Therefore, while he publicly scoffed at the idea that a year had passed for Naruto within a single minute, he had listened and not entirely dismissed the concept.
"He's what?" said one of the clan elders. "The foxboy?!"
"Now the beginning of a clan with hijutsu of its own, possibly a bloodline," mused Hiashi as he used Byakugan to monitor his daughter making lunch. Not that it was anything unusual in that respect, just that there were things going on at the moment that were such that he was considering Hinata in something of a new light.
"That's completely unacceptable," said the elder.
"Perhaps," said Hiashi Hyuga, betraying no sign of inner conflict. "I'm recommending a neutral outlook for now. It is simply best if we watch and observe how best to make use of the changing circumstance."
Kakashi slouched as he regarded his genin team. Now, a day after having been zapped into unconsciousness, he was having to re-evaluate certain things.
"So, dobe, what exactly can you do?" asked Sasuke Uchiha.
"Well, I've got Thunder element," said Naruto, "and Wind element. I've got some basic spells, but it's the ones that do massive amounts of damage I specialize at. I've also got Shadow Clone."
"So you mainly do Thunder-element ninjutsu?" asked Sakura. "And that genjutsu from earlier?"
"What genjutsu?" asked Naruto.
"She means the dragon," said Sasuke.
"There's no such thing as dragons," said Sakura, twitching a little.
"Actually I was trying to summon her son," said Naruto apologetically. "HIM I've worked with before."
"Summons are very handy," admitted Kakashi. "So, you can summon that friend of yours?"
"Oh yeah," said Naruto. "If there's a specific need. You wanted teamwork, so I thought it would work out."
"Well, we get to do D-Rank missions," said Kakashi, holding up a scroll. "This is today's."
"Alright, is it some awesome mission? Something where we can show off our skills?" asked Naruto. "Where I can use my magic and get some practical experience? Or at least blow something up?"
"Painting fences!" said Kakashi, smiling behind his mask.
Dead silence from all three.
"Painting fences?" eventually asked Sasuke.
"Yes, that's it exactly," agreed Kakashi.
"We have to paint fences while fighting off vampire cows or mutant soldiers or something?" asked Naruto hopefully.
"Not so much, no," said Kakashi.
"Defending our paint cans from enemy mages, err, ninja?" asked Naruto, losing a bit of hope but still trying.
"Not that either," said Kakashi. "Painting fences. There's some fences over on the East side that the paint's gotten a bit faded on."
The next day:
"Weeding an herb garden?" asked Naruto with a twitch.
"-and repairing a roof," pointed out Kakashi.
The next day:
"McNinja Burger?" asked Naruto with several twitches.
"Several people called in sick," pointed out Kakashi.
"It's not a strike from the 'Ninja Food Servers' Union is it?" asked Sakura. "That could be troublesome."
"No, nothing like that," lied Kakashi.
The next day:
"Catching a missing CAT?!" asked Naruto.
"You get to practice that one spell of yours again," pointed out Kakashi.
The next day:
Naruto heard Kakashi explain the mission, then just folded his legs to sit down on the grass and sulk.
"Trash pickup?" asked Sasuke with some disbelief.
"Part of the 'Keep Konohagakure Clean' campaign," explained Kakashi.
The next day:
"That cat AGAIN?!" asked Naruto with several twitches.
"This time, try not to use electrical attacks," warned Kakashi. "It took over a day for the cat to stop twitching."
The next day:
"Delivering takeout?" asked Naruto.
"Do a good job and you might get tips," pointed out Kakashi.
The next day:
"Delivering takeout AGAIN?" asked Naruto with a twitch.
"This time, Naruto, use a Sexy Jutsu and you might get tips instead of having customers deny delivery," appended Kakashi.
The next day:
"How many times does that damn cat go escaping?!" asked Naruto.
"And don't blow the target up this time," cautioned Kakashi.
The next day:
"No!" declared Naruto. "I want a REAL mission."
"Feeding chickens, slopping pigs, milking cows," said Sakura. "How can Sasuke show off how cool he is with THAT sort of mission?"
The next day:
"While we wait for Sakura to be released from the hospital," said Kakashi, breaking the somber mood of the morning, "we have a mission."
"Who would have thought taking over for a sick farmer would be that hazardous?" asked Naruto.
"We were all doing fine until she tried to milk that bull," pointed out Sasuke.
"If you hadn't gone shirtless while plowing that field," countered Naruto.
"I was trying to let the shirt dry," pointed out Sasuke.
"Well, today's mission shouldn't be all that bad," interrupted Kakashi.
The next day:
"That would have been bad," pointed out Naruto. "Good thing I know protective spells and kage bunshin."
"This isn't going to be another D-Rank that goes horribly wrong, is it?" asked Sasuke.
"Well, as long as we can keep the cat from hiding in the women's baths, it shouldn't be a problem this time," said Kakashi, wincing at the Killing Intent coming off his two genin.
The next day:
"Glad you're back, Sakura," said Naruto as he glanced at his teammate. "When will they remove the cast on that arm?"
"About a week from now," said Sakura. "Sasuke! Can you sign my cast?"
"What's today's lame mission?" asked Sasuke of Kakashi, ignoring Sakura.
"You'll like this one," said Kakashi confidently. "There's absolutely no chance of anyone getting injured for one thing."
The next day:
"Okay," said Kakashi with a twitch. "With Sakura having a cast on her arm and another on the leg now, we're going to have to make allowances."
"Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee," said Sakura, spinning around on her chair.
"Not to mention how heavily medicated she is," noted Sasuke drily.
"I've never seen squirrels attack someone like that," admitted Naruto. "Much less cooperate like that."
"Well, they WERE ninja-trained attack squirrels," pointed out Kakashi.
"S-s-s-squirrels?! WHERE?!" asked Sakura, now hiding behind Sasuke and peering nervously in all directions.
"Don't worry, Sakura, the nasty squirrels are all gone," said Kakashi as calmly as he could. "Naruto killed them all."
"Sasuke fireballed a bunch of them," pointed out Naruto.
Sasuke nodded at Naruto, acknowledging the credit.
"Well, today's mission is a little dangerous," said Kakashi, "so we'll be leaving Sakura to watch the cart while we go rat-hunting."
"Daisy, daisy,
Give me your answer true,
I'm half-crazy,
Falling in love with you..." sang Sakura.
"Couldn't we leave Sakura at the hospital?" asked Naruto. "She's running out of limbs to break."
Kakashi considered that for a few minutes, eyeing the casts Sakura had on three limbs, the bandaging covering about half of her head, and the heavily medicated idiotic grin on her face. "You might have something there."
"I'd ask that we not be given a completely lame mission this time, but I'm becoming convinced that the universe has it out for us," said Sasuke. "If Naruto didn't have homing attacks and flight, just those berserker rats would have become a problem."
"Well, this time we can leave Sakura on the cart, parked further away from the worksite, and do something you might consider fun," said Kakashi. "You get to demolish a building so that a new one can be built."
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(Posted Wed, 07 Apr 2010 19:16)
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