"I can't believe you were P-chan all along!" yelled Akane in righteous feminine wrath.
"A-A-Akane?!" squeaked Ryoga.
Despite expectations, Akane did NOT chase Ryouga out of the house while wielding any blunt trauma improvised weapons. She looked like she wanted to, but she didn't. She merely glared at him and when she spoke her voice was angry but controlled. "All those times I held you and you rubbed your head against my chest. Does Akari know about this?"
If anything, the controlled-angry Akane was more scary.
Ryoga drooped where he stood, clad only in a towel that Kasumi kept near the oven. "My life... is over."
Nabiki wanted to scream at Akane to kick him out of the house now before he did it.
"Perfect Shishi Houkodan," whispered Ryoga, practice taking over while his mind was occupied by doomsday scenarios.
The explosion was just as she remembered it, the pressure wave. The gas line rupturing under the pressure, the spark, the blast wave increasing in force.
The momentary blackness and waking up with an incredible pain in her chest and finding that there was a wooden shaft sticking up out of it.
She tried to speak again, to tell Akane to stop. Her sister dragged herself out of the ruins of the kitchen, saw Nabiki sprawled out - and pulled the piece of wood out of her chest. Blood began spurting everywhere.
Darkness again. Save that this time there was no voice offering friendship and a second chance.
Only darkness and cold.
"Wha?" asked Nabiki as she realized that she was still alive.
"Genjutsu," said a voice nearby.
Nabiki blinked and slowly lifted her head up from where she was lying on the ground. "Eh?"
Sasuke Uchiha was squatting nearby, looking fairly beaten up.
A blur formed and resolved itself as Iku before she could make out details. "He's fast, tough, and can summon crows. We need a strategy, none of us can beat him on our own."
"Why don't you just stab him from behind?" grumbled Nabiki as she slowly began the painful process of getting up. Really, she hadn't hurt this much the first time she was twelve.
"Those ravens, apparently he can see and hear whatever they do," answered Iku.
"I've been meaning to ask you," said Nabiki, dusting her clothes off once she was finally standing. "What kind of elf name is 'Iku' anyway?"
"My full name is Ikureilanidarurukina," said Iku. "Which basically means 'an unsightly spill of ink' in the local dialect of the dark elven nation. So I go by 'Ink' instead."
"Ikuraylay..." Nabiki gave it up as a lost cause. "What about Usagi?"
"Thrown into a bog he created by stamping one foot," said Iku. "I threw her a line then escaped when our jonin-sensei spotted me with one of his birds. I think I figured out the hidden meaning of the test."
"Which is?" asked Sasuke, not looking at her but simply scanning the brush.
"Teamwork," said Iku. "Our superior teamwork is stressed several times in history lessons."
"Teamwork," said Kara. "During my reading of the histories involved - that is brought up time and time again as one of the greatest strengths of the Leaf Village. Our shinobi cooperate more and compete less."
"Okay, so how do we get the bells?" asked Naruto. "He's too fast for me to catch even using the shadow clone technique and trying to mob him."
"I can match his speed," said Kara, "and I'm physically stronger than he is. Unfortunately, he can replace himself with a log and keeps replacing the bells with explosive tags when I do manage to grab them."
Trehawn Ghostflower sighed. "He's figured out that the typical genjutsu breaks will dislodge me if I'm trying to read his mind or influence him. All I can manage is temporary distractions using telepathy. Telekinesis is even more limited against him."
"He beat me like a drum at the matsuri."
Everyone looked surprised at where Ami had been sulking around the edges of their group.
Ami looked up from her own musing. "Get this straight. I'm only cooperating with you because if I don't get stronger, Sasuke will never acknowledge me. And the only way I can get stronger is if I pass."
"How many of those poison bombs you have?" asked Naruto.
Ami paused for a moment, then shrugged before answering. "Seven caltrops, three shuriken, fourteen senbon, two poison gas bombs - all are low grade paralysis poison. Three smoke bombs. One stink-em grenade. Two senbon with local serpent anti-venin. One kunai with medium grade paralytic."
"All that?" asked Naruto, sounding almost admiring.
"Forehead Girl took my 'best academic' status from me, and her friend gave me a fake 'poison bouquet' back when," said Ami, shrugging slightly. "I started studying poisons after that so I couldn't be tricked again. Turned out I'm good at that sort of thing."
"Okay," said Naruto, squatting and sketching in the dirt. "Let's see if this works. Trehawn, you lead in by trying to use your mindspeak to slow him down. He'll break it - but that gives Kara a chance to get in fast and grab the bells."
"He'll be on me immediately," noted Kara.
"Right, then Ami starts throwing smoke at him," said Naruto. "You'll just be trying to get away - while he'll have to try and find you. Kara gets out and away, meantime I use transformation and shadow clone to make a dozen copies of her so he doesn't know which one to chase. If we had more time, we could try luring him into a fuuinjutsu trap."
"But we've got maybe fifteen minutes in the test left," said Kara. "Okay. One chance at this. We all in?"
"Who gets the bells? There's two of them and four of us," noted Ami.
"Ami and Trehawn," suggested Kara. At the questioning gazes, she spread her hands and explained. "Ami wants to impress Sasuke. The only shot she has at that is if she passes this test."
"Gee, thanks," drily said Ami, not arguing the point though.
"Trehawn on the other hand has to get out of the Academy and be a genin just to do more work with the Yamanaka clan."
"True," admitted Trehawn. "There's only so much they can do while I'm just a student."
"Okay, so - any objections?" asked Naruto.
"Well, yes," said Kakashi, abruptly behind them. "You only have one minute."
At which point the alarm clock he had in one hand went off.
"Oh," said Kakashi. "Correction. You have no minutes."
"Would you believe that those are fake bells and we have the real ones?" asked Naruto.
"No. No I would not," responded Kakashi.
"Would you believe that we're all really shadow clones and we're in ambush of you at this very moment?" asked Naruto.
"No, I would find that hard to believe," admitted Kakashi.
"Would you believe that we've done a substitution, that isn't the real alarm clock and it's about to go boom?" tried Naruto.
"No, Naruto, I-" began Kakashi.
BOOM! went the stick-um bomb disguised as a clock, coating Kakashi in a layer of warm yellow sticky stuff.
POOF! went the shadow clones of assembled genin.
CRUNCH! went a little girl's fist, smashing into a log that was wearing Kakashi's flak jacket.
"Oh, I am REALLY beginning to dislike that substitution technique," noted Kara. "The log disguised as a ninja technique. That's the second time I've fallen for it today."
"On the other hand, that was pretty good teamwork," noted Kakashi from somewhere nearby but hidden.
"So, your team actually managed to pass?" asked Asuma as the waitress put their drinks down in front of them.
"Yes, though it took nearly an hour to get them to stop attacking as they were convinced it was all a sneaky trick to get them to drop their defenses," said Kakashi, swirling the bourbon-on-rocks in one hand.
Asuma Sarutobi considered that briefly before speaking. "You know. That does sound like something you'd do."
"How'd your teams go?" asked Kakashi.
Mako answered in his usually gravelly voice. "Fail. Oh, Tobio and Higure could have passed. Tobio is fairly competent if average, and Higure is exceptional in taijutsu and kenjutsu. It's just that the other two, Fuki and Kasumi, both waited until the two had their hands full fighting me and then went after their team-mates."
"Ouch," said Asuma. "Any injuries?"
"Higure got pissed off," said Mako. "After she got up from the initial attack, she went after the other two kunoichi."
"Ah, they survived?" asked Asuma.
"And are absolutely terrified of Higure at this point," noted Mako. "No choice though. Had to fail all four."
"As for my team, it went rather differently," said Kurenai Yuhi, putting her own half-finished drink down. "Shino wasn't entirely trusting of the two nonhumans, but they showed signs of cohesion and coordinated tactics. Given time, they may be able to manage some synergy."
"My team managed as well," said Asuma. "The Shiki-Ino-Cho teamwork managed to make an appearance, probably because the families are still close and so they understood the basics. The fourth member, Iljrene, mainly stayed clear of them and settled into a support role."
Shinobu made a face at his own drink. "Pass. Sheer luck near as I can tell."
"That's Usagi's skill," said Kurenai.
"Excuse me?" asked Asuma.
"Usagi, no last name, Viera. Apparently an idiot, but after observing her during an assignment I came to the conclusion that she's not so much an idiot but that she's a schizotypal personality disorder."
"A wha?" asked Asuma.
"A 'cloudcuckoolander'," tried Kurenai.
"Oh, one of those," said Asuma, nodding.
"Her special ability is 'Dumb Luck' - I saw her win a contest rigged against her by a store manager," said Kurenai. "That mindset is troublesome, they are unusually resistant to genjutsu because their mind functions a little differently than is normal."
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(Posted Sat, 15 Dec 2012 17:39)
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