled as he backpedaled away from the uppercut. Sai! When will you learn to hold back?!

The blonde didn't get far, when Sai grabbed his shirt and bodily threw him away from the group. The root nin, satisfied, turned to Hinata and lunged for her hand which held the most coveted prize; a custom-made Hyuga bento box stacked with goodies blessed by the gods.

The other contestants decided to join the competition. Sai betrayed not a flicker of emotion as he was tackled by Uchiha Hiroshi.

"Sasuke, take it!"

Uchiha Sasuke was already there, swiping and grabbing at the bento box, growing increasingly frustrated as the Hyuga heiress ducked and weaved through his attacks.

Sasuke was like a snake, his fingers seeking to grab onto the package like fangs. The Hyuga heiress was as graceful like a swan, as she never gripped the box once, instead letting it rest on the palm of her hand and it didn't slip off once.

At least until Naruto appeared between them, hands outstretched, slamming a palm into each of them. They flew apart, and the bento box was sent spinning vertically into the air, right above Naruto's head.

His heel raised as he coiled the powerful muscles in his leg to spring up and catch the box.

It was not going to be that simple. He growled in restrained anger as the sole of Sai's shoe ground itself into his face.

Use his face as a springboard? As of that moment Naruto was all out of mercy for Sai in their next Ne training spar.

"Didn't I tell you not to play these kind of games?" came the tired voice of their teacher, Iruka.

He still had the energy and precision to snatch Sai by the waist out of the air, and a second later, the bento box.

The rest of them smirked at each other, well except Naruto, who was spitting out the taste of what he believed was the toilet floor. The struggle for a Hyuga bento box was no game and it tasted sweetest when won through the harsh trials of fierce hard-fought combat.

"Iruka-sensei, you could never understand our passion," Hiroshi stated sagely.

The teacher rubbed the scar across his nose, "You're just lucky I can't punish you today. Hopefully your new sensei will beat some manners into you."

"Sensei, could you put me down now?" Sai asked dangling helplessly.

Iruka wordlessly let go and Sai would have used his skills to land on his feet gracefully, but a foot came out of nowhere and interfered with the ate a mouthful of dirt and the Uchiha twins sniggered while Naruto was suddenly fascinated in a cloud in the sky.

"Very mature," Hinata drawled sarcastically while Iruka just rolled his eyes.

"Break's over. Come in and meet your new team-mates."

As they were marched back to class by Iruka, Sai fell in step with Naruto. "I sense that we are still not even." His blonde friend turned to him and smiled. He then laughed, a laughter that came straight from the belly and was filled with amusement. The type a predator would feel when the easiest of prey tried to fight back.

It sent chills down the emotionless boy's spine.

Back in class, the room was filled with chatter as academy graduates gossiped and speculated on the teams they would be assigned to. It was like a normal day only the topic was on how their careers as soldiers of their village would begin.

Naruto listened to their chatter idly, catching snatches of their excited conversations. It was always the same. How they would be great, how they would make their family and/or clan proud or they would be unstoppable like the legendary ninja of old.

Naruto knew, that in terms of skill the highest most would achieve would probably be your average jounin. A select few would probably become Anbu. Naruto also knew that it was not skill that was needed to accomplish great deeds.

Towards the end of their days soon all would have an epic tale of their own to tell, that is all who lived long enough.

"I'm gonna be the greatest Hokage! Believe it!" Naruto heard the words, said with the voice he had been using for all these past years, yet he was distinctly sure he had not opened his mouth.

Blue eyes widened considerably and he sucked in a breath.

A boy stood on the desk, right before him and facing away. His posture screamed confidence with a will so strong Naruto was fixed in place staring in awe.

Before he could even think of reaching out to him, the image was gone in an instant and Minato was left wondering if he had seen anything at all.

"Naruto." Yes, that was his name. Not mine. My name is-

"Minato? Honey, are you ok?"

She was in his face, her bright green eyes staring directly into his. Brilliant blood red hair framed his vision. He reached out to touch it, to feel it, to inhale its scent.

That was when he realized there was a complete difference between her smell and this one.

It was a shockwave of pain that woke him up, with the origin being the point between his eyes. Pale lavender replaced green and dark purple took the place of red. Hyuga Hinata's face was a shade of red that matched the hair color of his wife in a different life.

"Naruto, if you don't mind I'd like my hair back." He let go as if he had been burned and leaned back slowly, waiting for the inevitable blow but it never came. The girl was all Hyuga poise and grace as she strode back to her chair stiff-faced, a chair which was 'coincidentally' way on the other side of class.

The class which had been the equivalent of a graveyard, chose that moment to erupt into chaos. Girls squealed and boys whistled. Hiroshi was thumping him on the back and Sai was taking notes. Sasuke was smirking at him with a raised eyebrow.

Before they buried him under a tonne of questions, Naruto decided a change of air was in order. Sai was probably the only unsurprised one when Naruto threw himself outside the window.

The blonde landed nimbly, but his legs shook with weakness beneath him. With a little speed he was round a corner away from the prying eyes of his soon-to-be former classmates.

"Minato," he whispered to himself, "you need to get a grip on yourself." He set a brisk pace back to his class. "I know you miss them, and seeing them here and there is fine and all, but..."

Naruto buried his face in his hands before using them to brush back his hair.

"You have to remember, they are not here."

Those words, he had to have said them so many times by now.

It had worked for a time. He had grown used to randomly seeing them walking hand in hand down the street, beside him in battle, in his bed.

The words...when they spoke, it was like a rock being drilled through his mind and soul exposing the raw emotions he kept hidden for so long.

Naruto knew if he let those emotions consume him, he could very well lose his way. How to face them without that happening was a question he doubted he would ever have an answer to.

The light from a window in the hallway blinded him slightly and he shifted, using his jaw-length bangs to shield his eyes.

It had been happening ever since he joined the academy. It had been the little one first, then she followed a while after. He didn't know why this happened. He had thought he'd let everything out when he visited the site where he and his family had made their last stand against the Demon Fox and cried his heart out.

Obviously something was still amiss.

But what?

He'd tried to fill the void with friends. He had made Sai into an emotionally awkward yet best brother a guy could ask for. If a boy and a girl could be best friends without other feelings attached, then Hinata and he had achieved that, though he wondered if she could look him in the eye without looking a little awkward. Sasuke and Hiroshi evened out his little group of friends nicely, Sasuke with his pseudo-normal behavior (when he wasn't brooding about revenge) and Hiroshi with his happy-go-lucky goofy attitude.

When friends are not enough, who or what does a back-from-the-dead-now-undercover-Root-operative-t hirteen-year-old turn to?

Naruto paused outside the door to his class. To save the world, yet keep my own world from collapsing. Not as simple as I thought it would be.

Iruka-sensei found him smirking at his own sarcastic thought.

"Naruto, what are you doing outside class?"

The lie came easily.

"I had gone to the bath-"

"No time. Get into class. The sooner I'm rid of you the better." The chunin teacher half-joked with a small smile.

Naruto smiled back, though his eyes were drawn to the group of ninja behind him. Jounin, all of them but one caught his eye in particular.

"Kakashi? You're early."

A masked jounin with spiky silver hair and his hitai-ate tilted to cover an eye yanked his arm from the grip of another jounin.

"Yeah, no thanks to him." he said referring to the brown-haired ninja whose dull eyes held a spark of satisfaction. "Do I know you?" he asked focusing fully on Naruto. "You seem to know me."

Naruto was spared from having to cover up for his slip when Iruka practically kicked him through the door. "We're wasting time!"

Thanks to Iruka, the students focused on the jounin rather than Naruto, something the blonde was unimaginably thankful for. He rushed back to his chair without drawing attention, to find Sai sporting a bruise on his cheek.

"You didn't?" Naruto said flatly.

"I did," Sai nodded, "Sakura's hair smells of peaches."

Naruto relaxed in his seat, "Right, analysis?"

"Data inconclusive, though I've made a hypothesis; Sakura may be distantly related to Tsunade, the Slug sannin."

"I don't know, but Sai may have a point. She slugged the guy hard," Hiroshi exclaimed with emphasis on the hard.

"Shut up you guys, I'd like to start my career without a punishment."

"I will call the names of the teams. I don't have to remind you to pay attention. Ask me what team you're on and you will regret it." Iruka's voice echoed over the classroom, full of authority.

The students tensed, some with their fingers crossed.

"Team one: Kagetora Sado, Shinji Toutaku, Matou Ikaruga. Your jounin sensei is Miyamoto Kakkò."

"Team two:..."

Team ten was the Ino-Shika-Cho reborn, the irony of seeing it again hitting him. Otherwise, it went on and on, much like his own had been, all those years ago. Then there had been a jounin sensei with silver hair waiting for him. Would it be the same this year?

"Team seven: Uchiha Sasuke, Uchiha Hiroshi, Hyuga Hinata. Your sensei is Hatake Kakashi."

Apparently not. Though he had to admit, it would have made life interesting if the teacher had ended up becoming the student in a whole new way.

Sasuke looked pleased he had not ended up with a bunch of idiots, while Hiroshi smiled like an idiot. Hinata looked a little put out though her smile was genuine when responding to the Uchiha twins looks.

It came to team twelve. Naruto had already noticed that it was only Sai and him left.

"Team twelve: Uzumaki Naruto, Sai. Your jounin sensei is Yamato."

Naruto raised an eyebrow, that meant some other genin lacking a team would probably be brought into theirs. He'd known he would be paired up with Sai. Konoha tended to preserve such dynamics. That his sensei would be the only survivor of Orochimaru's fanatical and cruel experiments was a surprise. Last he'd heard (thirteen years ago) the boy had been put into Anbu. The man now, well, he would admit the happuri-style forehead protector was cool.

"Be proud, all of you. As of now, you are genin ninja of the leaf, soldiers sworn to protect the village." Iruka turned towards the jounin and gave a short bow, "Please take care of them," he said smiling. He stood off to the side, the pride shining in his eyes.

One by one the jounin-sensei called their teams and the newly minted genin shuffled behind them. Team seven and twelve were the last in the room.

Kakashi and the brown haired jounin who had bee n dragging Kakashi, now identified as Yamato faced the five children.

"Team seven." Kakashi called out in a lazy voice.

"Team twelve." Yamato echoed.

"Meet us on the roof."

And with that, the two jounin were gone, twin clouds of smoke masking their disappearance.

The Uchiha and Hinata wore confused frowns on their faces.

Iruka chuckled awkwardly. "Just follow them, Kakashi does this every year."

"Every year?" Hinata asked, her frown deepening.

Iruka was gone in a puff of smoke himself, plainly avoiding the question. Naruto stood up, "Well, lets go."

When they arrived, they found the jounin talking like old friends.

"Ah Tenzo, I will take great pleasure watching you burn in the deepest pits of hell for making me come this early," Kakashi said as though he was speaking of the weather.

Yamato didn't mind apparently. All he said was, "Stop calling me Tenzo."

Arrayed before the two, Kakashi told them to sit on some steps.

"Ok, lets begin. I'm Kakashi, you can call me Kakashi-sensei. This is Yamato. We are your jounin-sensei respectively. Normally we wouldn't be together like this, but he demands that I show him how this must go or he'll use me for fertilizer."

Massive sweat-drops all round.

"I know, the threat is lame, but perhaps it will carry more substance for you cute little green genin."

"Here's how it will go. Introduce yourself and tell me your likes, dislikes, dreams and ambitions. Hyuga, you go first."

"A demonstration would be nice," Hinata half-asked.

Kakashi sighed, and mumbled about foolishness. "I'm Hatake Kakashi. Likes; don't have any. Dislikes; none of your business. Dreams and ambitions; hmm...I forgot. Your turn."

Hinata sighed and grumbled about foolish teachers.

"I'm Hyuga Hinata. My likes are my friends. My dislikes are my family and clan. My ambition is to be a ninja of the leaf first and foremost."

"Interesting," Yamato spoke up for the first time, "aren't you the heir to the position of Clan Head?"

Hinata didn't like the question from the way that she scowled at the man. It was as if he had just force-fed her something nasty.

"You wouldn't understand," she spat. Yamato held up his hands to show he wouldn't push further.

"Next Uchiha one."

That was Sasuke, "My name is Uchiha Sasuke. My likes are my brother, friends and training." Hiroshi put his hands right over his chest, putting on a touched expression.

"I'm still not telling you where the tomatoes are, dumbass."

Sasuke ignored him. "My dislikes are fan girls and people who cannot appreciate what they have. My ambition...is to kill my other brother."

Out of everyone present, Naruto's thoughts were perhaps the most unique.

Do you know I only saw him a few days ago? He misses you terribly by the way and wanted me to tell you that you should train to grow strong. How is he you ask? He's fine, though I think he's lost a few pounds which can't mean good things for his health. Otherwise he's ok, just living as comfortably as a missing nin who gave it all up for his village.

Kakashi didn't waste time in trying to lighten the suddenly tense atmosphere.

"Uchiha two, you're up."

Hiroshi's was brief, "Mostly the same as my bro, but my ambition is to rebuild the Uchiha clan."

Kakashi nodded, before giving Yamato a pointed look.

Yamato cleared his throat. "My name is Yamato. Though call me Yamato-taichou. My likes are botany. My dislikes are laziness and people who cannot respect nature. My ambition is to serve the Leaf to the best of my ability. Uzumaki?"

Naruto rubbed the back of his head in thought. "Well, my name is Uzumaki Naruto. Likes; friends, ramen, family, training-"

"Smelling girls' hair," Hiroshi teased. While Naruto's eye was twitching, the Uchiha knelt behind behind Hinata a lock of her hair in his hand. He took a very long, very exaggerated whiff. "Oh Hinata, be mine so that I may sniff your hair everyday."

Every male present flinched when the jyuuken strike connected with Hiroshi's lower abdomen. "I'd like to see you rebuild your clan now," Hinata huffed and turned away trying hard to hide the red on her face.

"Well, either way...damn that looks like it hurt. Sasuke you could help and lift you're brother off the ground." Naruto suggested.

"If he tells me where he hid my tomatoes, I may feel inclined to talk."

"Never" came the high pitched girly whine from the puddle of destroyed manhood that lay curled on the floor.

Naruto chuckled along with everyone else except Sai who gave a small amused smile. Friends did not fill the void, yet they came close enough that he did not mind keeping them. Also managing to make Sai smile was an achievement that he would not and could not allow to go to waste.

"My dislikes are...well, you'll learn about them soon enough. As for my ambition, to save as many as I can."

"From what?" Tenzo asked.

Naruto faced the man with a smile, "I don't have a definite answer for you, though we all need to be saved from something, don't we?"

Yamato looked him in the eye for the longest time, as if those two balls of flesh and fluid held all the answers.

"Your turn Sai."

The boy spoke like a machine. "I am Sai. I like drawing. I have no dislikes. My ambition...is to follow Naruto and help him accomplish whatever challenges he may face."

"Fag, hehe-ouch!" Hinata apparently did not appreciate touching moments being ruined by nasty comments.

"He does have a point though," Kakashi could not resist adding his two cents. "I should remind you, relationships among team-mates are not recommended."

Yamato nodded sagely, "It gets in the way of the mission." Plainly, he did not get the on-going joke.

The blonde wanted to kill someone. "Perverts, all of you. Dirty, sick twisted pervets."

"Well," Kakashi began, "this was fun. Now, tomorrow there is a genin test for you all to see if you truly deserve to be ninja of the leaf."

"Didn't we just graduate? We have hitai-ate and all." Hiroshi voiced the general question.

"I know, but its nothing to worry about really. After all the five of you did tie for rookie of the year. You've all caused quite a stir. Everyone's talking about it."

"So it should be simple enough for you to pass," Yamato added. "Uzumaki, Sai, meet me at training ground twenty tomorrow at six a.m. You'll meet your third teammate there also."

"Team seven, same time, training ground fourteen. Don't eat breakfast by the way."

Really? Tradition is well and good Kashi-kun, but you should try and mix things up a little.

When Kakashi saw Naruto's small smile, he felt a slight chill invade his body.

"Tomorrow then," and a cloud of smoke signaled his departure. Yamato gave them a nod and followed suite.

There was a moment of silence before Naruto stood up, followed by Sai. The blonde haired genin leapt up on the rail the jounin had been leaning on.

"Sai and I have some errands to run. I guess I'll catch you guys later?"

"See ya,"

"Hn"

"Naruto wait!"

That last one was Hinata. Naruto was surprised. The picture appeared so awkward. A shy Hinata?

"I wanted to thank you. Cause of you, I have good memories of these last four years."

"I should be thanking you Hinata," Naruto smiled. If she stuttered he would have quit ramen for a year, or a month, or a week. Most likely a day.

He turned to the others. "Don't get your hopes up, Naruto."

"Your welcome, Sasuke, Hiroshi."

He turned away, to face the village. Spread out before him, with its ninja hopping from rooftop to rooftop like fleas, he remembered that he loved it, same as all those years ago.

"Officially a ninja huh?"

It was sudden. It hit the ground in an explosion of dust and debris, fifteen feet tall and Naruto found himself staring into glass eyes.

"Hello there, Naruto asked dumbly.

Its arm came up, great and wooden, in a fierce uppercut that tore through the academy building like it was paper.

It went through the roof too, and as the ground collapsed under him, Minato's first thought was, not again.

Pairings undecided. Though definitely not anything between guys. Hopefully I'll update this sooner.