Ka-thud!
"Dropping to the ground in exhaustion simply indicates that my training regimen has been effective," said Orchid. "You have the rest of the day off. Tomorrow morning you go back to the village and go on a C-Rank mission."
"Umf," commented Naruto.
"You've abused your shadow clones as I've directed," said Orchid. "While purely physical skills could really only be gained by your real body, the clones were adequate for ninjutsu, control, fuuinjutsu, and the research at your castle."
"Mff," agreed Naruto.
"Since your scent is the same, the training of the cute little forest creatures has proven that at least some species can be domesticated," said Orchid. "This is now been registered as twenty five D-Rank Missions. Congratulations I suppose. I would have gone with one, but they're so soft nowadays."
"Fuud," mumbled Naruto.
"Well, I suppose you can at least stock better food," admitted Orchid. "Back to the subject at hand, you'll be going on a C-Rank mission with Team 7. Mind you, if I catch you reading any of that Kakashi's orange books-"
Naruto looked up at the pause.
Orchid considered for a moment longer then shrugged. "I'll probably mark it up with corrections and commentary as to where he got it wrong. Though some of it is code."
"'Code'?" asked Naruto.
"Mostly harmless stuff, it's just that everyone expects him to put hidden messages and such in his books," said Orchid. "Ninja after all."
"Ah," said Naruto, not having any idea at this point what she was talking about.
"No, you need some downtime and to reconnect with people you might be working with in the future," said Orchid. "Myself - I work alone but that's an assassin's path."
"Team 7. That's Sakura's team," said Naruto as he slowly got up into a sitting position.
"Team 7 is composed of Kiba Inuzuka, Sakura Haruno, and Sasuke Uchiha," said Orchid. "Without asking them any personal questions, I want you to observe them. At the end of your mission, you're going to file a mission report and fill out a personnel file on each of them."
"Wha? Why?"
Orchid's eyes were cold as they turned on him again. "Is your goal to be Hokage?"
"Well, yes," said Naruto.
"Observational skills are something that any high ranking ninja needs," said Orchid. "You notice that stack of paperwork on the Hokage's desk? Paperwork is also a big part of the job. Any further questions?"
"No sir!" He didn't want to get tossed around this morning.
"Good. You'll be prepping for a two week at minimum assignment. Get started, and be aware I'm going over your kit to see that it's complete."
"Basic kit, fine," said Orchid, going over the laid out contents of the first scroll. They sold these at the store after all. Toothpaste, toothbrush, dental floss, razor - not that Naruto was old enough to need shaving, three small pots of various flesh-color pastes to cover distinguishing marks, deodorant - because nobody wanted to smell sweaty ninja trying to sneak around, trial-sized shampoo/soap, and so on.
"Only two sets of clothing?" asked Orchid, not looking at Naruto.
"I figure if I'm in a different area, I should look at getting stuff the locals wear," said Naruto, who had asked the two chunin researchers what they would pack for a mission away from the village.
"Good choice," said Orchid, not believing for a moment that Naruto had come up with that on his own.
Bedroll was separate, as those got replaced frequently. Spare blanket, thin wool treated with a water-repellant. Bug repellant spray. Climb cord, collapsible grapnel, collapsible three meter pole, deck of Polu cards.
"You don't play Polu," said Orchid. "It's an overly complicated gambling game involving specialized cards, where wildcards depend on phases of the moon and day of the week. Five suites, and the deck is 64 cards. Why are you carrying a deck?"
"Uhm. It was cheap," said Naruto.
"Don't even bother with it, not that many people play the game and gambling is one of the three ninja prohibitions," said Orchid, setting that to the side. "If you want to learn a game for various purposes, try: shogi, go, poker, chess, or senet. All of which could be useful to know when you're doing an infiltration or just pretending to be someone else."
"So those might be useful?" asked Naruto.
"Certainly," said Orchid. "There are times when you want to pretend to be a common mercenary, a civilian, or someone else even if you're not on an infiltration or assassination mission. Some clients don't want it known that they've hired ninja of a particular mission, or there are times when you'll operate in the territory of another nation and for political purposes you're keeping your identity quiet. Ah. You're not going to Snow so there's no reason to keep the cold weather gear."
"Okay," said Naruto, watching as that scroll was put off to the side.
"Summoning scrolls?" asked Orchid.
"I'm supposed to keep up training them on a daily basis," pointed out Naruto.
"I've arranged a special jonin to handle that," said Orchid. She left two though. "Your shadow clones learning fuuinjutsu have improved somewhat. Still need to work on some of that sloppiness. You do NOT want to have a repeat of that incident where you sealed the bowl of ramen - and all the air in the room."
"Only happened once," said Naruto.
"A disaster that only happens once is no less a disaster," said Orchid, punctuating that with a snort.
"Who's training the animals?" asked Naruto.
"You remember that special jonin wearing the fishnet and trenchcoat combination?" asked Orchid.
"Oh, her," said Naruto. "She really liked the raptors."
"And they liked her," said Orchid. "Why I thought it would work out. Or turn into a nightmare so terrifying that children in Iwa will lose sleep over it three generations from now."
"Okay, we have a C-Rank mission," said Kakashi. "Starting tomorrow we're going to Wave Country to safeguard a bridgebuilder from bandits and other ruffians."
"All right! No more cat-chasing, weed-pulling, and roof repair!" exclaimed Kiba.
Akamaru barked happily.
"Hnn," hnned Sasuke.
Akamaru whined and growled.
"Yeah, he's right," said Kiba. "Can't really get that much stronger pulling weeds."
"Are we really ready for a C-Rank? Aren't they dangerous?" asked Sakura.
"You'll get to camp outside with Sasuke, maybe share a watch with him," said Kiba.
"Well, let's get going!" said Sakura enthusiastically.
"Tomorrow. 0900 hours. Oh, and we're going to have an extra hand along." Kakashi debated whether or not to tell them who.
"Mission specialist?" asked Kiba.
"Good guess," admitted Kakashi. "Not correct, but a good guess. No, this is someone who is getting private training from a retired ANBU and doesn't have a team."
"Death Orchid's apprentice?" asked Kiba. He held up his hands at Kakashi's look. "Hey, I heard about that. Also that she's a very scary old woman who you do not want to diss."
"Frightened of an old woman?" mocked Sasuke.
"Have you MET some of the older women in my clan?" asked Kiba. "Have you met my mother for that matter?"
"Pfeh," indicated Sasuke.
"How much do you know about Death Orchid?" asked Kakashi, curious.
"One of the best assassins Konoha has ever produced, she's usually nowhere near the target by the time someone realizes that someone ain't breathing," said Kiba. "She's maybe within a decade of the Hokage's age but which way depends on who you talk to. Which means she's an old ninja."
"So?" asked Sakura.
"So she survived being in a couple of ninja wars, without getting crippled or otherwise forcibly retired," said Kiba, making a face at Sakura before going on. "You know how many people in my clan survived to being that old? None."
"I'll bet Sasuke's clan has lots of elders who've lived that long," automatically added Sakura.
To say there was an awkward silence after that would be a massive understatement.
Sasuke turned and walked off.
Kiba waited before deciding to ignore that. "0900 Hokage Tower?"
"Yeah, that'll do," admitted Kakashi.
"What?" asked Sakura.
"Nothing," said Kiba as he walked off.
"Sakura? You've been saying how much better the Uchiha clan is compared to the Inuzuka for so long it's become a reflex. And you really need to stop that." Kakashi didn't wait for a reply before leaving via shunshin.
Sakura:
"Hmmph," said Sakura as she stepped up to the Hokage Tower and looked around. Some kid that looked vaguely familiar wearing some kind of workout outfit doing one-handed pullups by fingertips on the edge of a doorframe.
Looks like I'm first to arrive. Maybe Sasuke-kun will show up soon and we'll have some time alone before Kiba shows up. He's always so loud and annoying.
No such luck, here comes Kiba. Akamaru at least looks happy to see me. Kiba's still wearing that ugly winter-jacket thing and it looks like it'll be unseasonably warm this morning. Insult to fashion.
"Hey, Sakura. Scowling Boy isn't here yet?"
"Sasuke is not here yet," said Sakura.
"Okay, I'm gonna talk to Naruto while we wait then."
Naruto? Why is - oh my kami. THAT'S Naruto?! He's got to be at least three inches taller!
"Yo, Naruto. You waiting for your team?" asked Kiba.
"Not on a team," answered Naruto. "I'm training under an ex-ANBU. Secret location and stuff. How you doing, Kiba? I see Akamaru's doing well."
"Akamaru's great, but he says you got some weird smells on you. Eh, it's not been a great team but you can't always choose your pack you know."
Sakura bristled a bit at being referred to as part of a pack even if she understood why an Inuzuka used a lot of dog-related terminology.
"Training under an Ex-ANBU elite, huh?" Kiba was saying. "You look like you're doing a bit better. Hey, Hana smelled a bit like that chicken/lizard scent a week or so ago. You met her?"
"Hana's your sister? She's cool," Naruto replied. "Yeah, they rotate some of the chunin and such out. Gave me some tips on training animals and such."
"She couldn't give details, more of this secret stuff you're involved in," said Kiba in a thoughtful tone. "So you're involved in that. Huh."
What the heck? NARUTO is training with ANBU and involved with secret locations and training animals of some kind? Is it because he was such a pathetic loser that he was seen as expendable or something?
"Hey," said Kiba.
Hey? Hey what?
"Hnn."
Sasuke sasuke sasuke! It's Sasuke! Oh kami he looks so cool and prepared and...
"Dang. What the heck happened there?"
Kiba's voice snorted. "She's been getting steadily worse since were put on the team. Give her a couple minutes for the hormones to stop spiking."
Kiba:
His nose gave him a lot of information, and his understanding of Akamaru gave him more.
There was the usual hormonal spike when Sakura first met Sasuke in the morning. He didn't associate with many twelve year old girls that often, certainly not enough to get used to their normal scent and then start picking up on variations of that. So he couldn't tell exactly how normal this was. Maybe all girls going through puberty had spikes like that? Whatever - it was a major pain. Judging from Sasuke's usual expression, he didn't care for it either.
More interesting to both him and Akamaru were the changes in Naruto. The "dead last" looked more solid and certainly carried himself as if he was more aware of things around him. Naruto as he had been wasn't worth sparring with. This guy might actually be interesting.
"Hmph," said Tazuna. "Another dopey-looking kid."
Kakashi appeared by the time the summation had been started and had a handle on the situation by the time the last syllable had finished.
Since day one, Kiba and Sasuke had been conflicting over who was the Alpha Male between them. Kiba could certainly relate to that term, Sasuke would be casually dismissive if not outright contempuous. Kiba had the typical Inuzuka focus towards the good of the pack. Sasuke embraced the brooding loner archetype for the most part.
Add another male into the mix and the results was usually a certain tension which would only be resolved when every member understood where they stood.
Kiba was more relaxed about it than Sasuke, and Kakashi would be surprised if a challenge to spar was NOT forthcoming. Sasuke looked like he was dismissing Naruto as unworthy of consideration even as a sparring partner.
Sakura had been getting steadily worse in her trying to get Sasuke's attention and fawning over him, which was exactly the WRONG way to approach Sasuke from what he'd seen. Sasuke had gotten steadily more dismissive of Sakura as a result. Sasuke was less dismissive of Kiba due to the Inuzuka clan techniques but he still acted as if he was allergic to dogs or something as he avoided Akamaru.
Sakura often tried to curry favor or at least display her favoritism towards Sasuke by holding up the Uchiha as a paragon of all that was good. She also seemed to forget every so often that the Uchiha were all but extinct and her words seemed to indicate a large thriving clan. Quoting old information gleaned from books no doubt.
Naruto, on the other hand, seemed very uncertain about what to do with a team. Odd in that he'd only been undergoing training by himself for about three months.
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(Posted Tue, 04 Nov 2014 18:24)
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