-1 Seedlings of the Future

Chapter 1: Rise Genin and Meet Your New Masters

A new day dawns over the Hidden Village of Stone. As the sun rises more and more movement is able to be seen. The Ninja village is a blustering with movement by the time a rooster crows. In the outskirts of the village above a small inn a young boy lays asleep in a chair with his head laying on books strewn about a small wood desk.

"Ryo, wake up its time for breakfast." A females voice calls up the stairs into an attic loft. "Ryo your food is getting cold." The boy hearing the voice begins to snap out of his dreams and sleep back into the real world. When he sees the sun outside the window he immediately hops to his feet and runs about the room changing clothes.

"I'll be right down" He says grabbing a red shirt and a headband carrying the symbol of his village on it. As he throws the shirt over his head you can see the symbol for "light" in white on the back. He reaches the stairs and jumps down the first flight and turns and jumps down the second flight to reach the ground floor. Running out the door he grabs a couple rice balls and slams the door behind him.

On the other side of the village a young Genin female is walking on her own. The young girl walks towards the center of the town with her hands in the pockets of her green cargo pants. Her emerald eyes focused on her ninja headband wrapped around her left arm. She wears a black fishnet vest over her green short sleeved T-shirt. As she walks her black ponytail bobs in the wind and she walks with almost a skip in her step. Ahead of her she sees a coin laying on the sidewalk. Walking up to it she looks around to see if someone dropped it. As she bends over it suddenly changes into a huge spider and jumps at her. Taken back she jumps back and stomps on the creature and lets out a scream. "Komaru I'm gonna kill you… you jerk." From up in a tree the sound of a boy laughing hysterically is heard. "Come down here so I can kick your butt all the way to the school."

"Oh c'mon Ayame it was just a joke…. And besides if you beat me up who's gonna walk with you every day?" The voice from the tree says.

A boy wearing a long black hooded coat jumps down from the tree. He pulls back his hood and flips the coat open to reveal short blonde well kept hair sapphire eyes and a very slender body barely. He is shorter than Ayame and under the long coat he has his bodied tape tight with black bandages and some of the older bandages hang loosely off. His crimson pants hang loosely on the boys lower body and a belt hangs slightly off to his right side and his ninja headband hangs off of it. The boy smiles mischievously at her as he lands right next to where she squished the spider.

"Well I guess its off to be separated." The boy cracks as he starts walking towards the school with his hands behind his head. Realizing the implications of what he just said Komaru's trademark smile is wiped from his face for a second, but recovering nicely he adds "I guess its up to someone else to keep you from tearing the head off your teammates."

"Yeah and I guess someone else is going to have to keep you from getting yourself killed when one of your pranks goes wrong." the fiery youngster. The two of them talk as they walk towards the center of the town. They see all the other Genin running to the schoolhouse to get the scroll with instructions on where to meet their Jonin Senseis. The two friends take their time knowing that the next few minutes could be the last they get to spend with each other until they are finished with their training and take the chuunin exam. The two walk into the class room where they spent most of their youth. On the desks where they both used to sit is a scroll each. The both pick up the scrolls and walk towards the door without a word. Once they reach the outside they both run off their own way.

Ayame runs towards the edge of town wondering where her lessons are going to take place. She finally stops just outside one of the many parks that fill up a majority of the villages eastern outskirts. She feels excited about what is in store, but still feels the hurt of leaving her long time friend on his own. Pushing the sadness aside she unravels the scroll and begins to read.

"So I'm headed out of the village to the north….an old trading post." Ayame Thinks to herself rolling the scroll back up and running towards the north edge of the town. The long path down the north edge of the village takes her almost an hour to finish. She starts to get tired and a bit hungry. Yet she pushes on to make the old shack that was once a trading post in less than ten more minutes. Ahead of her she sees a boy in tan cargo pants and a red shirt. "Oh no I can't be paired with him can I?" Ayame thinks as she slows down afraid that her eyes weren't deceiving her. Standing proud and tall she walks straight up to the boy who has his head down in almost a sleep like state resting up against the remains of a fence.

"Well if it isn't Hideoshi Ryo, so how's the life of an outcast treating you these days?" Ayame says folding her arms.

"Huh?" The boy says snapping out of his trance. Without looking up he replies to the young Genin. "Oh Ayame, great looks like they paired the outcast with the psycho."

"What did you just call me you little punk?" Ayame replies clenching her fist right in front the boys face.

"Never mind I was just making an observation to myself."

"Yeah that's what I thought, you have no backbone I ought to kick your…"

"Hey no need to fight over me you two, I will help you both with your Jutsus." The voice of Komaru comes from behind Ayame and she turns to see the skinny Genin standing there with his usual smile. "So I guess the gang is all here, at least they paired us all with people we like. Imagine if you two didn't get along that would make my life so much more difficult." Komaru says poking fun at the both of them. Ayame runs over and gives her friend a hug and then smacks him.

"That's for not telling me you were here sooner."

"What would the fun have been in that?"

The three Genin sit around silently waiting to see who their Sensei is going to be. Suddenly something cuts through the air and the three ninja all dive out of the way as a shruiken explodes in a ball of light. When they can see again they slowly look up at a tall man wearing the typical clothes of the village's Jounin. Black cargo pants, a Green vest and a red shirt underneath. The only unique things that set him apart from most of the Jounin the ninja had seen was a red scarf and he wore glasses. Yet he seemed young compared to most Jounin. The only of the three that recognized him was Ayame. She recognized his eyes and his long brown hair. She recognized the Jounin she had a poster of in her room. "Oh my god, oh my god, oh my god." The young girl thinks as her cheeks blush. "its … its …" before the young girl could finish her thoughts the Jounin introduced himself.

"I am your new teacher, you can call me Hayate sensei." The man says looking down at the three of them. "now if you could please get up off the ground so we could start training I would appreciate it."

The three Genin hop straight to their feet and stand tall before their Sensei. He walks up and down the short row looking at them all. The only one wearing their headband around their head is Ryo. "Well at least they all didn't forget their headband. That would have been embarrassing." The Jounin thinks to himself as he stops in front of them and drops the bag he is carrying. Bending down he pulls out three black undershirts and throws them to the young Genin. As they each catch their undershirts they can barely stand, the undershirts seem to weigh a lot more than they look like. Next Hayate pulls out ankle bands and walks over to Komaru first and hands them to him. The small genin falls right to the ground from the weight of the clothes. Next he hands them to Ryo who handles the weight but can barely stand. Finally he hands them to the blushing girl with a weird smile on her face. Ayame not to be outdone by Ryo stands firm.

"You all don't have to stand and hold them all day… you can go put them on." With that Ayame walks into the old trading post and slams the door on the face of Ryo and Komaru.

"Girls only sorry boys." Ayame says locking the door behind her.

"Your friend is insane, you know that don't you Koma?" Ryo says under his breath.

"Maybe, but it makes my life more fun." Komaru says with a smile and a laugh.

Ten minutes go by and Ayame comes out. The boys are sitting down as she walks out.

"About time, I thought you got lost in there." Komaru jokes as she sits down beside them.

"Well you don't expect a girl to just throw something on and not check it out in the mirror do you?"

"Since when have you cared about your looks?" Komaru says surprised and for his troubles he receives a stiff elbow to the ribs from Ayame. "What I meant to say is you don't need to worry about your looks." Komaru corrects himself rubbing his ribs.

"That's what I thought." Ayame says with a smile.

From the trees Hayate Sensei walks into view. As he approaches the youngsters start to get up but he motions with his hands for them to stay seated. He walks up and leans on the fence remains next to them. "You can all stay seated for another few minutes, but I thought you should know. Your next test starts now."

Hey there readers. This is everyone's favorite Genin Ayame here. I can't wait to finish our exam and spend some time with Hayate sensei… Isn't he just so… anyways back on subject. Anyways I have to get going looks like the next test is starting.

Next episode: The strength of The Pack