"Excuse me?!" asked Sasuke and Sakura.
"How do you spell 'incendiary cascade effect'?" asked Naruto, still filling out paperwork.
"The test was about teamwork," began Kakashi. "The only one who even tried to put the team first is the one least suited to working with a team."
"I ain't got no problems with a team," stated Naruto. "Some of this paperwork, on the other hand."
"Your main problem with a team is that you tend to explode things," said Kakashi.
"Oh, I can fix that," said Naruto, standing up and calling Mitternacht to one hand. "Enhance Range. Enhance Spell. Now."
[Prolific Forestation]
Sakura and Sasuke stared as trees suddenly began erupting from the burned areas, growing to huge size as they watched. Flowers began popping up and going to full bloom as if in time-lapse photography.
"Okay," said Naruto, sitting back down and picking up the paperwork again. "Where was it? Oh here it is. Number twenty-four: 'Why You Deemed It Necessary To Use Wide Area Effect Jutsu In A Training Area' - I have to list all the jutsu I've used. Hmmm."
"Uhh," said Sakura, twitching heavily.
"And that proves my point exactly," said Kakashi. "With you doing things like that, you don't leave anything for Sasuke or Sakura to do."
"Oh," said Naruto, looking up. "Uhm. What should I have left for them? Heck, it's been four years for me. I don't even remember what all they could do."
"Naruto! Knock it off!" said Sakura, feeling thoroughly upstaged, confused, and like Sasuke wasn't paying any attention to her at all. Of course, the last was justified in that Sasuke wasn't paying attention to her.
"I might consider passing Naruto and Sasuke, and tie Sakura to the post, but Naruto gave one bell to Sasuke and one to Sakura," said Kakashi.
"And you don't want to tie someone to the post when they've got a big pile of paperwork to fill out," guessed Sakura.
"So I'll just fail all of you," agreed Kakashi, disappearing in a poof of smoke.
"Well, THAT bites," said Naruto.
"Hnn," said Sasuke.
"Well, Sasuke, you want to go get lunch?" asked Sakura, trying to salvage the situation.
Sasuke plopped down at a ninety degree angle from Naruto before picking up one of the forms. "What the heck? 'Ninja Form 1055-D, Pursuant To The Wildlife Conservation Act'?"
"The path of a ninja is fraught with danger and paperwork," agreed Naruto.
Sakura sighed as her attempt at a consolation date fell through and flopped down herself across from Sasuke to pick a form off the stack.
"Question two," read Sasuke Uchiha, raising an eyebrow. "Number of small woodland creatures displaced. Question three: number of small woodland creatures destroyed."
"Environmental impact study of chakra release in area?" asked Sakura. "What is this?"
"Paperwork expands to fill all available time, plus about fifty percent," said Naruto. "A captain I knew said that. Very true."
"Huh," said Sakura, not sure how to respond to that. "So what now? Go back to the Academy?"
"Well, maybe," said Naruto. "Though I think maybe I'll take the TSAB's offer. Become one of their operatives. Go to other worlds, fight monsters, recover dangerous artifacts, do search and rescue, make a positive difference."
"So why did you come back?" asked Sasuke.
"This is home," said Naruto. "My dream used to be to become Hokage. Now... maybe I still could. And then there's Hinata."
"That was for real?" asked Sakura, still trying to figure out a question on the form. "I thought you were kidding."
"No, that was for real," said Naruto. "I'm not sure how to handle it though."
"What's to 'handle'?" asked Sasuke as he tried to make sense out of question #4.
"Well, for one thing, I know next to nothing about her," said Naruto. "It isn't official, anyway. Your Uncle Genma has no legal authority over me. Hinata's father made a bet regarding it, so she might feel forced."
"No," said Sakura. "She's watched you for years. She's not being forced."
"You'd think she'd have at least talked to me sometime," grumbled Naruto.
[Naruto. Astral Vision. Relay.]
"Huh, hang on," said Naruto, who closed his eyes and muttered something, thenn touched his eyelids.
"What's that about?" asked Sasuke of Sakura, who shrugged in reply.
"Sasuke, someone's here to speak with you," said Naruto, his eyes still closed. "I can use a guise spell and channel their presence. It's really draining though, so keep it short."
"You're what?" asked Sasuke.
"Someone who died and hasn't yet passed on has a message for you, they were attracted to this place by the high-level magic I was slinging around earlier," said Naruto. "If you accept the call, I'll channel them - briefly taking their appearance while it's going. Problem is it'll eat chakra to do it, so I can't keep it going for long."
"Uhm, sure, I guess," said Sasuke, not sure what to make of this. Prior to the large explosions and making trees sprout out of the ground, he would have thought this a prank. Now he wasn't so sure. "Who is it?"
Naruto stood, said a single name, and then blurred and shifted to exactly resemble the individual named. The only indication that this was Naruto was the staff still in hand. Well, that and the pale aura and transparency indicated something other than normality in the woman revealed.
"Mikoto Uchiha."
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(Posted Sun, 20 Jun 2010 05:37)
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