![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Entry tags:
Teamwork 3, scene 2
Scene's still unfinished, but I reached a natural pause so yay.
Sakura took exactly seven steps at the bottom of the canyon where the other genin teams waited before she -- or more exactly, her stomach-and-groin area -- attracted her first "wait, what?" look. She had a moment of paranoia; but Naruto and Sasuke had repeatedly assured her that they couldn't even see the bulge she thought she'd noticed in her mirror. She couldn't have gotten a baby bulge in ten minutes; the answer must lay elsewhere. The ninja's eyes looked normal, though... But when he opened his mouth to notify his teammates, Sakura saw that his tongue was forked. She guessed he could taste the air, like a snake. So that was one tracker already, and she hoped his bloodline didn't somehow mimic the venom as well.
"Sasuke-kun," she warned quietly.
Sasuke nodded, giving the forked-tongued guy a quick glance, and went back to his scrutiny of the area once again. On her other side, Naruto strolled casually, fingers laced together behind his head. It had been innocently cocky as a kid; now she thought he was cockily provoking people, and enjoying it beside.
"Oh hey, I see a Konoha headband this way!"
Sakura looked, past a few dozens of strangers whose appearance ranged from harmlessly, hopelessly civilian to -- there was no better description -- total freaks. She could see Rain, Sand, Grass, Waterfall, and even a couple of moon symbols. There was a Moon country now? She hadn't known. Ages seemed to range from fifteen to around twenty, older even.
"Heyyy, Konoha guys!"
Rolling her eyes, Sakura followed Naruto, Sasuke right on her heels. At least this time he hadn't challenged the whole assembly.
The Konoha genin were young, Sakura noticed. There was a tall one, but he was still lanky; the little tuft of neither-blonde-nor-brown hair on top of vaguely greenish camo clothes made him look like a reed. The second one was a shrimp, pure and simple, cheeks still a little pudgy, eyes a little awed. The third, the girl, was slender, still not that shapely; but she had a long fall of sleek dark hair, tied at elbow height, that probably indicated feminine pride, and a more mature mind than her teammates'.
"Hi, rookies. Having fun yet?"
Naruto received a cold, quite unamused Hyuuga glare in answer. "We're not rookies."
Sakura sighed, and elbowed Naruto out of the way. She thought she recognized the girl now. "You're Hinata's little sister, aren't you? Hello." Sakura's first thought was that it couldn't be right, she was still too young for a Chuunin exam -- but she looked to be around thirteen, and Team Seven had been that age -- a little younger, even. And it had been six years since then.
Hanabi gave her a reserved look, but at least she didn't glare. "Yes. You are?" she added, with the ingrained haughtiness of the high-born.
"Haruno Sakura, this is Uchiha Sasuke, and Uzumaki Naruto. We were in Hinata's class at the academy."
The reedy boy shouldered his way in front of Hanabi and gave Sakura a would-be suave grin. "Hi there! It's a pleasure to meet you. I'm Yamanaka Inoru, and the dwarf is Keu. So I take it this isn't the first time the three of you participate in an exam?"
Hanabi didn't even glare at him -- Sakura almost missed the way her foot moved, just enough for the Yamanaka boy to trip on it.
"Hey! What are you doing!" he hissed under his breath.
"What are you doing?" Hanabi retorted, not even bothering to pretend to be quiet.
"Pumping them for info, duh! -- uh, I mean. Eheh."
Naruto burst out laughing, and Sakura stifled giggles in her hand. "Um... Sorry, this is only the second exam we have participated in. And I'm sure the Fire Country ones are very different."
Hanabi scowled. "Second one? But I remember that guy beating up Neji-niisan back then, what have you been doing since?"
Sakura restrained the urge to grimace. "... Oh, this and that..."
The two boys looked interested. Oh, no. What was she supposed to say now? Naruto was scratching his head and grimacing guiltily; no help from this side...
From his stand at her back, Sasuke glanced at the kids, in a way that implied he found none of them worthy of much deeper interest. "Classified."
Hanabi snorted and gave him a glare that seemed borrowed straight from her older cousin's stocks. "Really? Because I was wondering if maybe you've just been doing nothing."
"Hey!" Naruto protested, at the same time Inoru did.
"Hyuuga, don't talk trash to our allies, damn it!"
Hanabi crossed her arms and gave him a glare that Sakura was sure could kill small woodland creatures at twenty paces. "They're not our allies. Or did you forget what the other stages are? We might have to fight them too."
Inoru huffed and crossed his arms, mirroring her position. "Not a reason to piss them off now."
Naruto sighed heavily and made a face at Sakura. "Do you think he's right? No need to piss off our allies now?"
Sasuke snorted. "If we get in a position to need a favor from those brats, I'd rather we just lose."
Sakura gave him a startled look, which turned outright alarmed when Naruto's pouty frown turned into a devious smirk. "Glad to see we're on the same page for once."
And then he grabbed Hanabi by the shoulders, tucked her against his side, and gave her a noogie.
Sakura expected the girl to send Naruto flying with Kaiten, she looked that angry; but apparently she had better sense than to use a secret clan technique in the middle of a gathering of enemies. The elbow she drove into Naruto's ribs was quick and merciless, though, but without the Jyuuken, she was a barely pubescent girl and Naruto a stocky teenager who, just that morning, had taken two of Sakura's rock-shattering punches and gotten back up.
Granted, there had been some whimpering.
"If you're done fondling children," Sasuke drawled.
The blond let Hanabi go and made a face at Sasuke, half-disdain and half-annoyance. "If I'm a pedo, what's that make you?" Hanabi bristled even more at his carefree loss of interest. Ooh, Sakura knew the type, ignoring them was even more of a mortal insult than actual insults.
"Are there any other teams from home around here?" she asked hurriedly, before another fight could erupt -- between Hanabi and Naruto, or between Naruto and Sasuke, either or; she had a feeling that Naruto was this close to mentioning Orochimaru and dragging his name in the two idiot boys' fights never ended well.
Hanabi's other teammate, the slightly pudgy one, looked relieved by Sakura's intervention. "Uh, yeah, two. One of them's even older than you -- I think one of the guys is even married."
"Oh, really?" she exclaimed dutifully. "That's weird!"
Naruto turned toward Sakura and the boys, successfully distracted. "Is the other one Konohamaru's? I haven't seen that brat in ages... They failed last year, didn't they?"
Inoru shook his head. "I hear their teacher kept them home. I think he's scared or something. He's kind of a pansy."
"Aw, crap." Naruto's shoulders slumped. "Would have been fun to have the brat around."
"Ebisu-sensei is not necessarily a pansy," Sakura corrected. "This exam is likely to be much more dangerous than they usually are, and they're usually pretty risky as it is."
Hanabi was still fuming; Sakura decided to keep it short. "Well, um, it was nice meeting you, but we're going to see if we know the other teams now, okay?"
Still grinning a slightly painful grin, she dragged Naruto away, following Sasuke through the crowd. Hopefully he knew where they were going, but as far as she was concerned, 'away' was a perfectly acceptable destination. Before they could get very far, a wave of murmurs swept the crowd, and all heads started turning toward one of the canyon walls, where a group of Chuunin perched on a ledge watched the participants. She could see a Jounin there, face covered with a cloth mask that resembled Kakashi's, making his way to the front of the group as he read through papers pinned to his clipboard.
"Huh." His voice wasn't loud, but it resonated through the canyon. Good acoustics, Sakura thought, and concentrated to memorize everything he was about to say.
"So it looks like our Mizukage-sama managed to wrangle a few concessions out of his allies..." he mused; from the annoyed murmurs around her, Sakura thought she wasn't the only one who'd heard the contempt underlining the word 'allies'. What kind of country was this, where they could insult friendly strangers so freely? "Managed to do away with that stupid 'can't get to the third stage without all your teammates' bullshit too."
"... He did what?" Naruto was in shock; Sasuke had only arched an eyebrow. Sakura felt her nervousness turn into foreboding. If losing one of their teammates couldn't disqualify people anymore, the second stage was going to be even more vicious than their first time. The only ways to get people out of the running would be to either scare them into giving up, or injuring them. Or killing them.
"... Bunch of pussies. Okay! This is what's going to happen for this test. Listen well, I'll only say it once."
"Yeah, yeah," Naruto muttered angrily. Sakura took his hand again and squeezed; he needed to actually listen, not listen while brooding about how much he already couldn't stand the guy. It wasn't the Jounin they were going to be fighting.
"There's a cave," the guy drawled, articulating as if talking to a bunch of five-year-olds. "You go through the cave, one team after the other. There's a stone with a secret message engraved on it. You memorize the message. You get out of the cave. And don't worry if something happens to you in there, we'll make sure to move you enough that your bodies won't tip off the next batch."
Sakura swallowed nervously.
Beside her, Sasuke gave a little shrug and crossed his arms casually. "Ibiki did that better."
"Huh?"
"The intimidation routine."
"Oh--" Sakura blinked, and then chuckled. He was right at that, the insulting contempt was a little over the top -- not that it just couldn't be natural for the man, but if he'd been chosen as an examiner, it was for, and not despite, that peculiarity. She was letting her worry about the new settings take over. It couldn't be too much harder, right? It was just the first test, and they'd gone through that one easily at age twelve. They'd go through this one fine, too, Mist-crafted or not.
no subject
I think i'm going to love this month cause there will be so much teamwork!! Woo hoo!
I loved it!
Favorite parts
"Hey! What are you doing!"/"Pumping them for info, duh! -- uh, I mean. Eheh."
And the boys admitting they'd rather lose in unison that get helped by little kids. Lololol.
no subject
(and there will be teamwork until I crash and burn, which might be sooner than expected. Also i'd like to write some on my mermaids and other fics at some point... .__.; )