Naruto 1. The first changes

Summary: Mizuki tricks Naruto a year earlier and Iruka is inspired to make a few experimental changes to the last year at the Academy. The butterfly effect ensues.

This is a no pairing story – Naruto team friendship centric

If I get any bits wrong and they are not integral to the story I will go back and make the necessary changes. If it's wrong and integral to the story... well let's just call those bits AU.

Disclaimer: I don't own anything to do with Naruto.

Warning – I get most of my info from fan fiction because I've only seen a few episodes. After the time skip I get kind of sketchy, so while I might use something learned from that part of the show it otherwise doesn't exist.

Prologue

Iruka stared wonderingly at Naruto. This boy who was dead last in his class had managed to steal a scroll from the Hokage himself and learn a forbidden jutsu in only a few hours. This _child_ who was barely scraping by in class was a natural in the field, using a barely learned skill to take out a chunin. A _strong _chunin. Perhaps he _would_ manage to become the greatest Hokage as he claimed. I should honor Mizuki's challenge and allow him to graduate.

As Iruka shifted to stand and follow through on his thought he let out a groan as his wounds let their presence be felt once more. His mind once again shifted to Naruto to distract himself.

Where would the boy be now if the Academy taught using mock missions such as the one Naruto thought he was doing?

Iruka froze in place having only managed to get to one knee. His face blanked as his mind raced through the possibilities. The council had added two years onto the Academy education without really adding material to be taught. It would be usurping some of what a jonin instructor would teach, but he could argue that it would be following their desire for the students to be better prepared for the reality of ninja life.

He was shaken from his thoughts by Naruto touching his shoulder. He looked up into concerned blue eyes.

"Sensei are you alright?"

Iruka nodded slowly. "I'll be alright Naruto. I just had an idea I need to speak with the Hokage about. I think next year will be an interesting one for my students. I think... it would probably be a good idea to brush up on your sign language skills. If I get my way it will be a very important part of your training next year."

He finished standing and wrapped an arm around Naruto leaning on him slightly. He used his other hand to tip Naruto's face up to his own and give him the most serious and solemn look he could manage.

"I think now that you know the truth it is time for you to take your classes more seriously. No more pranks Naruto."

"Yes, sensei." Naruto's expression mirrored his own before he glanced away and spoke so softly that Iruka wasn't sure if he was meant to hear it or not. "I want people to see me as you see me."

Even softer still. "I've only ever wanted to be seen."

"I am sure that you will fight to become the most skilled ninja in Konoha and everyone will see you Naruto."

This made Naruto look up with confusion. "Skilled?"

"Yes, skilled. For the strength of a ninja is measured in how well he has mastered all the skills of the shinobi." This brought a very thoughtful look to Naruto's face.

Iruka waited a moment before giving him a shake and a squeeze lightening the moment. "Come on then, let's go. We need to report to the Hokage and get fixed up, then I will take you to Ichiraku's for ramen."

Naruto's dazzling smile was true to form but his exhaustion was apparent as he failed to leap about as he normally would at such an offer.

As they moved off with the sun rising behind them to light a beautiful day Iruka was busy plotting. Plans within plans each with sub-plotting between the lines. If he could pull this off it would be a prank on everyone who was against Naruto in Konoha and none of them would ever see it coming.

Author's Notes: I like to think that I'm taking this in a new direction. (I may be deluding myself.) While some events in the Naruto verse will still happen Naruto's involvement in them will have much larger changes. I have a few things that I want to see in a fic so that's what I'm writing. The Naruto world has so many characters with such potential for growth it hurts to see it squandered. There will be no pairings because I am against it for pre or barely teen kids and at the end of this story they will only be 13 or 14 tops. If this fic reaches 100,000 words I will be massively surprised but as I am forcing myself not to take shortcuts in telling the story I want to tell I have no idea how long this will be. Chapter 1 will probably be up within a few hours.


	2. Finding the basics and filling the gaps

Naruto was sitting on his favorite thinking spot on top of the Yondaime's head on the Hokage monument. His thoughts on this day however differed greatly from his usual fantasies of the village acknowledging him or how best to prank the village. No, today he was facing a different challenge.

It had been three days before Iruka-sensei actually came to take him for ramen. He had been kept by the hospital for two of them and the third he had been speaking with the Hokage for much of the day. The Sandaime had even canceled most of his other appointments for the day.

He had asked what they had talked about and Iruka-sensei had gotten all mysterious and wouldn't say much. He only repeated his advice about learning Konoha sign language and when Naruto asked how he should do that he was told to reread his textbooks. Even that rereading all of them would be a good idea. Naruto hadn't known how to tell him that the only textbook he had received in good condition had been the ones that Iruka-sensei himself had given him. The rest were so damaged as to be unreadable. One of the many ways his previous instructors had tried to sabotage him.

He snorted to himself. At least he knew _how_ to read. He wouldn't even know how to do that if they had been able to have there way. The Old Man taught him whenever he was brought in for playing pranks before he went to the academy. That had been another reason he started their early. He hadn't been allowed to go to a civilian school.

Now he was stuck trying to figure out how to get his hands on some textbooks he could actually read. He'd managed without them until now but if he was going to succeed he needed the books everyone else took for granted.

Before this last year when Iruka took over as the teacher for the last year students he'd been sent out of the classroom so much, before he'd taken to skipping, that it was a miracle he had any ninja skills at all. Most of the ones he did have were because he managed to watch other ninja practicing in the training fields. It was the reason that his stealth was so good, it had to be so he was able to watch other ninja even from a distance. He got his own practical experience figuring out the bits he missed from being too far away by using them while playing his pranks.

By now he'd had so much practice over the years using his stealth to watch and play pranks that it usually took at least a jounin level shinobi to find him when he didn't want to be found. Even then it wasn't until he allowed himself to be found by one of the few he knew he could trust not to hurt him. There were probably more of those than he knew about but it was better to stick with the ones he was sure of.

Okay, so think of this as a prank to be played. Where would he find the books he needed? At the academy. Could he sneak in and get them? Don't know. It was school break for the summer and he didn't know what he would have to avoid. Time to go and stake the place out.

It turned out to be much easier than expected as there were a lot of workers heading in and out of the grounds. Sneaking in was the easiest part. Trying to find where the textbooks were stored in the large building was a little trickier. In a stroke of luck all of the activity taking place seemed to be going on behind the academy with the actual building left deserted.

Where to go first though? After a quick overview of his own knowledge of the building he quickly realized that the basement was his best guess. Naruto actually had a very thorough grasp of the off limits to students areas because a little thing like that wasn't going to keep him from playing a prank on the teachers in their own little areas. The only obstacle to reaching the basement was a locked door and Naruto couldn't help but wonder who thought that was anywhere near enough security in a school that _taught kids how to pick locks_. I mean sure access was in a teacher's only area and teachers could easily catch a student out of bounds. _If_ they were present to do so.

Slipping down the stairs to the basement he found a long hallway the length of the building with a number of doors on either side. His goal was in the second storeroom on the right and past that door was an untraveled dusty floor that would leave a clear trail of footprints. Ducking back into the storeroom he started to gather one of each book he could see. When he had finished he looked in dismay at a stack of over thirty books! He knew that there hadn't been that many handed out in class but he didn't know which ones he needed. He would have to take them all.

Thinking quickly he made a shadow clone and had it henge into a toolbox that he could fit half of the books into. Then with a rather evil grin he created a lot more and had half of them turn themselves into brooms to sweep out the hallway. Why do things halfway? After all he had a golden opportunity in his hands. With the hall quickly swept clean he set his clones to discovering the contents of all the rooms. Many were disappointing filled with spare furniture or empty. The real finds were the rooms with training equipment. There were kunai, shuriken, senbon and wooden practice blades all of them with perfect balance. He nearly rubbed his hands together in glee. He could train with quality equipment this summer!

In the end where one man had entered the building empty handed in the mid-afternoon, five left one by one with large toolboxes in hand joining in with the workers exiting the campus at the end of their workday.

When they had all reached the sanctuary of his apartment he dispersed three of them but kept one to look through the books for the one on sign language while he emptied out his transformed clones contents into a closet and dispersed those too. His last clone was still slowly looking through the books so he decided to get his dinner ready.

"Hey, boss! I found the one you wanted, but there's a bunch of 'em that look like they could be really useful." With that he handed one book to Naruto and dispersed. His eyes widened. He knew exactly what the clone meant. About ten of the books were the dull and dry history texts that Iruka lectured from and seven that were about math that got harder from book to book, but the others covered everything from codes to setting traps, even a beginner's guide to sealing! There were _five _different books on taijutsu! One of them was the style taught at the academy but if the other four ever were they weren't taught there now.

Naruto was left gaping. He remembered everything the clone did from when he first summoned it, even what it had seen in each book! Now that he thought about it he could remember what each of his clones had done. He_ remembered_ sweeping out the hallway and looking in all the rooms. He imagined different things all the time to fill in the blanks he wasn't allowed to question and he had thought that was what he had been doing but no! He was remembering!

He decided another test was in order and created five more clones. He handed one his wallet and had him transform into one of the workman appearances he'd used that afternoon and sent him shopping at the store. He sent the second to see the Old Man and ask him about how the shadow clone worked. The third he sent to bug Iruka for information on what was going on at the academy. The fourth went to the top of the Hokage Monument to watch the sunset and the fifth was set to reading the first history text that came to hand. Each was told to disperse when they had completed it's task.

Naruto himself finished his dinner and started to read his book on sign language. It turned out that the first half of the book was on how to read body language and facial expressions. From there it gave examples on how to use them to send subtle signals that a comrade could pick up but an enemy wouldn't know the meaning of. Only after that did it become more of a dictionary with pictures instead of word meanings.

The clone that had been sent to find Iruka dispersed first without learning anything new, but as an experiment it was a success. He did remember everything it had done to find Iruka and the entire, even if short, conversation. The clone on a grocery run came back with twice the food of a normal trip and with Gama-chan half full rather than almost empty. Disappointingly none of it was instant ramen though, the clone hadn't wanted the store clerks to get suspicious of someone buying the same things Naruto usually did. Oh well, Ichiraku's was much better than instant and he could afford to go there more often if he let a transformed clone do the shopping and the Old Man _had_ said that he wasn't eating healthy enough. If he was going to be serious about his ninja skills it would probably have to include eating healthy food.

He smiled to himself as the memory of watching a beautiful sunset came to him as he continued to read his book. Shortly after that he received the memories of a very informative conversation with the Old Man on how to use shadow clones to train and the drawbacks of trying to use too many. As he was preparing for bed the last clone dispersed and he was amazed how different reading the information was to hearing it lectured about. It was so much more interesting. Time for another experiment. He created five more clones and set them each to reading a different book. Each was to disperse after four hours with an hour between each one with the last dispersing after eight hours.

He set the first to disperse to rereading the sign language book. The next was to work on the math text. The last three were given a history book, a book on setting traps and the last the book on the academy style taijutsu. If they finished their book they were to reread it until their time was up. When he woke up in the morning he was alone again and he had read four more books. The math he had only managed to get a small part of the way through because it took more time for him to work through the problems.

He made a large breakfast and planned out how to make the best use of his clones for the day. He made himself a lunch to take with him and created six clones to leave in the apartment. This time two of them would work on the math book for the longest period of time. He grabbed three of the books he had read during the night and set off at a run for the training grounds he had claimed for himself. They were disused when he had come across them because they were so far out.

On reaching them he created five more clones and handed a book to each and paired them off to practice sign language and setting traps, keeping one for himself. That one had the taijutsu book and was set to correcting his form against the pictures in the book as he slowly worked through each kata. Needless to say there were many corrections to be made as he had never before been given any instruction. He knew that Iruka would have done so last year but Mizuki had been their taijutsu instructor.

Over the next two weeks he followed the same pattern with only a few changes day to day. Chakra exercises replaced trap setting when it became obvious that he knew almost all of the traps in the books and with some he had even improved upon them during his pranking career. He also switched between taijutsu styles from day to day teaching himself each of the styles he had a book for. In this he did better than most would as unlike others he could observe himself from the outside and had a sparring partner that was exactly on his own level.

Within a week he had read and reread all of the books he had... liberated from the school, except for the math books, and he was working to master the contents of each. He had however grown almost addicted to reading and decided it was time to use a transformed clone to get into another place he had never been allowed. The town library. He sent two everyday to sit in the library and read. He didn't have any particular goal other than to read something so he started in the section he wanted to. The kid's section. It opened up worlds of creative imagining that he had never been allowed in before. It sparked his own imagination and he found an outlet for it and a new hobby that was much safer for the citizens of Konoha than his pranking was. He decided to spend his evenings writing down the stories that had been roaming his imagination during the day as he ran or practiced other things that didn't need his full attention.

One month to the day from his last failed exam two things happened. One would change part of his daily routine for the last month of the summer break and the other would ingrain another part of it for the rest of his life. Towards the end of his morning run he came across two chunin on guard duty. This was not unusual as there was always someone on duty there. The difference was that they were speaking to one another in sign.

He slowed down and realized that his practice with the clones had paid off and he could understand their conversation. Then his eyes narrowed as he realized that they were insulting him. Not the usual about the demon brat, but his intelligence. He came to a stop and smirked as he signed back an insult to their parentage. Thus began a morning long insult contest that quickly went from anger to humor as the insults quickly became a contest in the ridiculous. The guards quickly coming to appreciate the change from their usual boring duty.

Naruto left after signing a quick see you later when they were replaced at midday and went home to change. He was meeting the Old Man for lunch that day and he had something he wanted to show him.

Naruto rarely had any other travel speed than at a run and he hit his best speed getting to Ichiraku's for lunch. When he got there the Old Man was already sitting at the counter.

"Hey Old Man, been here long?"

"No, Naruto not too long." He quickly observed the small bundle of papers Naruto had set on the counter. "What this?" He said as he tapped a finger too them.

Naruto pushed the bundle towards him. "It's just something that I wrote. I thought you could tell me if you liked it or not." Old man Teuchi brought the Hokage his order and greeted Naruto. Naruto gave his own order as he watched the Old Man open the bundle and begin to read. They both ate in silence, one reading and the other waiting nervously for a verdict.

"Naruto this is an excellent children's story. Are you wanting to have it published?" The Sandaime was very pleased and enthusiastic at the idea.

Naruto was astonished. "What are you talking about Old Man? Nobody but you or Iruka would read a book with my name on it! I just thought I'd see if it was any good."

The Sandaime smiled at him. "Nothing easier Naruto! You would just need a pen name, and perhaps a little bit of editing." The last said with a gently teasing smile.

Naruto agreed to let him do a little editing and then to try and find a publisher for him. He was surprised to receive his story back with editing suggestions the next day but he made the changes and sent it back again. He didn't think anything would come of it but he went ahead and sent a note telling the Old Man to pick a pen name for him as he couldn't think of any.

The next morning's run had him coming across the same pair of chunin as the previous day and again he stopped. This time however it seemed that they were curious about him and asked many questions about what he liked to do and what he did during the day. The answer to both was training and soon devolved into the specifics of his training routine. They had many helpful suggestions and they conversed with him in sign for over an hour before he continued with his day.

Naruto was quick to discover the advantage of having found a somewhat bored and captive audience willing to answer any question he asked even when they would roll their eyes at something they found stupidly obvious. He'd store up the questions he had about what he read finally able to ask them of someone who had the time and would patiently answer him. He was able to ask and receive answers to questions on a multitude of topics.

The day before he was going to return to school shortly before he would usually leave he mustered his courage to open a topic he couldn't imagine bringing up in a verbal conversation. He asked them what they thought about the Kyuubi. With this question though the silence was broken.

"C'mere kid." The guard to his right waved him over. "That ain't a conversation to be had out in the open here. Our relief will be here soon. You got somewhere you feel comfortable having a private word at?" He set his hand on Naruto's shoulder.

Naruto looked up at him uncertainly. The man gave him a little shake.

"My name is Asahara Daichi and that is Ogura Takuma. It doesn't have to be completely private just somewhere we'll be visible but too far away to hear." At this Naruto couldn't help glancing up at the Hokage Monument. Daichi and Takuma shared a glance and a nod.

"Perfect."

Naruto standing beside Daichi silently and patiently waiting would be a shocking sight to all who knew him. The last two months had more of an effect than anyone would realize and the source of the change would never be questioned, only silently grateful that it had happened.

While still extremely energetic and having kept up his training routines, even significantly improving his routine and what he got out of it due to reading the academy training manuals and advice from the two chunin, Naruto had spent two months almost completely silent. The only people he spoke to were at the ramen stand and Iruka, otherwise he was so focused on what he was learning and his daily conversations with the pair of chunin that he didn't even think to continue his usual loud demands for any kind of attention. After all he was getting more positive attention everyday by being silent.

Having his chief means of communication become his hands had also taught him the most useful skill yet, but one he would not appreciate fully until many years after the habit had set. He learned to think before he 'spoke'. At first it was necessary in order to translate his thoughts into actions and then as he became more fluent it was to keep his teachers from taking the time to ridicule him before or even as they answered his questions. The two seemed to have made sarcasm a language of it's own even while using signs. The pair of clones that he had practicing sign every day held conversations about the things he thought about taking his ideas further and forcing him to think things through to the consequences and further changing the _way_ that he thought.

The three shortly found their way to the top of the monument and settled themselves on top of the Sandaime's head.

"Alright Uzumaki what is it that you want to know?" Daichi didn't seem to believe in small talk.

Naruto hesitated unsure how to ask. "I guess I want to know what you think about my having the Kyuubi in me. You've been letting me hang around and ask questions when you could have found a way to run me off if you wanted to. I guess I just want to know why your different from everybody else."

Takuma raised a hand to stop Daichi from answering. "What do you know about jinchuuriki?"

Naruto's only response was a blank look.

"It's what you are kid, a human container for a demon. You didn't think you were the only one did you?" At Takuma's clearly sarcastic question Naruto merely shook his head.

"I hadn't really thought about it. Only what having the demon meant for me, I haven't even really known for that long." Naruto was still confused. "What is it you think I should know?"

"Because there is a clear divide in the way people think about you and you should be aware of it. The civilians treat you as if you were the demon incarnate. Which is stupid because if you were you would have killed them all by now." Takuma seemed to still as he became more serious. "The ninja on the other hand are wary of you because jinchuuriki are generally used as weapons and as a whole have a reputation for being unstable and as likely to kill you as save you."

Now Daichi chimed in. "If we seem different to others it's because we've had a chance to see _you_past what you are. I think you'll find that you won't really have a problem with most shinobi once they have a chance to see past the 'Warning Dangerously Unstable' label that got slapped on you at birth."

"Not that you aren't dangerous or can't become dangerous because you can. Kid you got the damn Kyuubi in you. If you ever have to call on that we are all in big damn trouble. My advice is to become so strong on your own you never have to call on it."

"I will, I will become the strongest ninja in all of the elemental countries." The conviction in his voice and the sheer determination on his face paused Takuma in his tracks as he was moving to leave. It made him remember the rumors going around a couple of months before about the kid using a Mass Shadow Clone technique to take down a traitor.

He turned around curiously. "Kid, can you really do a Mass Shadow Clone technique?"

Naruto flashed him a grin. "You bet! I'm awesome with it! I don't need to be able to do that dumb old regular clone."

Daichi and Takuma shared a look of disbelief. Takuma decided to at least try and give the kid another push along the right track.

"Okay kid, one last thing, let me ask you a question. If I were to pick up a sword the length of my body and try to take it into a fight, without ever having trained with any kind of sword, would that make me the strongest one in the fight?"

Naruto was thrown at being asked such a blatantly obvious question. "Of course not, you're worse off trying to use a weapon your not trained in than using your body which you are."

"Your chakra is like that sword. Most jonin have a kunai and a kage has a katana and both are experts with their weapons. Your chakra reserves are at kage level or above but your control of it is almost as bad as a first year student. Something for you to think about. What would you be capable of doing with it if you had even average chakra control?" With that he turned and melted into the forest atop the mountain leaving the energetic blond gaping after him.

Daichi moved to follow him calling a few final words over his shoulder as he left. "You're gonna be a helluva ninja one day if you put your back into it! See you around kid!"

Naruto ran towards the Academy. He wasn't about to be late for the first day of class. He wanted to be early to see just what Iruka had been hinting at when he told him to make sure he was fluent in Konoha sign language. He'd only seen him a few times during the break because Iruka had been busy getting everything in place. It had been a very interesting and informative break for him and it had all started with that one comment from Iruka

Naruto arrived at the academy to the unusual sight of Iruka standing at the door with a clipboard in hand. Before he could call a greeting Iruka gave the hand sign for quiet and he came to a stop without saying anything.

"It's good that you studied Naruto. For today you will all have assigned seating, so go in and have a seat and all will be explained when everyone is here. For now just know that there will be no speaking today except in sign or points will be lost and points affect your class standing."

Naruto was glad for all the practice being quiet over the break or he would never have managed to go a day without speaking. He walked into the classroom to find large packages on every desk. He found the one with his name on it and took a seat. He looked around at the other early students as they were waiting. He was only slightly familiar with some of them because of their obvious clan affiliations. It was odd to know that this was the class he would have been in if he hadn't been entered into the academy two years early. He could tell that he was getting quite a few interested looks from a few who didn't know who he was.

There was one other big difference to the room from last year. One section of the wall at the front of the room had been changed to have horizontal lines. At one end of the lines starting at the floor and going to the ceiling were numbers starting at zero and counting up by fives. In the fifth row were disks with each students name on it.

Naruto looked away from the wall with interest as a boy sat next to him. The tag on his package read as Nara Shikamaru. The boy with black hair pulled back into a spiky ponytail gave the package a sulky look before slumping back against the desk behind him and closing his eyes.

Only a few minutes later Iruka walked into the room and went to the front. Naruto felt himself almost involuntarily coming to a state of readiness. The evil smirk on Iruka's face couldn't hold any good news for anyone.

Iruka began to speak and sign at the same time. "Alright everyone keep in mind that any verbal communication will result in losing points. This year we are going to be focused on practical work. The only paperwork you will have will be turning in mock mission reports for mock missions that you will run and other reports and assessments as will be requested at any given time and for a multitude of things. There will be no class assigned bookwork with a class wide test. Any such assignments will be to individuals as deemed necessary for the development of their practical skills." Many of the students began to grin at the thought of no more tests and bookwork.

"I'm sure all of you have noticed the board up here. This is how your class standing will be tracked. All point gains and losses will be tracked on the instructors clipboard and tallied at the end of the day. You will be given a list of each point change complete with a reason for it. Changes to the board will be made once a day after you have gone and before you return the next morning. At the end of the year where you are on this board will determine class rankings. Needless to say if you have zero points you will be failed from the academy completely with no chance to return for another year." At this several students protested aloud.

"Deushi!"

"Hida!"

"Haruno!"

"Mizutoni!"

"Yamanaka!"

"You have each lost two points for failure to follow orders. You are to remain silent if you have a question raise your hand wait to be acknowledged and then use sign language. Yes, Miss Haruno?"

"Why didn't you give us any warnings before taking points?" Body language could convey many things and Sakura Haruno's was screaming anger.

"On the contrary Miss Haruno, I gave you an order to remain silent before you entered this room and a reminder as I began speaking. If the Hokage were to give you an order do you imagine that he would repeat himself to you to get you to follow it?" Iruka looked around at all of his students to make sure they were all getting the message. Things were going to be very different around here from here on out.

"When you become genin you will be considered an adult ninja who will behave like an adult and follow orders like one. If you cannot prove to me that you have the maturity to do this, you will not pass from this academy!"

"I only took two points today. From tomorrow onward a failure to follow an instructors orders will remove five points for the first offense and each further offense will become ten, fifteen and so on. If any of you were to reach a removal of fifty points you would be entirely removed from the academy as unfit to serve Konoha." Many of the students had gone pale. Such strictness had never been applied to them.

What they didn't realize was that the expectations really weren't that unreasonable. They wouldn't be given any orders that they could not already expect to be given as an actual ninja in the field where they could be executed for a failure to follow orders. Better to find out now if they couldn't handle it.

"Moving on, let's go over the packages in front of you." Iruka moved to a similar package on his desk. "Inside each package is a standard field kit complete with weapons. Every package has identical contents with no visible markers of who they belong too. There are instructions on how to tell your items from everyone else."

"Leave yours alone for now and open it this evening, but I will demonstrate the contents which are the same for everyone." Iruka then proceeded to shock everyone by stripping down to his boxers before reaching into the pack and pulling out a bundle of dark gray and black cloth.

"This will be the standard uniform that you will wear starting tomorrow on the second and last school day of the week. I am going to demonstrate how to wear it. When I am through I should not have any identifiable features to distinguish me from anyone else wearing this outfit." As he spoke he was donning the outfit and rearranging his hair to be flat beneath the cloth head covering.

"The goal will be that not even your best friend would recognize you. Your only identifier will be a small number patched on both arms and the back. This number will change every day with only the instructors knowing who is who." When Iruka had finished applying the stick on numbers to his arms and back and placing wrap around shades there was not a visible inch of skin anywhere. If he hadn't completed the transformation right in front of them they would have no idea who was standing there.

"This will be important. At the end of each day you will turn in a list with a name next to the numbers of who you believe to be wearing that number on that day. Do not make a guess if you truly have no idea. For each student you correctly identify you will receive a point and if you are incorrect you lose a point. For each time you are identified you will lose a point." Iruka then stopped speaking aloud and continued solely in sign language.

"This is more important than you realize. If you were to use a family technique that is easily identifiable you could lose up to twenty-nine points in one day."

Iruka scanned the room trying to gage who was understanding him and who had just become completely lost. He held back a sigh as he realized that the answer was too many. He was pleasantly surprised that Naruto wasn't one of them, he must have taken the hint to heart.

"Raise your hand if you can understand me." Only half the class did so. "You are all prohibited from speaking aloud for the rest of the day. If you are next to someone who raised their hand I expect you to practice with them for the rest of the day."

As he continued he began speaking aloud as well. "If you did not raise your hand come to the front of the room. For those still seated if you are by yourself find a partner to sit with and practice for the rest of the day. That includes lunch too."

"As for the rest of you..." He glared balefully. "We will be having a crash retraining course so that you will not be too much of a hindrance to the team you will be assigned to tomorrow. Teams will change from week to week as we find complimentary skill sets. On the days you are in your uniform you will be speaking solely in sign language to be able to hide the distinctive sound of your voice."

Naruto braced himself for speaking with the Nara boy. He hadn't managed to make any friends last year after he had to admit that he'd been unable to pass the previous year's final exam. He turned to introduce himself but of course the other boy was already signing and his first question was the obvious one.

"I failed the final exam because I couldn't make a clone. I can do it now easy though."

"Is this the same as last year with the uniforms?"

"No, last year was simply more of the same as the others. Iruka-sensei got the idea at the end of last year and talked to the Hokage about making some experimental changes to the last year at the academy. When the council decreed that students would spend two extra years studying they didn't really add to what we learned they just added more bookwork classes than are really necessary. We will all be evaluated before the mid year break. If the changes are working to make us better ninja then they will stay. If not it's back to the old way."

"How do you know all of that?" There was an unfamiliar look on the boy's face. Naruto was busy trying to place it and so answered without trying to brag about his knowledge.

"That was all I managed to pry out of Iruka-sensei when he took me for lunch one day. He wouldn't tell me what the changes were though so I know as much as you do about that."

Naruto finally managed to figure out what was so out of place. The Nara boy had been looking at him with respect for knowing something no one else did.

Naruto spent the rest of the morning talking to Shikamaru and learning what the other boy knew about their classmates. Some of which was gossip, what 'everyone knew', about them and the rest a sharp assessment of their skills. He quickly grew to respect the other boy's intelligence when he gave a thorough explanation for how he had reasoned out his own knowledge of things.

At lunch he was introduced to Yamanaka Ino and Akimichi Chouji as Shikamaru's future teammates. Their fathers wanted them to be a successful team modeled on their own and were likely to get their way. He was also introduced to the other clan kids but didn't really get a chance to talk to them when they were called back to class.

The previous pairs were broken up as all but a few students were sent to practice after their morning of review. Naruto found himself conversing with Aburame Shino who explained that his family was able to converse silently through their bugs and had let his practice of the standard signs lapse over the summer. Finding the subject very interesting he asked a number of questions that were difficult to answer with the rather limited vocabulary of sign forcing Shino to use the alphabet signs for more difficult words that Naruto _still _didn't understand. This caused Naruto to swear to himself that he would start some clones to reading the dictionary at the library.

At the end of the day they were all instructed to pick up their packages and follow Iruka outside and to the back and side of the academy. They all gawked at the new building beside the target practice area. It was long low and narrow with two doors facing the academy and the back of the building went a few feet into the woods behind the academy.

Iruka stood before the building. "Starting tomorrow and on the days you wear your uniforms you will report here at the standard class time and knock on either door. When the previous student has passed through you will be allowed to enter. In the first room you will be checked for identifying features and helped to adjust your uniform as necessary. In the second room you will receive your number patches and your team assignment for the day. In the third room you will be given your mission assignments and the post you are to report to."

"You will only have an hour to get to your post and plan for your assignment, and in a month when you are more used to your routine this will be cut in half. All the instructions you will need for the day will be given in your mission briefing. The standard rules that apply that I gave you this morning are listed in your package and I suggest you familiarize yourselves with them." Iruka stood tall before them deliberately going for a more militant feel than he usually would.

"These days will be your chance to prove that you have what it takes to defend and to fight for Konoha. Class dismissed."

Naruto looked around at his new classmates as they drifted together to talk. Shikamaru and Shino were both approaching him. "Hey guys, really different stuff going on huh?"

They both nodded and Shikamaru went up to the building and set down his package before sitting himself down beside it and leaning back with a huff to enjoy the sunshine. "This is going to be troublesome."

Naruto turned to Shino. "Hey, sorry about all of those words I didn't know. I'll look 'em up tonight and you can try and explain it again day after tomorrow. Alright with you?"

"Certainly, however if we are allowed to speak I don't mind explaining them to you as they come up." The monotone voice confused Naruto. It was only due to reading the book on body language that allowed him to pick up the slight cues there that weren't in his voice. His body was slightly tense as if he were braced for something. Rejection. He thinks I might reject his offer. Shikamaru's information on his classmates had included the fact that Shino was considered by most to be that creepy bug guy who no one really talked to.

If there was one thing Naruto knew it was how it felt to be shunned by others and that hope when you met someone new that this one would be the one who would be different. He held his hand out to the other boy. "Sure man you got a deal." He grinned when his hand was taken. "I'll probably read up in the dictionary anyway. I wouldn't want anybody to think I was ignorant or something."

He tugged Shino over to sit by Shikamaru to talk for awhile. Naruto was sure it wasn't that Shikamaru didn't want to be friends with Shino, it was that he'd just been to lazy and didn't really see a reason to make the effort. What Shikamaru had left out about his classmates Ino had filled in. Including telling him about Shikamaru himself.

After talking for several minutes they all got up to leave. They had all managed to agree on one thing.

Tomorrow was going to be a very interesting day.

Author's Notes: I am working on further chapters and I expect to have the next one up within the week. Please leave a review to help keep me motivated to write more.


	3. An Iruka Interlude

Iruka shook his head as the smoke from the dispersing shadow clone drifted apart. He hadn't even realized that he hadn't been talking to Naruto. He would probably need to have a talk with him about the appropriate use of his new technique. He turned away to continue on his errand. His time was going to be limited as he oversaw the project the Hokage had assigned him. Certainly it had been his idea and he'd planned to devote several hours to outlining the concept and convincing him of the benefits, but at this rate he wouldn't have time for anything else. Not even grocery shopping. In any event the Hokage had been won over within fifteen minutes.

As Iruka began walking again his focus turned inward. Things were changing rapidly for him. The trust he was being shown in being given management would be advantageous in furthering his career if he wanted to. He had never really looked beyond teaching since he had been assigned to it. He felt comfortable with it and enjoyed molding his students into ninja. It was a job to take pride in, and he did. He stiffened his spine at the thought. He had allowed the new responsibility to cloud his head and obscure the real goal. He is a _teacher_ and it was his duty to take the new tools he was being given and use them as effectively as possible to do his job. For _all _his students and not just Naruto.

His original idea had simply been to change the focus of the last year of the academy to practical work. He thought that with a chance to shine in an area favorable to him that Naruto would put in a better effort. What he hadn't expected was the Sandaime's zeal for the idea becoming greater than his own and his additions a great deal more complicated. It had gotten so complicated that they had been required to start the construction immediately or it wouldn't be completed in time. The building plans would still require a day or two to complete but the enormous amounts of movable wall sections that would be used to adjust the size of the mission zones could be started immediately and would probably still be in progress into the new school year. The Hokage had dedicated a huge tract of land to the project and was even going to build a mock small town to be completely populated with ninja on the days it would be necessary.

When he had first gone before the Hokage and explained his idea he had been asked what he believed his changes would accomplish. His answer had been to tell him that it would allow otherwise average students a chance to find their potential, and to weed out those who could meet the physical requirements but were otherwise unsuited to field work so they could be guided to attempt a medical career. They were always in need of more medics than they had. Then he cited his surprise at Naruto's skill that he hadn't seen in the classroom but that he had seemed to blossom in the field. The Sandaime hadn't needed any further convincing. Iruka actually felt almost as if he had been conspiring _with_ him for Naruto's benefit. So many of his suggestions had felt like they would directly benefit Naruto. Of course they would benefit others _too... _so he'd simply accept what he'd been given and not bring up questions when he's sure the answers would only spell trouble for someone. After all he already had trouble of his own to deal with.

Organizing the design of the new training ground and it's construction would be difficult but within his skills. The hard part was in his additional task. He needed to find chunin and convince them to fill the spot of field instructors, and he needed _thirty._ Enough that he could promise that they would only be needed one day a week for a few hours – one to follow each team. He already knew that he would be able to fill some of the spots with jounin wanting a preview of their potential genin in the field, although he expected those would mostly be later in the year. A devious little thought crossed his mind. Maybe if he introduced them to the idea as _free entertainment. _He'd schedule a night for touring the ninja bars and catch them when their guard was down.

For the sheer amount of money and manpower going into this project he couldn't imagine the consequences if it failed to live up to expectations as a teaching tool. It was all going to depend on the attitude of the kids through that first week. If they took it as the challenge that it was supposed to be, if just one would act as if they were a _ninja_ and not just a student... it would succeed. As strange as it sounded, he was counting on Naruto to be himself. He had that devious prankster edge, he just needed to use it. If this overgrown idea of his succeeded it would change Konoha in ways he couldn't even begin to predict. Konoha was a reflection of it's ninja populace, a change in one appeared in the other and this would be a major change in it's ninja. Iruka couldn't help snickering to himself as he glance around at his fellow citizens who would be outraged if they knew what he did. The future of Konoha was resting in the hands of it's most reviled member... Naruto.

Author's Notes: I hope to post the next chapter within a day or two depending on how busy I get. There will be at least one more Iruka interlude in the next few chapters to give a wider view than Naruto has right now.

I would also like to invite you to come up with a pen name for Naruto. Keep in mind that while he will not always be writing kid's books he won't be doing smut anymore than I am. Naruto's writing is not a major plot point and won't become one. It's to show character growth and for maybe some humor bits later on. For incentive to participate I will offer to dedicate the chapter which reveals Naruto as the author to the person whose name choice gets picked.


	4. First Lessons

Naruto dressed himself carefully being sure that he was fully covered yet still able to move freely. Checking that he had placed the contents of his kit so that he could reach anything he needed and literally quizzing himself on the contents of each pocket. He had prepared himself for the day as best he could. He wanted to impress Iruka with how much he had improved. He also wanted to prove that Iruka's idea worked and had been worth the expense that had gone into it. The cost for the uniforms and field kit alone for thirty students was almost mind boggling to him without even taking into account the construction that had to take place.

When he had arrived home the previous evening he had opened his package to survey the contents. There were three full uniforms and two pairs of shoes as well as a full kit of ninja tools including the training 'poisons' and their antidotes as well as a field med kit. The instructions Iruka had given about the rules that could gain or lose you points were on a paper in the med kit. Naruto had used them to make a list of restrictions and rules for himself while in uniform and had been reviewing them in his mind over and over so as not to forget any.

Number one is to focus all his energy on the mission and to remain absolutely still unless a movement is necessary. Body language can give away your identity.

Number two is no clones! The only exception being the academy taught kind if he can ever master it. Way too identifiable.

Number three is no noise. The goal is to move with utter silence throughout the day making no exclamations of any kind. Not a laugh or a snort or a huff of breath.

Number four is watch everyone. A single movement can give away an identity.

Number five is misdirection. Adopt a physical movement or quirk that you have identified from a classmate to throw others off the scent.

The last two he had put into effect as soon as he had heard the rules yesterday. He had chosen two of the boys from civilian families to mimic. One had a slight tilt of the head occasionally and the other a slight hitch in his step as he turned away. Both of which he had practiced the same way he did his taijutsu. He planned to alternate with the tilt to show teammates and the hitch for the opposition.

All five rules together were what he was thinking of as his mission mindset. He had a hearty breakfast before dressing and he performed one last check of his appearance by forming a new clone and doing a slow circle of inspection. Done. Time to go and report for his mission.

He took the trip at full speed knowing that maintaining his energy level wasn't really a worry for him and the earlier the better today. He arrived to find that both doors already had someone waiting with both wearing their uniform slightly incorrect as far as he could tell. As he held back for a moment the door on the right opened and the waiting student was ushered in. He took his own place before the door and knocked as he scrutinized his momentary companion. Their identity was hidden though he might have been able to place them if he had more familiarity with his class or more time before they too were taken inside. He had only moments to wait on his own before the door opened and another anonymous figure waved him inside. This one though was wearing a white arm band.

The first room itself was very small but well lit. Little more than a large closet. He stood still in the middle of the room as he was inspected. His appearance received a nod of approval and the inspector moved to the wall by the door and flipped a switch. Naruto moved to the door to wait for it to open. When it did Naruto was surprised to find Iruka seated behind a desk with a high counter in front of it on one side of the room. As he approached he noticed that he couldn't see anything below Iruka's shoulders.

"Name?" Iruka hadn't bothered to look up.

"Naruto."

At this he did look up with a smile. "I really wouldn't have known you. Good job. Today you will be wearing the number five patch and you are on Team Green. Every team has a different color and white is the color of the observers who will be grading your performance." Here he hesitated a moment before handing him his patches and armband and speaking softly. "I am the only one who knows which student wears each number. If you can remain anonymous you can be certain that you will be graded on your skills just like everyone else."

Naruto gave him a sharp nod and then began placing his number five patches and armband as he moved to the door to the final room. When it opened and he stepped through he found another observer waiting at a regular desk with sets of papers before him marked in a variety of colors. He was handed a stack marked with green to match his armband.

"At the first ringing of the bell the exercise will begin. Team Green is one of three teams with a scroll. You are to guard it from all other teams, if you do lose it make sure you get it back before the second ringing of the bell at which point the exercise has ended and you will report back to the south side of this building. You will find your scroll and your teammates at the post marked on your map. If you have a bloodline limit it is to remain inactive and you may only use your _own_ senses to identify your fellow students. There are walls surrounding the exercise area. If you are caught deliberately leaving that area all points earned during the exercise are void with an additional fifteen deducted."

Naruto nodded his understanding and exited the building taking several steps into the forest and 'disappearing' before he stopped to look at his map and orient himself to it. The map showed a square mile of forest with ten posts dotted on the map and two streams making their way through it as well as four large clearings and several smaller ones scattered throughout. About half of the posts were in clearings and the others in wooded areas. Team Green had been assigned a post in a wooded area almost exactly in the middle of the map.

Naruto took off through the trees jumping from branch to branch. It was a skill he had only managed to master a few days ago. Mastering tree walking was necessary before you could do it and learning and mastering that exercise had taken him over two weeks. He was making his way through all of the chakra control exercises listed in the book and tree walking was the ninth and most difficult he had come to so far. He had started trying to water walk three days before and that one was coming much easier to him since at least he already knew how to send the chakra to his feet. It was also another step in his desire for misdirection, as the more skills he had the more he could pick and choose which skills he used while in uniform to throw people off.

Reaching his post, which was an actual fifteen foot tall, two foot thick post, he realized that he was the first one there and took up a position in a crouch on top of it after stowing the scroll that had been there. He was rewarded a few minutes later with the approach of both of his teammates. Then he had to hold back a sigh as both of them looked around the post in confusion for several minutes without ever looking up. This did not bode well for their skills in his estimation. He waited for them to come to the base of the post again and jumped down to land silently before them. His teammates were numbers Three and Fourteen. Three fell into a defensive stance and Fourteen tripped and fell trying to back away.

It took effort to hold his mindset and not react other than to indicate his armband and show them the scroll he had retrieved. Letting his head tilt slightly for a moment he started to sign rapidly only for Three to signal him to slow down.

'Do either of you have any plans for protecting our scroll?' At their head shakes he continued. 'I do, I think that it would be a better idea to be the hunter instead of the hunted.'

Fourteen seemed more confused than Three. 'What do you mean?'

'Nothing in our instructions tells us to stay here. We just have to keep our scroll. If we come across another team with a scroll we can take theirs too. I think we should head away from our post when the bell sounds and set traps to take out as many of our enemies as we can. What do you think?'

Three was enthusiastic about the idea and Fourteen agreed with only a little hesitation. With that team Green settled in to plan their traps. Because each had arrived early they had the full allotted hour to plan and when the bell rang they were ready and sprinted swiftly through the trees.

Within a half an hour of lying in wait around their specially prepared clearing they had their first challengers. This trio started to skirt the edges avoiding being out in the open. This did little to help them as Team Green had riddled the entire area with well hidden traps. The first trap sprung was a two for one with two of them swinging from the same simple foot catch. Their third member, Four, was so startled that Naruto easily hit him with a drugged senbon before doing the same with the two in the trap. It would only be enough to put to sleep for a few minutes at best. So they quickly freed the two in the trap and tied them all up.

Naruto waved over his team as he reached to reveal the faces of their captives. Fourteen reached out to stop him and he waved her back. 'There is nothing in the rules to stop us but we also don't want to give anyone else the advantage. We will look and then put their masks back and hide them up high in the trees. Securely so they won't fall. Quick before someone else comes and we're not ready.'

They followed his plan and promptly moved back into position to ensnare as many teams as possible. They managed two more teams, both already looking a little beat up, before a third team in better shape found a gap in the traps made by the last of the other teams that they hadn't yet been able to reset. They were caught out of position and were forced to fall back to a preplanned rallying point.

From there they moved on to set up a rather standard ambush taking out another team with drugged senbon. By this point they had learned the identities of twelve of their classmates and Naruto had ideas for getting them at least a few more. At least six were guarding a scroll and he would bet they hadn't gotten as creative with their orders as he had. That would mean that they had set themselves up defensively at their post so he knew where to look to find them. He signaled his teammates and explained his reasoning to them.

'Yeah, so what?' Was Three's response.

Restraining his irritated reaction again he explained. 'We aren't likely to have anymore teams stumble into us so let's go to them. We can make a try for their scrolls but even if we don't get it we might be able to recognize them from how they fight. If we decide to make them fight us that is. We have a slim possibility of getting their scroll by stealth.'

They set off through the woods again planning to speed from post to post looking for their scroll guarding counterparts. Fourteen was starting to lag by the time they found the Yellow Team at their fourth stop. Naruto assigned her to hide and watch the fight to see if she could tell who they were while holding on to their own scroll to keep it safe as they made an attempt at assaulting the post in the middle of the large clearing.

The Yellow Team seemed fresh which was unsurprising since few ninja would attempt a straightforward assault on such an open area. It was a strictly taijutsu match and Naruto was immediately hard pressed as he had never faced two opponents before. If it hadn't been for his summer of training he would have been slaughtered in seconds. He had expected one of them to stay back to guard their scroll and he only had time to think that he had better start sparring against multiple clones before they were on him. His one saving grace was that they were as unused to fighting with a partner as he was to fighting more than one person and he was able to adapt faster than they did and started to direct them into blocking the other. Not that he thought that out in any way. Things were moving way too fast for him to _think _but he was an instinctive fighter with a natural feel for the flow of a fight. His mind would intuit an unorthodox move that would work and his body would move to do it without a second thought.

When they backed off for a moment to sort themselves out he took the opening as a chance to clap twice to signal his partner to retreat. They met back up with Fourteen and they relocated to a hiding spot up in a tree.

'You were right, I could tell who they were by how they were fighting. Three was up against Sasuke and Five you fought Ino and Chouji. I thought for a second of sneaking up behind them while they were distracted and stealing the scroll, but number Two from Team Gold beat me to it. I'm positive that it was Hyuuga Hinata.'

Naruto let his head tilt slightly as he took in that surprising news. He decided he had better learn to keep track of what was going on around him. In the heat of the moment he hadn't even noticed the girl and he had been facing the right way! He started doing a visual sweep of his surroundings and got kind of twitchy about all the places someone could be concealing themselves.

'I think we need to move real soon. We don't know who could be nearby. I think we should continue our plan to check out the other posts and see what our options are if we find the last scroll team.' Naruto checked that their reaction to his proposal was positive and then signaled them to follow him on his next mad dash. Fourteen seemed to have found a second wind and managed to keep up until they found their last target two stops later. It was another wooded post and this team looked to have seen some action.

After a quick conference they decided on a blitz attack on one member of the team. Go in fast and one would engage the target as the second sweeps past and grabs the scroll while the third runs interference with the other team members. They had crept closer and Naruto was about to give the go signal when he noticed something was off. 'Wait. Problem. Traps detected and further reconnaissance required. Fourteen fall back twenty feet. Three sweep left. I'll sweep right. Check for traps for thirty feet then report back to Fourteen's position.'

Three minutes later they were back together and reporting a number of detected traps. Three wanted to attempt it anyway and Fourteen thought that a stealth approach might work better. The debate on what to do was short and ended with one comment from Naruto. 'Think of the traps we couldn't detect from where we were. We have our own scroll to defend, so we can't afford capture. Don't worry, this isn't a total loss. I was able to identify Twenty-three as Shikamaru and Seven as Shino. We should go into hiding until the bell sounds. I think we've done all we can for now and if the other teams can't find us they can't get our scroll from us.'

With that they retreated to a high treetop to wait for the second bell. When it rang it found Team Green rested and still with their scroll. They were able to make their way swiftly back and they were only the second team to arrive.

There was a short wait for everyone to arrive and Iruka arrived just before the last team did. Standing between the teams and the building he addressed the class.

"Your day is not yet over. As I am sure you have noticed, on the wall behind me is a clipboard for each of you. You will each be filling out a mission report for every mock mission that you run. As a Konoha shinobi if you receive injuries on a mission that needs treatment your report is expected two days after you have been released back to duty. We will operate the same way even though you are expected to _try_ and avoid inflicting more damage than a few bruises." Iruka thought that was a little harsh on his students but they were preparing them for a difficult world and injuries were simply one reality of it.

"The packets on each clipboard should be fairly self explanatory. You are to give a summary of your actions on the mission, a review of your opponents actions and abilities as well as your opinions on your _teammates_ actions and abilities. There is also of course the sheet for listing the students you were able to recognize. When you have finished your report and turned it in to the mission room," Iruka motioned to the last room in the building, "you are free to leave for the day. Before you get too excited about that you should know that your report, if well written and thought out, can gain you up to ten points."

"Are there any questions?" Iruka paused and looked to see if anyone would come forward. "If you change your mind I will be available in the classroom, which is also where you will report in the morning. It will be a non uniform day and we will be reviewing the results of today's exercise."

"Grab the clipboard that matches your patch and find a place on the grounds to complete the forms. When you are finished you are free to do whatever you want. However, from what I observed today many of you would be well served if what you wanted to do would be to train." His stern look took in several of the teams that Naruto's own had captured. "Get started."

Naruto grabbed his clipboard and retreated to the treetops again. He found himself a comfortable nook where several branches split and he was partially reclined but he could brace his clipboard on his knee for writing. He started with his list matching names with their number. He had nineteen names for the list and he had hopes that only one person had figured out who he was. It was hard to hide from an Inuzuka nose when they were on your own team. Even if he hadn't learned his scent yesterday when they met, he was the only student whose scent he wouldn't be familiar with from spending years in the same class. With most other students he had the advantage of them not being familiar with his skills or how he moved. If your teammates have any skill at all it was going to be an almost automatic two point loss and gain there for everybody.

For the rest of the forms he would just be as honest and thorough as he could be, but he wanted to try to put in as many positive observations of his teammates as he could. With Kiba it was fairly easy with his only real concern being his tendency to let his aggression run his actions. Otherwise he thought they were fairly well matched on skill but his own ability to create a plan gave him the edge over him. He had easily listened to reason and followed the plans they agreed upon and had helpful suggestions to add to them.

With Sakura it wasn't as simple. While she too had offered some suggestions it was only a few and only when prompted. She lacked any aggression or competitive spirit and it had taken her three times longer to set up a trap. She had virtually no stealth or awareness of her surroundings and her stamina was almost nonexistent. She was taken unaware every time they had returned to her position after separating and he hadn't even gotten the chance to evaluate her hand to hand skills. For being reportedly the top kunoichi in the class last year, she was showing no talent in the field. She hadn't really held up her position on the team, more like held them back. He winced when he thought it but it was true and probably the worst thing he could say about a loyal Konoha ninja. Teamwork and supporting your team were words you heard at least once a day in class and usually more often.

He got to working. He wanted to get started on some training as soon as possible. He hadn't used any clones during the day so he wouldn't be distracted at a critical moment with a memory rush. He thought that Iruka would be in for a surprise though when he saw Naruto's report. Shortly after he had started writing in the evenings he had set another couple of clones to practicing his handwriting. He'd found it necessary in order to be able to _read_ what he had already written. He hadn't really cared about it before when the only things he had to write were homework and test answers. He'd just gotten so used to the fact that for years whatever he wrote down didn't make any difference in his grades that it wasn't worth the effort. Now he was writing his stories for himself and he had wanted to be able to reread them whenever he wanted to, and that was much easier with better handwriting. Now it would pay off for him because he knew he could trust Iruka-sensei to be fair. He'd thought last year that maybe Iruka-sensei was trying to be fair, but he hadn't really realized that he could _trust_ him until he'd stood up for him against Mizuki.

He wondered idly what the next day was going to be like. If it was going to be more boring lectures or if it could possibly be as fun and interesting as today had been. He let himself grin behind his mask as he hadn't since just before he left his apartment that morning. He and his team had succeeded in their mission! While there hadn't been any explosions or flashy techniques used, he had more fun and excitement than he had ever had playing a prank. If things stayed like this he wouldn't miss playing pranks at all. He had been in his element and the day had only succeeded in convincing him that being the best ninja ever was what he was made for!

* * *

Naruto was once again early for class and he quickly made his way to his seat before he looked to the points board and couldn't stop his jaw from dropping in shock. He had thought he had done a good job but he hadn't expected to top everyone else by fifteen points! He looked past his own to see the other top scorers. Shikamaru, Shino, Kiba, Hyuuga Hinata and a civilian family student named Deushi Benjiro were all in the same row if not exactly matching on points. Sakura was ten points below that matching with two others who he assumed were from Team Gold and profited from Hinata's success as Sakura was from his and Kiba's.

The second shock was to see that Uchiha Sasuke and the rest of Team Yellow had gone below their starting points. He was still staring when Shikamaru took a seat next to him with a clap on the shoulder and a quiet congratulations. He looked around the room and saw plenty of other shocked faces to match his own. The burning fury being directed his way from the Uchiha was perfectly understandable to him and didn't faze him in the least. So it was another shock to everyone present when Shino of all people spoke up pulling everyone's attention with a very out of character comment as he took a seat behind Naruto.

"I guess the Uchiha scion is not quite the prodigy he is claimed to be is he?" While spoken in his usual monotone it was deliberately loud enough to be heard by everyone, and Naruto couldn't think why Shino would have said it until he noticed that no one was glaring at _him_ any longer. Naruto finally broke out of his shock and gave a dazzling grin at the boy who would have been gratified to know that his small act in defense of his new friend had cemented him into a lifelong friendship.

Before anyone could respond to Shino's comment, Iruka entered and called the class to order and took roll. He picked up a stack of papers and began to walk around the class passing them out as he spoke. "The first sheet is a list of the necessary field skills you will need to demonstrate your competency in. Next to each skill are the points you were given or docked. The second sheet has comments from the instructors who were observing you yesterday. Some of you may have comments from more than one instructor, it simply means that something you did came to their attention." He noticed that many of the students were looking depressed at the number of comments on their sheet. "Keep in mind that this is not to make you feel bad, this is to show you where you need to improve."

"Take a moment to look through your sheet." As they were doing that Iruka pulled out a large map and clipped it in place. He pulled out the colored dot magnets that would be easy to move around the map to show the movements of the teams and placed them at the appropriate starting points. He turned to his class and saw that he had everyone's attention.

"Everyone done? Good. Now we get to talk about the strategies... or in some cases the lack of strategy that was used yesterday." This comment had many students wincing and almost shrinking in on themselves.

"I was both disappointed and very pleased with your first exercise. You were given few rules. Stay within the walls, and keep or capture a scroll depending on which team you were on. This allowed for a great variety in how you responded to this challenge. Some of you did better at this than others. We will start with the three teams with a scroll who were on the defensive." He pointed to each team on the map as he spoke.

"Team Yellow's sole plan seemed to be simply straightforward combat with any challengers. They lost their scroll to a stealthy member of another team while they were distracted. Team Blue had a solid defensive strategy that held up against all comers, but they had weaknesses that could be exploited. We will get into that later though." He paused and tapped his finger next to the next team.

"Team Green however seems to have had the best grasp of the nature of the exercise. They took their scroll and left their starting post and went on the offensive to eliminate the threat to their scroll and achieve their missions secondary goal which was to identify as many of their classmates as they could."

He moved their markers to a central clearing on the map and arranged Team Green's markers around it. "Towards that end they used traps to capture and unmask as many opposing teams as possible." He moved three teams to the clearing, reached down to his desk and pulled out three gray markers. "The gray marker indicates a capture. On future missions you will see black markers to indicate when a team has been 'killed'." That remark had more than a few of his kids swallowing nervously.

"When they believed they had reached the end of that plan's effectiveness they switched to finding the identities of the other scroll bearing teams and managed to discover all but one of them. They provoked Team Yellow into combat to gain an advantage and avoided combat with Team Blue when they recognized that it would put them at a disadvantage. At this point they switched plans again and went into hiding to protect their scroll." He moved Team Green's markers from one point to another, demonstrating their movements through the morning.

Iruka faced the class and moved to stand in front of his desk. "I'm sure that many of you had fun yesterday running through the woods playing a game. I'm not saying that you can't have fun while training or running these mock missions. I am saying treat it like a _mission_. According to the rules we gave you, it was simply a more complicated version of the game Keep Away. Those three teams were supposed to keep the scrolls away from you." Iruka smiled and a received a few giggles from his students.

"Here's the catch though. Those three teams with a scroll were on a mission for the Hokage. They had infiltrated another hidden village and were bringing vital information back with them. Those of you on a team without a scroll were ninja from that village trying to retrieve the stolen information and capture or kill the teams with the scroll." This was what he needed to drive home to them so they would take the mock missions as the opportunity to learn and not simply to play.

"Now which of these three teams was most likely to have a successful mission? Team Yellow with direct confrontation? Even if the strategy works they will most likely have been identified as a Konoha ninja from the techniques and fighting style they used. At that point we have the information _and_ a diplomatic incident that could start a war." With the way Team Yellow had sunk down in their seats and the rest of the class was nodding the point was made.

"Team Blue hunkered down behind their traps? If the teams had worked together they could have overrun their position and they would have been killed or worse captured. If they were killed the Hokage can say that they were acting on their own and we avoid the possibility of war. If they were captured, as I am sure you remember everyone can be made to talk eventually and we are back at a diplomatic incident this time without having the information they were sent for." Now everyone was cringing in their seat and Team Blue looked a little green.

"Team Green was the most likely to complete their mission. They stayed mobile, had a plan to take out the opposition and stayed flexible; changing plans as needed and keeping their mission goal in mind."

"There are two things that you need to keep in mind. The first is that each exercise is a mock mission scenario that you might encounter in the field. The second is that the missions conducted in uniform are to teach you to be able to complete the more politically delicate missions that require complete discretion on your part. Using a technique that is loud and flashy could destroy that aspect of your mission even if you complete your other objectives. Failing in that type of mission is the kind of things that loses the village business from an entire country."

"I think you all understand the need to take this seriously now." He received nods from several students and he could tell that the entire class had been kept riveted to his words. "With these points in mind let's review yesterday's scenario and discuss possible strategies."

Naruto's attention was captivated as Iruka continued to break down what everyone had done and what they could have done better. This was not a dry boring lecture; this was practical information that he would be able to put into use almost immediately! His imagination was sparked and he could practically see the strategies Iruka was describing. He could also see other options, ways to improve on his suggestions or tailor one to fit into other plans. Naruto had to stomp down on his internal glee so that he could concentrate but it stayed bubbling just below the surface and it was all he could do to simply try to stay still in his seat. He was almost vibrating in place trying to hold in his excitement.

Over the course of the morning he managed to calm down and not explode into little pieces of happy, which is what he felt would happen. He wasn't used to feeling anything positive in large amounts and he really wasn't sure what to do with himself.

Iruka was wrapping up the morning with a few announcements. "Tomorrow you will be having another mock mission, but this one will not be in uniform so any clan techniques will be an option and you will be allowed to use your bloodline limit if you have one. You will report to the mission building again in the morning to receive your team armband and your mission briefing. You may use the standard kit that you use with your uniform. Any additions to it will be approved or denied when you report in the morning."

While the other students were cheering, Naruto's own grin was slipping from his face as he looked down at his jumpsuit. He loved it and he trained in it just fine, but it wasn't really suited to use with the standard kit that was designed to go into a multitude of small pockets for easy access to whatever you needed. It looked like he would need to dip into the money he'd saved over the last two months to buy a few outfits for missions.

Iruka was continuing after the cheers died down. "Your schedule will consist of a mission and mission report one day and the next you will be in the classroom going over the previous day's mission in the morning. In the afternoon you are being given free time to do with as you please." He had to wait through another round of cheers. "Alright, alright calm down. While you are allowed to do what you want it would be a good idea if you took another look at the instructors comments and used this time for training to improve on your weaker areas. Consider that a very strong suggestion. Class dismissed."

Naruto was in no rush to leave as he already had his clones training and he wanted a chance to talk to Iruka for a minute. While he was waiting for everyone to clear out he noticed that Sakura was sitting in a depressed slump looking at her sheet with instructor's comments. It had a long list of comments. He winced and got up to make his way over and give her the book he'd brought for her on chakra control exercises. Many of the exercises in the book that would increase your control would also increase your chakra reserves. He might have only been her teammate temporarily but she was going to be a Konoha kunoichi. He'd given a lot of thought to whether or not he should help her, and due to the conclusion he'd reached he would also be talking to Kiba to try to give him a few helpful hints. He'd resolved to do the same thing for everyone he was teamed up with. After all if he wanted to be the best Hokage ever it would be best if he started acting like one right away, and one of the duties of the Hokage was to increase the strength of the village. Keeping knowledge and skills to himself wouldn't make the village stronger.

"Hey, it's alright." When she looked up he gave her an encouraging smile. "If you try you'll get better with practice. I noticed that you didn't really have a lot of stamina, so I brought you this book I thought might help you."

Sakura blushed and gave a quiet thank you.

Naruto noticed that most everyone had gone and he started to head towards Iruka calling an I'll see you later back to her with a casual wave. As he approached him the excitement he'd been suppressing all day bubbled up until he was practically bouncing in front of him and words burst out of him. "Iruka-sensei this is so awesome! I know you were talking about how we should take it seriously and I am, but it's also so much fun!"

Iruka laughed and felt a little knot inside release. He'd been worried that Naruto had been changed completely by his new knowledge. He'd been extremely proud of how well Naruto had done but he'd worried about the quiet and serious attitude. When he'd shown up on time without a word it was only his trademark orange outfit that reassured him that he was the same boy. Now he knew that while his behavior may have changed he was still the same fun loving boy he'd gotten to know last year and he could see the changes as constructive rather than alarming.

"I'm proud of how well you did Naruto, and I'm pleased that you are having fun even when you are taking your mission seriously. I'm sure you will have fun tomorrow too even though it will be a very different experience when you aren't trying to hide who you are." Iruka placed his hand on Naruto's shoulder to hold the excited boy in place to meet his eyes.

"I want you to continue to think up more _indirect_ ways to accomplish your goal tomorrow as you did yesterday. This is supposed to allow all of you to learn and gain experience. With your shadow clones you could probably use them as a blunt force to win your objective. Right now though neither you nor your classmates will learn anything useful if you use them that way. I know it isn't really fair to take the limits off of your classmates while giving you some but I want you to limit yourself to five clones at a time, only making more as the first are dispersed. Okay?"

Iruka received a grin in response. "You bet, sensei! It wouldn't be any fun if it was too easy."

Smiling back at his student he was glad that he'd taken it so well. "Who knows? Maybe later in the year we may use you and your shadow clones to train against the rest of your class. It just depends on how well everyone does. We have to keep the missions challenging so that everyone can continue to grow!"

"Go on and get out of here! I've got things to take care of."

Naruto made his way outside and was delighted to find that five of his classmates were waiting for him there. Shikamaru and Shino he could understand their waiting, and Chouji with them as Shikamaru's best friend. He knew that Kiba probably wanted to talk, but why Ino was waiting with them he was mystified. "Hey, guys! What are you planning to do for the rest of the day?"

Ino came out with her plan with her usual outspoken bluntness. "I want to know how you knew what to do when no one else did. Who told you?"

While Naruto was still gaping at her Shino stepped in with a more diplomatic wording. "We do want to know, but you don't have to tell us. I also thought that you might want to train together this afternoon."

"Yeah, me too." Kiba chimed in.

Naruto tried to think of the best way to explain. "Well, nobody told me, I guess I just looked at it a little differently."

"What's that supposed to mean?" Ino sounded exasperated.

"I used to play a lot of pranks and you have to come up with a way to get around rules and restrictions or sometimes to use the rules as part of the prank. I guess I'm used to looking for the loopholes so I can do things my own way. You just have to get creative in finding ways to do things that follow the rules but are still unexpected." All he got were blank looks so he tried again.

"I think... I think what it boils down to is expectations. People have had bad expectations of me for years so I always wanted to prove them wrong. I didn't know how to do it on the big things and so I started with the smaller expectations. They think I'll go right I'll go left., if they think I should be quiet I'll be loud, and if they think I should be sad I'll be happy.

"For a lot of different reasons whenever someone expects me to do something or react a certain way... I just don't. Everyone expected me to stay at my post yesterday, but there wasn't a rule making me stay so I left. We were expected to defend so I had us go on the attack. Towards the end we had been active and on the move all morning so someone might expect that to continue so we hid." Naruto hadn't really made that connection before with how he acted in direct opposition to expectations. He shelved it to think on later and quickly moved to change the subject to something not as deeply personal as his motivations.

"Anyway now you know and I'd like to train with you but it will have to wait until later. I need to go shopping for a few things for tomorrow." There was a squeal and he suddenly had Ino latched to his arm. He looked at her with astonishment.

"I'll be happy to help you shop for whatever you need Naruto-kun. I'm an expert shopper!" Ino was batting her eyelashes at him.

Naruto just stared at her in confusion for a moment before Shikamaru explained for him. "Sorry I forgot to warn you not to mention that word in her presence. Ino will take any excuse to go shopping. You probably won't get a chance to train today either, now that she's latched on."

"I'm not that bad Shikamaru!" She yelled at him before turning to Naruto and speaking sweetly. "I just thought that you might like to benefit from my expertise."

"Uh, yeah, sure." He had to call back to Shino over his shoulder as he was dragged away. "I'll see you tomorrow and we can train after class!"

The four boy's left standing there exchanged looks and Kiba spoke for them all. "He's doomed."

Author's Note: Well this was the chapter that wouldn't end. I wanted to cover these two critical days in this chapter and I didn't realize how long it would get. In the next chapter we are going to fast forward a bit I believe. I am restraining myself from explaining my story to you in these notes as if you were in kindergarten. I have seen too many authors explaining the reason why they did this or that. Interesting sometimes but I will let my story try and stand on it's own merits. So if you have questions feel free to ask them. I may not answer except to say I will address the question in future chapters or maybe oops you caught me out I better fix that. The best questions make me go crap I didn't even take that into account and then addressing the issue makes the story better. Thank you to everyone who has put me on some kind of alert or favorite. Updates are likely to be slow but I will finish the fic.


	5. Sneaky Naruto

Hello! Sorry for the long wait. I won't say that it won't happen again. I write when I want to write and for the last year I was in the entirely wrong head space for it. The doctor finally has me on the right meds I guess. What I will say is that I reread my outline and notes and got chills I liked it so much. I would like to thank everyone who reviewed and kept me thinking about this story. I also hope that everyone who has me on alert likes the new chapter. Please let me know what you think!

Naruto stared at himself in the mirror that he had a clone transform itself into. He had just finished dressing for class and he had decided to check his new outfit. He looked... different. He was having trouble picking out what exactly had changed though, particularly since he had never been one to look at himself in a mirror much before. Did he look taller? Thinner? Both? Maybe it was that he looked older. He was stumped on how a simple change of clothes could make such a difference. It would continue to escape him because the change was not simply in the clothes but also in himself. He was no longer wearing his permanent mask of happiness and now that he had found some actual happiness and contentment for himself lowering the mask had allowed his growing emotional depth and the hard earned wisdom he had acquired from his rough childhood to shine through.

Naruto had managed to escape from Ino only when she had to return home for dinner. Far from the experiences of his fellow males and their expectations he had actually enjoyed the shopping trip, and learned a great deal, as Ino actually was the expert she claimed to be. His overabundance of energy meant that he was easily able to keep up; and the fact that he had never been allowed into many of the stores that Ino dragged him to made it into an exciting new opportunity. They couldn't treat him _too_ badly in front of a valued customer from an influential clan, and who was quite obviously shopping for him. Most responded by simply focusing on Ino and ignoring his presence as much as possible. He stayed quiet and paid attention to how Ino bargained with the shopkeepers and listened as she explained the differences in quality products and poorer goods. His wardrobe had tripled under her guidance, adding more casual and even a few fancier outfits in addition to his 'working outfits'. He'd even managed to get some of his new clothes in orange.

As he had been dragged through the streets Ino had kept a running monologue about what kind of new outfit he needed and the colors to get it in. Much of what she had to say about the type of clothes that would be best went right over his head and he was thinking that since she probably knew more than he did he could let her pick stuff for him. That is until she started on the colors, then he let his stubbornness kick in and he could out stubborn anybody. After arguing with Ino about it for several minutes they managed to reach a compromise. He got to keep the orange if Ino got to pick the shades. She had been very persuasive in her arguments on why some other shades would be better, but his arguing had at least reminded her that maybe he had some of his own requirements.

When he insisted on having a lot of small pockets she had gotten a thoughtful look and said she had seen just the thing for him when she had been on a shopping trip of her own a few weeks earlier. He had to admit that she was right. She had found some long sleeved clingy shirts with lighter and darker irregular orange stripes that were broken up by zippers of an even darker orange. The shirt itself reminded him of one of his neighbor's cats and the zippers were specially designed to open and close noiselessly with small weighted cloth tabs that wouldn't flutter in a breeze as a grip. She had also found him pants with a matching stripe pattern in grays with the same kind of zippers in a matte black that were also slightly loose in the thighs and calves but strapped tight to the ankle with black straps. He had tried everything on at her insistence and she had added new gray shoes as well and then forced him to hold still as she did a full body inspection. She scrutinized every detail and gave him one final ultimatum to follow to complete his 'look'; she ordered him to grow out his hair until she told him otherwise. He agreed as while his appearance didn't really matter to him it really seemed to be important to her and she had really helped him to get the new things he needed.

Naruto took one last look as he ran his mental inventory to make sure that he had transferred his entire kit into his new outfit. With that complete he gave himself a nod of approval. Whatever that difference was he thought that it was probably a good thing. He'd had a healthy breakfast and plenty of time to get to the Academy even if he chose to walk. However, running was always more fun.

Despite how early it was he wasn't the first to arrive and it appeared that the mission office had yet to open. He took the opportunity to observe his potential teammates and opposition. They presented a … _varied _appearance. Most of the students already there tended toward one extreme or another and it seemed to be mostly divided by gender. The boys looked as if they were going into a war zone and had brought the equipment to match; the girls all looked as if they were expecting to go for a walk in the park rather than a mission. He spotted barely a handful of weapons between them. Practical ninja wear it was not on either extreme. Even with the clan students the trend continued, just not as blatantly. The handful that seemed to hold the middle ground with him were going to be the ones to watch.

He was glad to see that his new friends Shikamaru and Shino were with him; but the surprise was to see

Hyuuga Hinata, and the civilian born Deushi Benjiro as well. He gave an acknowledging wave to his friends but he was too curious about the other two and he wanted to see if they could possibly be as nice as Shikamaru and Shino. His decision on which he would talk to first was one entirely based on how much time was left before the mission office would open. Hinata seemed very shy and reserved and he wouldn't have time to break through it that morning but he resolved to make time that day. Benjiro was standing quietly by himself watching the others talk amongst themselves.

"Hey! Benjiro right?" The question was asked quietly as he didn't really want everyone to pay any attention to what he was doing.

"Yes." Benjiro's answer was just as quiet but his body language had become defensive and wary.

"We haven't really had the chance to talk yet, and I thought I would come introduce myself to one of the few sensible people here. I'm Uzumaki Naruto."

"Sensible?" The wariness was fading away in favor of curiosity of his own.

"Yeah, I mean you see it too, don't you? Most of them are either too weighed down with equipment or brought way too little."

Naruto and Benjiro spent the fifteen minutes until the mission office opened discussing the reasons for all of the different items included in the standard kit and debating various additions and subtractions to it based on personal ninja technique and style. The conversation ended with both making mental notes to make changes to what they would consider their own standard kit.

When the mission office opened and Naruto received his assignment he found it very familiar. In fact it was the exact same team and mission. Only for this one the only restrictions to achieving the goal were his own self imposed restrictions and Iruka's limit on his shadow clones that he found very reasonable. There was a sense of glee from all of the students as they realized that the day's mission was set up exactly the same as the last. They all streamed into the forest to get into position.

Naruto fell into a rearguard position letting Kiba take point with Sakura in the middle and more protected position. He let his body go through the motions as his mind raced for the best strategy to use. He made a quick decision that he would only use the shadow clones as his 'signature' technique as well as the academy taught replacement technique during the free style missions and hold his other skills back to use while in uniform. That left only deciding on what their strategy would be to complete the mission. They would have an hour to plan once they reached their post so he would see what his teammates could contribute to making up a sound strategic plan.

As it turned out they settled on a simple plan, stealth on the move. They would move around but try to stay hidden from everyone. Naruto decided to add his own touch however as he summoned two clones with orders to hide the team's scroll. One would stay with the scroll transformed into an innocuous object to protect it while the other would disperse to let him know where they were hidden. If things stayed to plan he would summon and disperse another clone at the end of the exercise to tell the remaining clone to bring it in.

The plan worked for a good part of the morning with Kiba's keen senses giving them enough time to get into hiding. Then they had the misfortune of running into Shikamaru and Shino's team. They were able to get away the first time, but Shino had managed to tag them. The second time they also managed to get away, but the third time Shikamaru caught Naruto in his shadow for long enough that his team was able to take down Sakura and Kiba. That left Naruto to be tied up before Shikamaru released him. Once free of Shikamaru's shadow technique though Naruto was able to summon two clones to release him and turn the tables on the other team. This time it was Shikamaru's turn to get his teammates to safety while Naruto's team chased after.

The bell rang to end the exercise with both teams still free and still with their scroll. Naruto's clone with the scroll joined them and then dispersed just as both teams were reaching the mission hut, causing all of them to break out laughing.

The next day's mission review was just as riveting for them and supplied a wealth of strategy and tactics that they had heard before, but they are hard to think through without the practical experience they were now getting.

The next few months their schooling followed the same pattern:

Monday – mission review and breakdown in the morning, training in the afternoon

Tuesday – uniform mock mission in the morning and report writing in the afternoon.

Wednesday – mission review and breakdown in the morning, training in the afternoon

Thursday – free style mission in the morning and report writing in the afternoon

Friday – mission review and breakdown in the morning, training in the afternoon

Saturday – uniform mock mission in the morning and report writing in the afternoon

Sunday – Day off

For Naruto after a mission day he would get together with his friends and sometimes some other classmates and train or occasionally goof off together. After a mission review day and on Sunday's he pushed himself to get ever better chakra control and to get better at all of the taijutsu styles he was learning.

A little over two months later and all of the training paid off in an unexpected way. They were assigned the teammates who would be on their genin teams unless something unexpected happened. Everyone was assigned based on their teamwork and who they worked best with. The most surprising match up was Uchiha Sasuke being teamed with two of the civilian raised ninja who were excelling with the new training.

Naruto was assigned a team with Shikamaru and Sakura. Which was a rather scandalous breaking of the Ino-Shika-Cho trio that everyone was expecting, but Shikamaru really couldn't work well with Ino.

This signified a huge change for Naruto too; he decided to trust his teammates with all of his secrets. Starting with the training he had been doing and ending with the Kyuubi. By the time he reached the last secret they were gaping at him.

"Naruto, the next time someone says you can't keep a secret – laugh in their face, really loudly and then snicker and point every time you see them after that." Shikamaru's comment started all three of them giggling so hard they fell over.

When they were finally done laughing Sakura leaned over to Naruto and hugged him. "Thank you, Naruto."

"What are you thanking me for?" Naruto was confused.

"For holding the Kyuubi all your life and keeping the village safe, but also for helping me when you didn't have to."

Now when Naruto trained he did so with his teammates oftentimes nearby doing their own training. It was a time of contentment for Naruto, but the next significant change was only three weeks away. Only this time it was not Naruto at its center.

He slipped silently into the bedroom through the window. It was difficult to maintain his stealth without automatically suppressing his chakra as he had been doing the jonin technique instinctively for years. However, he had a point to prove to an arrogant Nara.

He moved quickly to the bed and placed the specially prepared kunai at his target's throat with one hand and used his other to stifle any involuntary cries. Then he leaned forward to whisper barely a breath of sound into the target's ear.

"Your son's laziness just got you both killed." On seeing the stark fear in the civilian woman's eyes he pulled the kunai back a little. Leaving his hand in place he continued to speak until he had gained her complete cooperation.

Shikamaru came awake with a start. Something was wrong. He glanced warily around his room but whatever had awoken him wasn't in here. There was a strange smell in the air that he couldn't quite place. He stiffened as he finally realized that he was hearing unfamiliar footsteps in his parent's room across the hall. He heard a window opening and then quiet once again.

He slipped from his bed and ghosted from his room to his parents. There was a light glowing under the door. He hesitated slightly at breaching his parent's privacy but his instincts were still screaming at him.

Slowly sliding the door open he froze at the horror before him. The room was covered in blood. His brilliant mind almost completely overcome by shock could barely note that the blood had been what he had smelled since he awoke. There was so much of it he could barely recognize his mother past the gaping wounds covering her throat and torso, leaving only her face untouched by blood.

Then a low chilling laugh came from the window. "Hello little Nara, how do you like the surprise I've prepared for your father?"

He forced himself to look away from his mother and towards the voice. An Iwa-nin was leaning casually against the frame and he broke out of his shock to realize that this man had come to revenge himself against his family.

Thinking quickly he prepared himself before entering the room. Running wasn't an option, this was clearly someone who had skills that were beyond him and his only chance was in out-thinking him.

Straightening up the man entered a strange stance with his fists clenched and wrists crossed low and close to his body obviously preparing to use some kind of technique. Shikamaru quickly took the two steps forward necessary to capture him with his favorite technique that he had been activated before he stepped foot into the room.

Before Shikamaru could say anything the other man grinned. "Foolish child, do you really think that you can win with this little trick? That I would not have prepared in advance for just this eventuality? There are two things that you should know. The first is that there is a reason I came at night, and the second is that I am a clone."

With that the man crumbled into a pile of dirt on the bedroom floor and just as quickly the lights went out and Shikamaru stumbled forward after being hit at the base of the neck. It was just hard enough to daze him slightly without doing much harm. Shikamaru assumed a defensive stance as he tried to sense his attacker. It did him no good. He would take a bruising hit and be knocked out of his stance regain it only for the events to repeat. This went on for only a minute with him having taken at least a half a dozen blows to his arms, thighs and chest.

Then everything stopped.

"Tell me child, did any of those blows touch your throat?"

Shikamaru was terrified and confused but perfectly willing to talk and stall for time. "No, there was only the initial strike to the base of my neck."

"Ah! But there you see, is the thing, if I had wished each blow I struck would have been fatal. Then there is the other issue you should be aware of. Why don't you look in a mirror? I struck the first time before you ever awoke."

With that the lights returned and Shikamaru found himself facing a mirror. He was covered in brilliant red paint that at first look seemed eerily like blood. His fear ratcheted up as he realized that each blow would have severed a major artery. The mark on his throat was different though. It was a dull rust red color in a line along his neck. It was a mark of his terror that it took a moment to sink in that it was a match to some of the drier blood stains on the walls. He fell to his knees and threw up violently as he came to the realization that he had been so vulnerable to this man that he had been painted with his mother's blood in his sleep and never known it until now.

He sat up trembling as he surveyed the slaughterhouse that the room had become. He stood and started to make his way to his mother's side. Before he could get there he was again surprised by a voice from the window. This time the man was sitting braced in the window with one foot on the sill and an elbow resting on his knee with his hand dangling.

"So what do you think, Nara?"

"Of what?" Shikamaru's voice was raspy and dull.

There was a wave of the hand to encompass the room. "Of my little demonstration here."

Shikamaru had reached the end of his ability to cope with the events of the last few minutes. He screamed at him. "What demonstration?"

"That you can be caught by surprise, out-planned and outmaneuvered. Your nice happy family destroyed..." The man stared into Shikamaru's eyes as a transformation melted away. "... By an academy student not nearly as smart as you are."

Still staring into Shikamaru's shocked eyes Naruto called out. "You can get up now Mrs. Nara."

Shikamaru whipped his head around to stare as his mother started to sit up the gaping wounds melting away as the illusion broke. The copious amounts of blood stayed and Shikamaru began to sway as the shocks to his system started to overwhelm him. Naruto was quick to lead him from the still horrifyingly bloody scene into the family kitchen and into a chair.

They were joined very shortly by a clean and dressed clan matriarch who began bustling about making tea. She set the tea before him and carefully checked that he was recovering before leaving them to have their discussion.

After sipping his tea for several minutes Shikamaru had been given enough time for his extreme intelligence to analyze his recent experience. On an intellectual level he could understand what had happened and how he had been manipulated. On the emotional level the memories were still extremely disturbing on a visceral level. He had managed to figure out the how of the situation from hindsight but he needed the whys to really understand.

"Why? Why did you do this and why did my mother agree to help you?" Shikamaru had been teamed or opposing the blond off and on for three months and actually teamed with him for three weeks and he had never seen him look so serious.

To an outside observer of the conversation the two boys might have looked as if they were engaging in a staring contest so intense was there shared gaze. Naruto nodded as if he had found something he was searching for; which he had. He had been searching for Shikamaru's focus, and he was being given all of it.

"You've been coasting on your intelligence. Doing as little as you have to, being content to be average in your skills because you can out think any opponent you have." Naruto snorted. "Of course you have. All of your opponents have been your peers who you know you are smarter than or your father or someone experienced like him that you are not expected to beat."

"What if I really had been an enemy? One who is more skilled than you with surprise and better intelligence on your abilities than you have on his? The possibilities for what you could come up against that would outmatch you, or any active duty ninja are literally as limitless as my imagination."

At that Shikamaru winced. Naruto was extremely inventive and his few losses at the academy were usually due being opposite to Naruto's team and him pulling some insane last minute tactics that saved his team and mission. The blond was simply too unpredictable and thought too differently for him to be able to plan for every variable he might come up with.

"The only way for you to prepare for all the tricks and traps and surprises you'll face is to have as many tricks and traps and abilities up your sleeve as you possibly can. I could come up with endless scenarios where you are facing multiple superior opponents and by the time you have out thought yours into a trap your teammates are dead and maybe so are you because you exhausted yourself taking out the first one. Or if you do survive, how do you feel afterwards when you think it all through afterwards and realize that if you had just trained harder and learned this technique or that one you could have saved them."

"But why did you do this? Why didn't you just talk to me about it?" He was surprised to find himself almost pleading for an answer he could live with.

"Because you've been treating everything to do with the academy, or your training, as a test or a game to win with the goal being to see just how little you could do and still succeed. The only problem is that when you finally did lose and realize just what your little game had cost you... well it would be too late for someone. Whether you or someone you cared for I don't know but you needed to have your eyes opened."

"If I had just talked to you about it you would have blown me off. I know Shikamaru, it's what I did. I had to have my own eye opening experience before I got serious and I'm just really damn lucky nobody died." Naruto had grimaced as he thought back to facing Mizuki, and how Iruka had almost died for him. It hadn't been until as recently as three days ago when he was assigned his team that he had even thought of how lucky he had been.

It had only been seeing how his teammates were still treating their training as a game that he had to think about why he no longer did and taking that thought to its natural conclusion. That when they had their own eyes opened they might not survive it like he did. Damn that Nara for teaching him how to think things through.

"You'll have to ask your mom her reasons for letting me though." A most unlikely prospect, she may have been a civilian who married into a ninja clan but everyone knew who ran this household with an iron fist. "She's staying in the guest room. I've got some clones cleaning her room as we speak. I think all the pig's blood really gave the illusion that extra edge don't you think? We can talk later about how you never did sense the chakra I deliberately wasn't suppressing." Naruto stood to leave and had almost reached the door before he paused and turned back.

"Of course you realize that we can't have our teammate walking around with her eyes closed can we?" The smirk on his face was rather evil. "You'll have to help me tailor something specific for her awakening. Her eyes are currently so firmly shut they might as well be sewn that way."

"I have one last piece of advice for you. You'll probably be able to reason your immediate reaction away, but every time you have a choice of whether or not to be lazy I want you to ask yourself a question. Is it worth the life you could have saved?"

**Author's Notes:** Yes, I got him out of the awful outfit that we all hate and into something I believe to be more practical. When you picture the clothes just think of orange and gray tabby cats... with black zippers on them. I had to snicker just typing that. As for the scene that I have been calling Motivating the Nara it was one of the main reasons for this fic. How do you get a Nara to stop being lazy? Apparently you have to kill someone. Umm… any suggestions for waking up Sakura? I'm drawing a blank. I have no idea when the next chapter will be out. I am writing a story for the Sherlock fandom at the moment as well. So it might be a couple of weeks or a couple of months. Ciao


	6. Another Iruka Interlude

Iruka spent his day going over his paperwork in preparation of his late meeting with the Hokage. All of his meetings seemed to take place late in the afternoon or early evening anymore. He'd asked the scheduling secretary for an earlier appointment but all he would say was that it wasn't possible due to orders from the Hokage that Iruka always be the last appointment of the day unless he brought in an urgent issue. While his issue was fairly urgent to the academy, it didn't affect the village as a whole…yet.

He needed to talk to the Hokage about graduating the academy's top team to genin half a year early. Keeping them with the class would merely demoralize them. It was already happening; it was an accepted fact that no team could beat their record. They were very good on their own, but when the prospective genin teams were created their teamwork together and their individual skills boomed. They made the top three students a team and then in groups of three down to the bottom of the class rankings. The teams were only made once the dross had dropped out and Iruka fully expected all of the rest to graduate to genin. He felt that having teammates that were mostly level with each other skill wise would be a good idea to follow. A better idea than the usual political maneuverings that decided which students would be teamed with which.

He didn't think that the Sandaime would argue with the necessity, but with his choice of instructor. He spent his trip to the tower rehearsing his arguments. His choice would be unusual but he thought his pick was simply the best one for the team as a whole and as individuals.

When he was finally let in he addressed the Hokage informally, "Sandaime, I have some concerns about some of my students."

"Ah. Naruto's team I assume?"

"Yes sir, they need to graduate and take real missions to grow further, they did very well when they were working individually as you know. As the top three students in the class they were assigned to the same team, they continued to do very well. Three weeks later and they have become untouchable by the other students and they gave the chunin instructors fits trying to keep ahead of them."

"You said gave, are they no longer driving our chunin insane?" The old man chuckled.

"No, now they are giving the jounin fits." Iruka stated seriously. "It's only the experience gap that is truly keeping the jounin ahead. They are more than ready to graduate."

"Yes, it does look that way. Do you have a teacher in mind for them?" The Sandaime inquired.

"I do, but it's going to take me a lot of effort to get you to agree to it."

"Who exactly did you have in mind?" The Hokage could not help but think that it was things like this that kept Iruka to the last appointment slot of the day so as not to cause him to interrupt his carefully managed schedule.

Author's note: I know it's really short, but the next bit will be a longer chapter I promise. Anyone know who the teacher is going to be? I promise mini-fic with the prompt of their choice for the first five people to guess correctly!


	7. Passing the test

"Uzumaki, Haruno, Nara." As he harshly called their names he tossed them each a band. They unfolded them to realize that they had been given Leaf headbands.

"Congratulations, you have just become genin of the Hidden Leaf Village. You are to meet your teacher on top of the Hokage Monument." Iruka grinned at them. "You had better get going if you want to meet your teacher on time. You only have fifteen minutes to get there. You'd better hurry."

With that all three grabbed their field packs and jumped out the window facing the Monument. They were just able to hear Iruka start telling his other students that if they applied themselves maybe they would also be able to graduate early before they were too far away.

They had become a very good team in the four months that they had been assigned to one another, each with their own specialties. Sakura was genjutsu and ijutsu, as specializing in both was almost never done she was constantly studying in her chosen fields. Getting better every day on perfecting her chakra control and knowledge base was her goal. She worked as support mostly trying to attack an enemy from a distance. She was working on turning her instinctive strength while she was angry into a dependable and devastating hand to hand technique but there was still a long way to go on that.

Shikamaru was their information analyst and speed fighter, he focused on his stealth and infiltration as well; his ambition was to be Konoha's spymaster and advisor to the Hokage. While he was able to work well with Sakura, it was working in tandem with Naruto that something different happened between the two. They had developed the beginnings of a synergy together that allowed them to take out more skilled opponents than either was experienced enough to handle on their own. In time they would be a formidable team in any situation in the field or at home. Shikamaru was planning his future around how he would best be able to support Naruto when he became Hokage as he was now certain would happen.

Naruto's ambition was unchanged. However, with influence from Shikamaru's advice on how to use his ability to spam clones with his ability to physically transformation, he had his own spy network practicing throughout Konoha for later deployments elsewhere. He was also their heavy hitter, he was able to take the most damage and dish it out. When he had a little more practical experience he would be sheer hell to fight, as he was now capable of adding subtlety and finesse into his insane spur of the moment plans. He was also their leader, he listened to his teammate's advice, but he had the natural charisma that drew others to follow him.

With only a few subtle gestures he let his team know that this had somehow escaped his spy network. This was a worrying thought as he hadn't considered that a change of this magnitude could have slipped by him anywhere in Konoha.

Waiting for them on top of the Hokage Monument, was the Sandaime. They came to a stop before him and bowed.

"Hello students."

The team shared a confused glance between them and Naruto ventured to ask the question.

"Are you here to introduce us to our jounin teacher?"

"As the three of you are very unique in your ability to learn very quickly each in your own way, so too will you have an unusual teacher."

"Is it the Copy Ninja Kakashi?" Shikamaru volunteered his guess.

"That is a very informed guess Shikamaru, but no. I will be teaching you myself." He paused slightly as they gaped at him letting their shock ease before he continued. "That is inside the village I will be. On any mission out of Konoha you will have a temporary protector who will be nominally in charge but it will be the duty of your team to do your very best to complete the mission without that jounin having to intervene directly." He looked on at them, all still gaping at him, in amusement.

"This is however a secret. If asked you will give the name of your teacher as Monkey and explain that he is active ANBU and you are unaware of his identity. As this will excite gossip of its' own, I advise that you avoid giving out any information at all." He gave them a very serious look. "Is this understood?"

"Understood, Hokage-sama!" They chorused.

"While I am acting as your teacher, I am to be addressed as Monkey-sensei to avoid confusion. Are there any questions?"

"How can it be a secret that you are teaching us if you must spend so much time away from the Tower to teach us?" Sakura asked.

"The same way your teammate can be in so many places at once. I am a shadow clone." He allowed them a moment to absorb all of the new information before continuing.

"Ordinarily genin straight from the academy would be set to doing D-rank missions to foster team work, but I have heard that you have excellent team work already. What we are going to do instead is a series of tests over the next week to see where your skills truly lie." As he spoke he gave them a stern glare. "I expect you each to strive to do your best. In the future as you pass one of my tests I will train you in a skill that will be useful to each of your specializations."

"The first test is of your information gathering skills. Your task is to sneak into the ANBU headquarters and bring me back the information on the top three papers on the captain's desk. You have three hours to return here and report."

The three genin didn't move for a moment merely turning to each other and having a conversation with only a few small facial movements until finally Naruto spoke up firmly ending the debate.

"If he is to be our teacher; he needs to know the true level of our skills in order to help us improve them."

With that he formed a clone and dispersed it. The team remained standing unmoving for two minutes before Naruto spoke again reciting the information from three classified documents that the Hokage had reviewed himself before handing them directly to the ANBU captain.

"You have a clone spying on my ANBU captain?" It was the Hokage's turn to gape before he narrowed his eyes. He interrupted before Naruto could manage more than a couple of words. "We'll get back to that later. For now we will continue with the series of tests I have set up. When I designed the tests I had time limits set for them. Now I simply want to know how fast you can complete each test returning to report each mission to me here each time."

Three days later the team was on the verge of collapsing with exhaustion. Naruto was in the best shape but even he needed to sleep and he hadn't gotten any, taking some of the assignments solo so that his teammates could get a few hours of rest.

They walked the rest of the way up the monument to find the Hokage standing in front of a tent with a solemn judging look on his face.

"In the original plan this test took place over a week and a half with the nights off unless you needed to work in darkness. You have surpassed all of my expectations." He pulled back the front flap on the tent showing the genin that there were three beds. "Sleep for now, and we will speak more in the morning when I can be sure that you will remember the conversation."

Naruto barely managed a thank you to the old man before moving to collapse on the farthest bed leaving the closer ones for his even more exhausted companions.

They woke twelve hours later to the smell of cooked food. Exiting the tent they found the Sandaime and another man they didn't know seeming to have a staring contest seated across from each other. At the pre-teens entrance onto the scene the stranger looked at them briefly looking them over before turning once again to the Sandaime and giving him a grudging nod.

"I'll do it. I'm sure they will too if you ask them, and I'll make sure that they will live to regret doing so." With that he stood and left the camp site.

"Monkey-sensei is there more to the test after all?" Shikamaru asked warily.

"It is more in the line of being a completely different test that I am asking you to participate in. In ten days they are holding the chunin exams in Iwa. I want your team to participate. We need to put forth a strong showing from our genin, but the only other qualified team is being held back until next year by their sensei. I don't expect you to actually make chunin; we just need you to make your best effort to be in the running for it and try to make it to the last round."

There was no gaping this time as they were too stunned to move or do more than blink at him. Naruto was the first to recover and gave a whooping laugh causing Sakura and Shikamaru to stare at him. He gave them both a little shove.

"This has got to be one for the record books. I mean, come on, entering a chunin exam after having been genin for less than two weeks _and_ having no official missions under our belt?"

They both started to smirk.

"Can you imagine if we actually made chunin?" They were no longer smirking, now they could only be termed evil grins.

The academy missions may not have been official but once Naruto woke up his teammates to the real world they had all treated them like they were and they had gained a lot of experience getting around the chunin and jounin instructors.

"Let's do it!" Sakura said with determination.

"Hell, yeah, I didn't get off my ass and train like a demon to do anything less than make chunin my first time through an exam."

"Team Strife accepts the mission assignment, sir." Naruto said turning to the Hokage.

"Excellent, you will have the day today to do any shopping you need to do and rest tonight because you will be leaving for Iwa in the morning. Your temporary teacher standing in for me will be my son Asuma." He stood to leave. "You can meet him at the main gate at seven in the morning. I wish you the best of luck Team Strife."

When they reached the gate, exactly on time, they found Asuma waiting and smoking a cigarette. Naruto was giddy to be leaving the village hidden in the leaves for the first time. He pranced and danced and babbled about nothing in particular. A day away from the border to Iwa Asuma stopped him with a hand to his shoulder.

"You will be representing our village to Iwa even before we cross the border. Try to act a little more badass and a little less toddler on a sugar high." Thus chastened Naruto decided to be a picture of model behavior the rest of the journey.

"Yes, sir!" He gave Asuma a salute. "Leader of Team Strife reporting for duty, sir."

"Team Strife? Where did you come up with that one?" He was treated to three identical evil grins but Naruto responded.

"That would be because strife is what we always give to anyone who opposes us."

The trip to Iwa could be made at full ninja speed in a little over five days. Team Strife plus guest made it in eight so as not to arrive too exhausted and still have at least a couple of days to get a lay of the land. Two days would be all that was needed with Naruto spamming spy clones in every shape from the animate (from the size of a mouse to the common flying bird in the area) to the inanimate (a variety of objects that could be carried and left anywhere and never suspected).

Two days had been generous; they knew more about Iwa than some of its ninja would ever bother to learn in one. Naruto had practiced mapping from such massive information flows with Konoha, and now no one knew the Hidden Leaf better than Naruto and no one else probably ever could. They had also learned the common form for chunin exams starts with information retrieval in one form or another, then a survival challenge followed by a tournament style elimination round.

Round one was pathetically easy for them, the only reason they even bothered to leave the exam and wander the village with the rest of the teams was so that they would not give away their advantage. Naruto had managed to discover the entire content of the exams and the answer to the first exam on the first day in the village and he was still picking at the secrets it held and would continue to even after he was gone from the village until all of the chakra from each clone was used up. That would be a very long time for some as sitting still took up very little energy and a clone didn't have to continue expelling energy to hold a transformation.

The survival challenge was only slightly more difficult for them. They needed to collect the opposite token to the one they had, which was actually variation of a standard academy operation. They went with stealth, rather than the brute force the Iwa genin they took it from seemed to be expecting. Naruto sent a raccoon clone into the camp after two of their targets were asleep and Sakura had placed the other under a genjutsu. It made sure to behave as an animal would as it tore through the packs in the appearance of looking for food, continuing even after finding the token to make the deception complete. They continued the stealth approach and did not have even one fight before they reached the safe zone.

After a two day wait for the rest of the candidates to make it to the safe zone the third round was announced. Suddenly it was time for the first of the one on one matches to take place. This was the most nerve wracking part for all of them. In Iwa they only opened their doors to outsiders once so anyone who wished to view the exhibition must come with the original delegation. Naruto and Shikamaru held no true concerns for their own matches; it was Sakura they worried for. She was still working on making her brute force technique reliable instead of anger triggered. It was still only slightly more hit than miss.

Her first match was a good one for her as her opponent was vulnerable to genjutsu and she was able to get close enough to use an ijutsu technique to knock him out. Naruto and Shikamaru breezed through their first matches as well. Sakura was knocked out late in the second round after putting in a good showing. Naruto immediately knocked out her opponent when he faced him in the third round. Shikamaru also won his third round. This left them in the unenviable position of having to face each other in the final round.

Naruto stood on one side of the battle area with Shikamaru on the other. They stared at each other as they went through a mental countdown, when it reached one they both turned sharply to the judges and called out.

"I concede!"

The Iwa Tsuchikage stood up looking irate.

"Explain yourselves at once!" He demanded

"We have sparred many times together. While I can possibly beat Naruto it would require showing too much of my arsenal to potential enemies so I concede." Shikamaru stated respectfully.

"Do you hold a similar belief?" He asked of Naruto.

"Yes sir, I am at a disadvantage to him in such an enclosed area with spectators I have to be careful to avoid. While I could possibly still beat him I too would have to show much of my arsenal. That is why I believe it is best that I concede."

"Then as both opponents have conceded the last battle is a draw and I declare that the tournament has ended. We shall conclude the exams this evening with a celebratory feast and announce the new chunin!"

As they returned to Konoha they were a day past the Iwa border when Naruto started giggling, the giggling soon became laughing. He gave a whoop and started doing cartwheels before stopping and running back; he picked up Sakura and swung her around.

"We did it!" His laughter was infectious with the rest of the team joining in and even Asuma allowing some low chuckles to escape.

"We went from genin to chunin in record time!" Shikamaru crowed.

The impromptu celebration went on for several more minutes before they continued on and quieted back down.

"What happens now?" Sakura questioned mostly to herself. "Will we still have Monkey-sensei or will be reassigned apart now that we're chunin?"

"No, they won't separate you, not until you're older at least, and if you are a very effective team it won't be for a long time." Asuma tried to reassure her. "As for my father still training you… I don't think he'd be willing to let anyone else have the molding of you."

"Also, depending on the missions you receive you will still need to have a jounin along for a little while and I will be happy to offer my services as your escort. It will make for a nice little vacation while you brats will be working your asses off."

Author's note: So, only one person got the teacher right, but they still have not gotten back to me with their prompt. This chapter will be moving things along. I am going with the theory that the chunin exams take place once a year roughly six months after genin exams depending on where they are located for that year. If my timeline is off a little per my personal system just ignore it as the vagaries of Iwa holding the exam a little later than usual. I think there are only a couple of chapters to go with a possible epilogue.


	8. Weeding out corruption

Their triumphant return to Konoha was cutoff at the gate when the guards spoke quietly to Asuma, stating that they were required to make their way to see the Hokage at their best speed. With a quick nod to the guard they hastily took to the rooftops and were at the Tower within only a few minutes. They were ushered inside without delay. Even in their swift travel through the village they had observed the subdued attitude of the villagers. It was mirrored in the bearing of all of the ninja in the Tower and the serious demeanor of the Sandaime.

"Jounin Sarutobi and Chunins Nara, Uzumaki and Haruno reporting." Asuma resorted to protocol in the face of such solemnity.

The Hokage gave them a grim smile.

"Congratulations Team Strife, however, I am afraid that your remarkable accomplishment is not the cause for celebration that I would have wished for."

"What's happened?" Asuma demanded.

"Two days ago Teams Hunter and Discord were graduated to genin early. For your information Asuma that would be Hyuuga Hinata, Inuzuka Kiba and Aburame Shino in Team Hunter; in Team Discord we have Yamanaka Ino, Deushi Benjiro, and Akimichi Chouji." This last was directed solely at Asuma before once more addressing them all.

"Uchiha Sasuke was apparently enraged at being overlooked again for early graduation and blamed his teammates. He attacked them with intent to kill. While he did not manage to do so due to the interference of one of the jounin instructors, one was maimed and will never be able to serve in the field, and the other is never likely to want to do so after his comrade turned on him."

"What is happening to him now?"

"He is in the psych ward at the hospital for treatment and rehabilitation. I have just been reliably informed that he is unlikely to ever be ready to serve Konoha as he has apparently been rather separated from reality for some years even before this incident. It is unfortunate, but at this point while we will be doing everything we can for the boy, we will now be looking in to what our options are for recovering the Uchiha line with only minimal cooperation at best from him."

Asuma shot a look between the new chunin and his father. Surely this was more information than the Uchiha's former classmates needed to hear. He looked again to Team Strife. While they looked grim and faintly repulsed neither did they look surprised at what they were hearing.

"This was disturbing news for the village as a whole. You are all aware of how he was practically worshipped by the civilians?" He was given several nods of confirmation.

"They are looking for someone to blame. Right now your team's successes will look like the Uchiha's failures and we cannot allow that to happen. I plan to keep all three of my new teams busy out of the village. As you are all three now chunin I will be assigning you to C and B rank missions as consecutively as possible. I want to keep you out of public eye as much as possible for several months."

"Asuma, will you agree to take responsibility for Team Strife as its nominal leader? Allowing them as much freedom to grow and your support for their learning as you can?"

"I've grown pretty fond of the little brats and they are very impressive for their age. I won't have a problem working with them."

"We won't even need to return between missions if you think that is best." Naruto volunteered.

"How do you plan to report in or to get your next mission? I was not aware that you had become a summoner." The Hokage was intrigued. What else did his young friend have up his sleeve?

"Only of clones, mine just happen to be very versatile." With those words Naruto created a clone that immediately transformed into a small hawk and flew out the window. He then explained the system Shikamaru had helped him to devise for contacting his teammates even when he was far away from them, as well as the nature of his infiltration of both Konoha and Iwa.

"I didn't realize how many tunnels we had under us to disguise the secondary ANBU that live in them."

The Sandaime froze. Root was still in operation against his express orders. He had his suspicions but never any confirmation until now.

"Tell me Naruto, have you mapped Iwa and Konoha? I would be very interested in going over such a map as you detail your observations before you are sent out on your first mission. I have arranged for all three teams to stay in the Tower until you are set to leave on an appropriate mission." With that he shooed the others away and waved Naruto forward.

In the end all of Team Strife wound up spending a week and a half in secret meetings with the Sandaime first learning the origins and supposed demise of Root, and then making a plan with their own unique flare for optimizing their abilities. The team was then sent out of Konoha on a B rank only to slip back in several days later through one of the security holes they had mapped.

They had spent their time out of Konoha using Naruto's clones under Sakura's supervision to create enough of the drug they needed and Shikamaru and Asuma creating a technique that would cause a very soft yet persistent wind to blow through the tunnels. The first time they used it all four placed their caches and used the technique very gently to distribute the fast acting knock out gas, then after ten minutes they used it again, and a stronger version, to clear the tunnels of the drugs. After that they stepped back and allowed the actual ANBU to capture all of the tunnels occupants. They left through a different gap in security and went to their checkpoint to await the outcome of the operation.

As for the Root's Leader, Danzo, the Hokage called for his advisors on a pretense and kept them with him until he received the report from his ANBU. When he received confirmation of all three advisors complicity he had all three taken for interrogation. He had never believed when he first had his suspicions about Root validated that taking them all prisoner could be done without any loss of life and only a few minor injuries from the few traps that were active.

He briefed the clone Naruto had left with him and then had it disperse, it would let them know that they could continue on with the B rank that they were supposed to be doing now that the A rank had been completed.

Their first B rank went exactly according to plan. The second and third required a little fast readjustments to the plan on the fly. Even Asuma was impressed with Naruto's improvisational skills. While he would have done things differently he had to admit that Naruto's plans had a more positive outcome than his would have. It was that realization that had Asuma feeling more comfortable with allowing the blond his leadership role. He took on more of a mentor role for all of them; helping them to develop their natural talents and shore up their weak points.

They took a remote cabin in a village a day away from Konoha as their home base for the duration of their voluntary exile. In between missions they spent their time training and learning all that Asuma could teach them. With the Professor as his father he could at least give them the basics if not up to a mid-level in a lot of disciplines, where he left off his father could guide them forward. The Sandaime had taken to sending a clone out to their cabin, when he knew that they were there, to direct them in their training.

By the time of their fourth mission they had comfortably integrated him into the team and he had been 'introduced' to their motivational methods. He joined Sakura in cursing what Naruto and Shikamaru could do when they put their minds to a problem. As it happened Shikamaru had found a genjutsu that would work for Naruto better than it ever would for anyone without his chakra levels. It allowed for incredibly detailed scenarios to be played out as the caster specified, the trick to it is that the more chakra you poured into it the lifelike it became and the more it was believed. This allowed a training genjutsu to take on nightmarish proportions for those Naruto targeted.

For the rest of their lives both Sakura and Asuma would shiver when Naruto was complimented on his creativity. They had been on the other side of it and wouldn't wish it on anyone.

Their eighth mission out, however, truly cemented their team. It was supposed to be a vacation, a simple C rank, pick up a bridge builder in Konoha and protect him until he had completed his project. Things were going to plan and they were laughing and joking with one another, ignoring the occasional complaints of the hung over client. Then when they saw the obvious genjutsu, with an exchange of glances and a few flickering hand signs as they continued to laugh and joke, they set out the plan.

As expected when they targeted Asuma first he faked his death, leaving only the 'genin' of the team to fight off the attackers. Needless to say the attackers were quite surprised to be stopped in their tracks several yards distant of the target that the genin had left seemingly unprotected. The prisoners were quickly secured by more conventional means and handed over to the resurrected Asuma for interrogation.

Not much intelligence was gained, only the confirmation that Tazuna was the target, before they both managed to commit suicide.

Asuma grimaced to himself, now that the mission was confirmed as being a higher rank he should technically return to Konoha with the team. He was, however, quite sure that his team were ready to stretch their abilities some more. A B rank mission was well within their skills at this point. The only thing he needed to consider was if the mission was likely to turn into an A rank. His kids might be ready for a lower A level opponent, but definitely not a higher one. It was time to ask the client a few questions.

A few answers later and Asuma was reassured that no higher level ninja was needed for a simple civilian assassination job. A greedy civilian like Gato wouldn't be willing to pay what a higher ranked ninja would charge for pulling such a low level assassination. They would continue with the job and get the kids a little more experience against enemy ninja; they had wiping out ordinary bandit camps down to an art form by now.

They continued on, taking a boat across the water to the island nation. The bridge builder taking the time to explain how Gato's shipping monopoly had devastated the island's economy and his hopes for breaking that monopoly with his bridge. Soon enough they were on land again and making their way through a light mist and under attack again almost before they knew it.

"Get down!" Asuma barely had the time to call out before a giant sword went flying through the space they had all been standing in bare heartbeats before.

The group looked up to see that the sword was lodged in a tree trunk and had a large bare-chested man standing on it. He looked prepared to give a speech but Asuma didn't give him a chance as he immediately attacked, trying to knock him away from his sword.

It didn't work; as he recovered it, as he dodged Asuma's attack he gave a harsh laugh.

"Not much of one for talking are you?" He asked rhetorically as he backed up quickly to give himself space to move. "That's alright; I can kill you without another sound being made."

He started a technique with an unknown purpose. It became obvious as the mist abruptly began to thicken unnaturally.

"Shell game!" Asuma called out. They could not rely on hand signs in the thick fog.

Naruto quickly spammed several hundred clones that rapidly transformed into the rest of the team and the bridge builder. The real trick to the shell game was not to hide which group was where, but to cause enough distraction to remove the actual target from the table without being seen. The real Sakura was left with the job of staying with the client, Naruto and Shikamaru would stay and look for openings to try and help their comrade in arms.

"I can't help with my shadows with this mist in place. Is there anything you can do about it?"

Naruto had been working with Asuma to master his wind nature, but he had only reached the point of sending out directed gusts of wind. He gave it a try, letting loose several blasts that cleared the fog for several feet before it came swirling back in. This gave him an idea that he was desperate enough to try. He could hear Asuma locked in battle with the original attacker, but his clones were being taken out by what had turned out to be water clones of their opponent when his clones had managed to return the favor and take one out.

He created one clone directly opposite to him from several feet away and at the same time they sent continuous blasts of air almost directly at each other. The key here was the almost, the blasts hit each other and started to swirl together becoming stronger and faster than he was capable on his own. It swiftly started to form into a cyclone and was able to lift the heavy fog. Naruto concentrated on maintaining his creation safely, trying to fine tune his control over it.

This left Shikamaru free to use his shadow abilities to capture the ninja that Asuma was fighting.

"Nice job Shikamaru…" was as far as Asuma got before a new factor in the battle made itself known by attacking Shikamaru with several senbon, forcing him to let go of his technique to dodge.

Things had reached a stalemate. While Naruto's clones took out the large man's clones, Asuma was a match for the man himself – his knives against the sword and his wind techniques against the water that was favored by his adversary. Shikamaru was holding his own against the slight young man that had come to his elder's aid. Naruto himself was kept busy trying to keep the cyclone he had created from taking on a life of its own or from dying out completely and giving the advantage back to their foes.

Slowly all of Naruto's clones were destroyed making it obvious that they had managed to spirit their client away. The two attackers broke off from the battle and retreated into the trees.

"Until next time." The large one said as he gave an irreverent salute before turning and disappearing into the trees.

Naruto and Shikamaru maintained their ready state until Asuma signaled that they could stand down. Naruto allowed his cyclone to finally die down and turned back to see that he was being stared at.

"A cyclone?" They both asked simultaneously.

"What?" Naruto asked defensively. "It worked didn't it?"

"Sometimes, Naruto, I forget what a very scary place your head is. Then you do something like that." Was Shikamaru's only response.

Asuma felt the need to address the issue more fully. "Don't do it again. You had very little influence on that thing. Use a little restraint."

"Well, of course I won't use it again until I can get it to do exactly what I want, I know better than that. It was a desperation move to try and get us an even playing field." He defended himself.

Naruto started to walk in the direction of the bridge builder's house again as it was the designated meeting spot. His voice was excited as he continued. "I mean it will take a lot of work to do it but once I get it working right it'll be great for taking on large groups. I was thinking that it would be even better if it was made up of sharp wind blades…"

Shikamaru and Asuma shared a horrified look before hurrying after the crazy blond.

Asuma was able to decide extremely quickly that he had two choices. He could train the kids like crazy trying to build their skills up, or he could do the same thing _after_ they take out the only reason someone would want to kill their client. It would also be yet another good training experience for his chunin team. He would have them gather all the information possible on the Gato Corporation and its founder - and then kill him.

It would be doing a good deed for the people here, but also allow them to complete their mission to protect the bridge builder without too many further complications. Without Gato to pay for it, no one would be attacking the man.

The team gave it their full effort. Naruto went into full infiltration mode sending out dozens of clones to find the best avenues of approach. With Naruto acting as the hub of incoming information and giving it to Sakura and Shikamaru they plotted the fall of the entire corporation from the dinner table in the bridge builder Tazuna's house. Naruto had recently discovered a new use for the training genjutsu that Shikamaru had found and helped him learn, he could use it to show his teammates everything that one of his clones read and experienced. The previous limitations on the speed of the flow of information from Naruto to his teammates now bypassed it took them barely two days to plan out how to take control of the Gato Corporation upon the 'accidental' death of its leader.

The implementation of the plan took a full day and a half to complete, but most of that was completing the paperwork to finish the takeover. Sakura used an ijutsu to put Gato's regular bodyguard into a deep sleep for a few hours allowing Shikamaru to take his place standing behind Gato. He first used his shadow technique in a reversed fashion allowing himself to learn by feel how to sign Gato's name. Once he had mastered the signature and handwriting of his target Gato had an unfortunate accident - slipping on his spilled tea and falling against his desk in such a way as to break his neck.

They decided what Gato would have wanted for the corporation and created a faked will that divided it between a Trust for the betterment of the Land of Wave - controlled by a board to be headed by Team Strife, Team Strife itself, and the final third was left to the Daimyo of Wave. The team had decided that they would have some of Shikamaru's retired family members take up the running of the remaining two-thirds that they controlled. It would give them a chance to stretch their intelligence again, and Shikamaru was sure that some of them would welcome the opportunity

There was a massive celebration held in Wave when they heard the news of Gato's death, it would be a matter of days before the contents of his will would be heard and another massive celebration held. The Daimyo would be understandably quick in having the will ratified and the change of ownership made official.

One of the outstanding issues that needed to be taken care of was the matter of their two attackers, the elder of which Asuma had recognized as Zabuza the Demon of the Mist, and the younger they found out was his apprentice Haku. They decided that to avoid the possibility of being attacked again in outrage to go ahead and pay them for their services, funding the next possible Mizukage was worth doing in Team Strife's collective opinion. The package of money was delivered, just after the news of Gato's death made the rounds, to their hide out by a shadow clone that was dispersed barely within sight of it; leaving the package to drop to the ground and which was then the subject of a cautious examination. Said exam revealed a payment far higher than they had negotiated for and a note with the best wishes of Team Strife to a future Mizukage, and a polite request for them to go away. Zabuza roared with laughter and Haku let loose a string of nervous giggles.

The bridge to the mainland was completed in record time as each citizen wanted to have a part in the new prosperity after Gato's death broke his hold on the people. On the day of the bridges completion Team Strife was packed and ready to leave. There was a large group waiting to see them off. After saying their goodbyes the ninja left but their sensitive hearing kept them well within earshot as the bridge was given the name The Great Naruto Bridge. Naruto reddened slightly as his teammates giggled and gave him little digs with their elbows. Only moments later a shout went up in the crowd and they could hear the news of the contents of Gato's will spreading through the crowd.

"Why exactly was I left out of the list of beneficiaries?" Asuma asked bewildered. He was only then learning of the disposition of the corporation, having been kept busy with guarding Tazuna as they were planning and executing their task.

"Well, if you are going to be too lazy to even oversee the operation, then you are going to get left out of the will. You are, after all, supposed to keep us from making such small little oversights in our planning." Shikamaru teased him with a trace of self-mockery, fully realizing the slight hypocrisy of his words.

All three chunin broke into laughter and started running as Asuma gave a howl of outrage and started to give chase.

Author's note: Whoops, I really had intended for the Sandaime as their teacher but things developed differently as I wrote the story. As such, would catgrl106 and Neko-Renku please give me their fic prompts? If I missed anyone else who said Asuma please let me know. For my previous winner I have posted their fill already.


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