//------------------------------// // Graduation IV: Trees, Books, Ramen. // Story: Sunset Shimmer: Kunoichi // by RIPoste //------------------------------// “Come oooon.” Naruto groaned. “Can’t we do something else already?” I grimaced at Naruto’s obvious displeasure at our current job, but I could not really fault him for it. Thing was, some of the D-ranked jobs were a little… underwhelming. In fact, many of them seemed more like chores than anything else. Still, at least they pay well. After all, as much as picking out weeds from a herbal garden might seem as something that was beneath a shinobi, the fact that the owner was paying  around seven thousand ryou for something like that was rather generous already. “Oi, dead last.” Sasuke called, “stop pulling out the herbs.” “Shut up, Sasuke!” Naruto growled back. I sighed. “Hey, if you two would stop that already? We are supposed to be working.” I looked at Naruto. “And pay attention to what you are doing, would you? If we mess up the job, the owner can choose not to pay us.” “Hmph!” Naruto snorted and turned away. I sighed, couldn’t they just cooperate with one another for once? Well, at least he was paying attention to what he was doing now. I supposed that was the best I could expect from him at the moment. Suppressing a sigh, I picked up the nearest basket of useless vegetation and began moving out. “Good job.” Kakashi-sensei nodded from his spot just outside the door. “Keep up the good work.” I nodded curtly in response, but otherwise said nothing as I began to make my way to the regional waste disposal site. It was probably too much to hope for sensei to actually help us with such an easy mission. In fact, I should be amazed that he even bothered to turn up. To be honest, I had always found it surprising that Konoha had been willing to let Kakashi-sensei babysit a bunch of genin instead of running missions that would benefit the country more. Of course, maybe he was just the best person for the job. I mean, the Jinchuuriki and the Last Uchiha both on the same team? That was just too coincidental to be actually a coincidence. As the best shinobi in Konoha, he was probably just the best person for the job. Of course, I was under no illusion myself. It was obvious that I was merely supposed to fill in the requirement for the one kunoichi per team rule. I might be a tad bit insulted. However, considering my current circumstance, well, I don’t think that I had the right to complain. I flipped the basket over, depositing its contents into the one of the containers that was in the disposal area. Once it was empty, I slung it across my back and began making my way back to the team. On the way back, however, I took a small detour. As I passed by a familiar fruit store, I bent down, pretending to inspect their goods while slotting a small piece of paper into a small flower pot nearby. Someone would pick it up later, who on the other hand, I would not know. Our identities were kept a secret from one another, primarily to protect each other. In a sense, it was a little like the famed ANBU of Konoha, except that we were dealing with a little bit more on the ‘information’ side. My job done, I continued back at a quickened pace. It wouldn’t do to keep my teammates waiting after all. “Right, good job team.” Kakashi-sensei clapped his hands together once we had exited the compound. I breathed a sigh of relief when Naruto and Sasuke finally broke off from glaring at each other to give Kakashi-sensei their attention. “I took the liberty of taking on a second mission for our team.” “What? When?” Naruto asked indignantly. “Just now.” Sensei’s eye curved, an indication that he was smiling. I shook my head in exasperation. Of course he did.  “Shouldn’t you ask us first?” Sasuke asked, a hint of annoyance in his voice. “Well, I thought that I could save you all the trip back to the mission desk, so why not?” He shrugged. “Besides, once this is over, we would have cleared our quota for the day.” “So what’s the mission?” I asked. “It better not be a boring one!” Naruto proclaimed as he pointed at Kakashi-sensei. “A hundred ryou that it is.” I whispered to Sasuke. “In your dreams.” He muttered back. “I’m not betting on the losing side.” Sensei deadpanned at us. “Should I be concerned that my genins are starting to have an interest in gambling?” “Don’t worry about it, sensei!” I chirped back, smiling innocently. Well as innocently as a guilty party could be anyway. “Sensei~” Naruto whined. “What’s the mission?”  “Well,” He fished about in one of his pouches, retrieving a small slip of paper which he handed to me. “It’s for tidying a library. The details are on this piece of paper.” “Eeeehhhh.” “Enough of your whining.” Sensei smacked Naruto lightly on the head, silencing him. “Now if the lot of you are done playing around, start heading to the library.” He looked at us, a mild glare in his eye, “that’s an order. I have something to do now, so I’ll meet with you there later.” He vanished in the blur that was the Body Flicker. Liar. He was probably going off to slack off. Especially if he was going to meet with us later. “Right!” Naruto pumped his fist into the air. “Last one there’s a rotten egg!” He yelled as he dashed off. I stared after him, “Does he know which library we are supposed to go to?” I asked Sasuke. He sighed. As did I. “Let’s get him before we lose him.” I muttered. Needless to say, the librarian was not amused with the fact that we were late for the job. Though thankfully we were not too late. “Help me sort out these books.” The librarian, a stiff old lady with her hair tied back in a bun, told us as she pointed to, quite literally, a mountain of books stacked on a nearby table. “You have until closing hours to complete the job.” “Understood.” I answered for our team, mostly because Naruto and Sasuke was still glaring at each other over that little scuffle they had on the way here. For real though, could they just lay off each other for just one day? Was that too much to ask? “We should split the books and scrolls here into alphabetical order of their authors.” I told the others as I got to work. That was how the libraries in Konoha store their documents in the library if I was not mistaken. We got to work sorting them out, though I did at least commit to memory the names of the books that caught my eye. I mean, the History of Hashirama Senju? The Shinobi Wars? Chakra and its Uses by the Hiruzen Sarutobi? Those were quite literally gold mines worth of information. In the end, it turns out that sorting them out was the easy part. Mostly because Naruto could not be trusted to put the books back in the place they were supposed to be quietly, causing quite a ruckus with his Shadow Clone Technique, especially once they started arguing with one another over where each book was supposed to go. “Kyoku-chan.” Naruto whispered, “Isn’t Fujino supposed to go in the ‘F’ section?” “They sort it by surname,” I replied as I slotted another book back into its rightful place. “So you should be looking at ‘K’ instead, for Karusu. Which is here.” I pointed to the side of the corridor of shelves. “Oh.” He replied, looking around for the shelf that the book is supposed to go onto. “Eh, I’ll be right back.” “Why?” “I need a chair, it’s at the top shelf but I don’t think the librarian will like it very much if I climbed her shelves.” Naruto actually caring about public property? Now that’s new. Nevertheless, it was a welcome change. “No need.” I told him, “Wait a bit.” Channeling chakra into my feet, I leap off the ground, somersaulting in midair so that I could plant my feet squarely on the ceiling. Once I made contact, I immediately gripped on the surface with the chakra concentrated on my feet, holding myself in place. “Right, now pass me that.” I turned to Naruto, who was looking at me in amazement. I quirked an eyebrow at him, “What?” “Whoa.” He breathed. “How did you do that?” Seriously? Was this something to be impressed at? “Chakra control.” I replied. “The chakra in my feet keeps me from falling off the ceiling. Now hand over the book.” “Can you teach me?” Naruto asked as he passed me the aforementioned object. I took a moment to think about it, mostly considering if it would be worth my time. “Sure.” I replied as I slotted the book back into its spot in the shelf,  “Though I got some conditions.” “Keep concentrating.” I called up the tree. Unfortunately, moments later, Naruto tumbled down the tree in a That was probably the wrong thing to do, considering that it broke his focus and caused him to plummet to the ground. I knelt by him, “Sorry about that.” I grinned. “Though you shouldn’t have broken your concentration either way.” “Hn!” The sudden grunt told me that our resident Uchiha genius failed again. I looked over at him and the tree that he was climbing with a hole the shape of his foot in it.  Yes, the Uchiha genius had invited himself to the training session after our missions. Again. Though it couldn’t be helped, I suppose, considering that it was either join us or go off by himself, and to a person that cared a lot about power, it would be a miracle if they were to actually skip out on free training. Well, not exactly free, per se, but that was an entirely different story. “You are using too much chakra!” I yelled out at him. He looked at me and nodded before heading back to the task at hand. At least he was taking my advice to heart right now. Small win for me I guess. “Urgh.” Naruto let out a snort of disgust as he looked at his rival. “Letting him get a headstart?” I asked Naruto, smirking a little. The question was on purpose. It was one of the best ways to rile him up, after all. And true to my expectations, he tensed, made a face and dashed off. A surprisingly simple boy. Hard-working, that was for sure, but still simple underneath it all. One would actually find it hard to believe that he was the Jinchuuriki for the Kyuubi underneath it all. Still, cultivating the competitive rivalry between the two of them would probably help the team spirit. Perhaps, they would be less likely to turn on me when I had to eventually leave. One needs to plan for the long term, after all. Training continued only for about two more hours, not that we couldn’t exactly continue, but it would be dangerous to continue training in the dark. Especially when you couldn’t exactly see where you were going. Yes, you really couldn’t. Training Ground 5 at night was pitch-black. Still, the boys made rather good progress, and I managed to get some senbon practice in as well, while getting a little bit of cash from the two of them for helping them out. So all in all, it was a rather productive session. Naruto, as usual, was excited by the progress he had made, and well, I shouldn’t exactly rain on his parade. Sure he was not running up trees anytime soon, but he could still manage to walk slowly up. That was a huge step forward when one thinks about it. “Who's up for dinner at Ichiraku’s?” He crowed jubilantly. “If you’re treating? Sure.” I laughed at the face that he made in response to what I had suggested. “I jest. Though I suppose I can come.” I just made some easy money after all, I could afford to splurge a little. “How about you?” I asked Sasuke, more out of courtesy than anything. The chances that he would accept an offer made by Naruto was next to zer- “Sure.” What? I blinked. Now that was a first. “Who are you and what have you done with Sasuke?” Naruto yelled, echoing my thoughts. “Shut up, dead last.” Sasuke glowered, “now can we hurry up?” Naruto returned his glare, but otherwise said nothing as he continued walking, though to my puzzlement, there was a slight spring in his step that wasn’t there before. Cheerful, was the word I would use to describe Ichiraku Ramen. Teuchi and his daughter Ayame, were probably the most optimistic people I had ever met in Konohagakure to date. In a way, they remind me of Naruto. “Hahaha, glad to see you bring some of your friends around, Naruto-kun!” Teuchi said, sporting a friendly smile as he welcomed us. “Hi Teuchi-san, Ayame-san.” Naruto greeted cheerfully. “The usual, please!” “And what will your friends want?” Ayame looked at us, a questioning smile on her face. I looked at the menu, and pointed at one of the options. “That one, with extra char siu please.” I like my meat, a guilty pleasure from when I still lived in Canterlot. Griffonian Kebabs were good, fight me. “So, how about you introduce your companions to us?” Teuchi asked as he worked on our meals behind the bar. “Ah, this here’s Kyoku-chan, she’s the best kunoichi in our class!” I would admit that I preened a bit at the flattery. Some habits never die, after all. “And that’s Sasuke-san.” He continued, pointing at the Uchiha, “He’s my rival!” Did I miss something today, or were Naruto and Sasuke much friendlier to one another? “In your dreams.” Nope, guess things were still the same as ever. Still, it would be nice if this lasted a little longer than usual, now wouldn’t it?