Assignment Day

Chapter 1

Assignment Day

Akari had been staring at the hitai-ate in her hands for so long that the metal plate had warmed against her palms. It was not new. She had been issued it three days ago, after graduation. She normally wore it around her neck because it felt scratchy on her forehead. Today, she held it in her hands.

Around her, the Academy classroom buzzed with the kind of noise that only happened when nobody was pretending to learn anything anymore. Graduates leaned over desks, shouted across aisles, and loudly announced which jōnin they hoped would not be assigned to them.

Someone near the windows had started an argument about whether team assignments were based on grades or personality. Another insisted they were random. A third person claimed the Hokage personally arranged every team and had once put three people together because their names sounded funny in the same sentence.

Akari believed all three explanations equally. She looked over her shoulder at the row behind her.

Kazuki Arakawa had his feet on the desk. That was the first thing Akari noticed about him. Not his dark red wrap shirt, or the hitai-ate across his forehead, or his black hair that seemed to have been cut by somebody who had been distracted. It was the way he always occupied more space than had technically been given to him.

He was balancing his chair on two legs and talking to two boys at once.

"I'm telling you, they have to consider combat specialization," he said. "Otherwise you could get three people who all do the same thing. That'd be stupid."

"You do one thing," one of the boys said.

Kazuki's chair came down with a bang.

"I do lots of things."

"You do fire."

"Fire is lots of things."

Akari smiled despite herself. She knew Kazuki in the way most Academy students knew one another. He was loud and he liked Fire Release more than anything else. She also knew he had once been told not to practice a fire technique behind the Academy and had interpreted that as permission to practice it beside the Academy instead.

Across the room sat a boy Akari knew even less.

Renji Mori was ten, two years younger than most of them, too young for the hitai-ate pressed against his forehead. He was sitting very straight with a notebook open in front of him. Nobody had told them to take notes. Akari watched him write something, look at it, cross it out, and write it again. She wondered what there was to write.

Probably something smart. Renji was one of those people who was supposed to be smart. Akari had heard he graduated early because he was good at homework and chakra control. She had also heard that he had cried during a practical exercise when one of the instructors used an exploding tag without warning.

As Iruka stepped behind the instructor's desk, the room changed immediately.

Akari sat forward. This was the part that mattered. Graduating had mattered too, obviously. But that was about becoming a genin. This was about who would be standing beside her afterward.

"Alright. You've all passed the Academy requirements," he said. "That means, starting today, you are officially genin of Konohagakure. It does not mean you're finished learning. It does not mean you're ready for missions. And it definitely does not mean you stop listening to your instructors."

Several students looked away. Iruka noticed.

"Some of you especially."

Kazuki grinned.

"Your teams were selected after reviewing your Academy records, demonstrated skills, chakra affinities, and the needs of the village. Your jōnin instructor will be responsible for your field training from this point forward."

A hand went up.

"Yes?"

"Can they fail us?"

A few people laughed. Iruka did not.

"Yes."

The laughter stopped. Akari's stomach did something small and unpleasant. Iruka glanced down at the first page. Then he began reading names.

Teams formed around the room one by one. Some people cheered. Some groaned. One girl made a noise like she had just been sentenced to prison when her name was read beside a boy she clearly disliked. A few students immediately dragged their desks together as if the assignment itself had already turned them into lifelong comrades.

One assignment caused more noise than the others. Iruka read, "Uzumaki Naruto. Uchiha Sasuke. Haruno Sakura," and Naruto was on his feet before the third name left Iruka's mouth. Sakura groaned. Sasuke looked as if he had already decided the entire day was beneath him. Akari smiled. Naruto had failed loudly, trained loudly, complained loudly, and then shown up again the next morning just as loudly as before. Of course he was starting his genin career the same way.

Iruka got them seated again and moved on. Akari listened harder each time Iruka reached the bottom of a list. Not yet.

Not yet.

Not yet.

Then: "Akari."

Her head snapped up.

"Arakawa Kazuki."

Kazuki pointed at himself with both thumbs. "Yes."

"That wasn't a question," Iruka said.

A few people laughed. Kazuki grinned anyway. Iruka continued.

"Mori Renji."

Akari turned to face the younger boy near the wall. Renji stopped writing.

Then Kazuki stood. "Oh, this is going to be good."

Renji looked alarmed by how quickly Kazuki had reached that conclusion. Akari felt something bright and warm rise in her chest.

She had a team. Two actual people. Kazuki was already coming over to her desk without waiting for Iruka to finish the remaining assignments. Renji looked toward Iruka as if expecting him to stop this.

Kazuki dropped into the empty seat beside Akari and said, without greeting her, "You do Wind Release."

Akari blinked. "Yeah."

"I do Fire Release."

"I know."

He leaned closer as though sharing classified information. "Do you know what happens if you put wind behind fire?"

Akari's smile grew. "Bigger fire?"

"Bigger fire."

Across the room, Renji closed his eyes. Akari pointed at him.

"He's making a face."

Kazuki looked.

"He's definitely making a face."

Renji closed his notebook and came over to their desk.

"You're talking about combining techniques before we've even met our jōnin."

His voice was softer than Akari expected. There was an edge of worry in it.

Kazuki shrugged. "We met each other. That's enough to start."

"No, it isn't," Renji said.

"Why not?" Kazuki asked.

"Because we don't know if her wind will make your fire bigger or blow it back into us."

Kazuki frowned. Akari thought about it.

"It'd probably make it bigger," she said.

Renji stared at her. "Probably?"

"I'm pretty good with wind."

"How good?"

Akari opened her mouth. That was a complicated question.

"Strong," she said instead.

Kazuki nodded approvingly, as though this settled everything. Renji did not look settled.

"Strong isn't the same as controlled."

Akari's smile faltered for half a second. Renji's eyes widened. "I didn't mean — I mean, I don't know if you're controlled. I just meant those are different things. Technically."

"They are," Akari said.

Kazuki looked between them. "So you're really strong and really bad at control?"

Akari glared at him. "I am not!"

"Kazuki," Renji said.

Kazuki looked at him. "What?"

Renji glanced at Akari, then back at Kazuki. "Maybe stop."

"Why?"

Akari's face was hot now. "It's fine."

Renji immediately looked down. "It's not fine."

Akari folded her arms.

Kazuki looked from Renji to her, still obviously trying to work out what he had said wrong.

Iruka finished the final assignment. The classroom broke apart almost immediately. Jōnin began arriving one at a time to collect their teams. A tall jōnin appeared at the door and called three names.

Students left in clusters. Nobody came for them. At first this did not seem important.

Ten minutes passed.

"Maybe she forgot," said Kazuki.

Renji looked at him. "Who?"

"Our jōnin."

"We don't even know if it's a woman."

Kazuki pointed toward the assignment sheet Iruka had left on the desk.

"Reina Takamori. Woman's name. I read the paper."

Renji looked at him suspiciously.

Akari leaned over her desk and rested her chin on her folded arms.

"Reina Takamori," she repeated.

The name meant nothing to her. She tried to picture what kind of jōnin belonged to it. Old, probably. Thirty was old when you were twelve. Maybe she had a giant sword. Maybe she had dogs. Akari hoped for dogs.

Kazuki had tipped his chair back onto two legs again.

Another five minutes passed. Akari got up. "I'm hungry."

Renji looked alarmed. "We're supposed to wait."

"There's food downstairs."

"What if she comes?"

"Tell her I'll be back."

"What if she leaves?"

Akari stopped. It was a stupid question. Probably. No jōnin would arrive fifteen minutes late, see one student missing, and simply abandon the entire team. Probably.

She sat back down. Kazuki noticed.

"You're scared she's going to leave?"

Akari looked away. "No."

"You sat down really fast."

"I'm not that hungry."

Kazuki's grin sharpened with the discovery of something he could poke. Renji looked from him to Akari and, to his credit, seemed to recognize danger faster than Kazuki did.

"Maybe she's testing whether we wait," he said quickly.

"Then the test is sitting."

"You can fail at sitting."

"No, you can't."

Renji looked at the chair balanced on two legs. Kazuki followed his eyes. Slowly, he lowered the chair to the floor. Akari laughed.

Renji almost smiled. Almost.

"You smiled," Kazuki said. Renji denied it. Akari testified that she had seen the face.

Renji muttered, "Traitor."

"We're teammates," Akari said.

The words came out before she thought about them. They made the room feel different.

Then Kazuki ruined it. "So, if I challenge somebody, you both have to help."

"No," Renji said immediately.

"Depends who you challenge," Akari said.

Renji looked at her as if she had personally destroyed the moment.

Kazuki pointed at her. "See? Teammates."

A voice from the doorway said, "You will have to help each other." All three of them turned. "Even when Kazuki is being stupid."

The woman standing there was not that old. She was a little shorter than Akari had expected, with light skin and black hair pulled into a low tie at the back of her head. A few shorter strands had escaped near her temples. She wore plain, black shinobi clothing beneath an old, faded flak jacket. Nothing about her looked decorative. No giant sword. No dramatic cloak. No dogs. Her eyes moved over Kazuki first. Then Renji. Then Akari. Akari straightened without meaning to. The woman's gaze dropped briefly to the hitai-ate still sitting in Akari's hands.

"Reina Takamori," she said. "You're mine."

Kazuki stood immediately. "You were late."

Renji's eyes closed.

Reina looked at Kazuki. "I was."

Kazuki opened his mouth as if he had expected an argument, then closed it when none came. "Why?"

"I wanted you to have enough time to talk to each other before I got here."

Renji glanced at the clock. "Twenty-three minutes?"

Reina looked at him. "You counted."

Renji's mouth tightened. "Yes."

"Good."

Reina stepped into the room. She stopped in front of the three desks they had pulled together and looked down at them. "I know what's in your Academy files," she said. "That isn't the same as knowing you. So we'll start simple. Names, specialties, one thing you're good at, one thing you're bad at. Arakawa."

Kazuki did not hesitate. "Kazuki Arakawa. Fire Release. I'm good at fighting."

Reina waited. Kazuki waited too.

"One thing you're bad at," she reminded him.

"Nothing important."

Akari snickered. Reina's face did not change. "Listening after you've already decided what you want to do."

Kazuki's eyebrows rose. "That's in my file?"

"Repeatedly."

Kazuki looked offended. Reina shifted her attention. "Mori."

Renji swallowed. "Renji Mori. Earth Release. I'm good at... barriers. And chakra control."

"Bad at?"

He hesitated long enough that Akari thought Reina might answer for him too. "Unexpected things," Renji said.

Kazuki laughed once. Renji's ears went red. Reina did not laugh. "That's honest. Keep that."

Renji looked up at her. For the first time since she arrived, some of the tension left his shoulders. Then Reina looked at Akari. "Akari."

Akari wished she had prepared something. "Akari," she repeated. "Wind Release." Then, after a pause, "I'm strong. I'm good at moving fast. Short distances."

"Slipstream," Reina said.

Akari blinked. "Right."

"Bad at?"

Akari looked down at the hitai-ate in her hands. There were easy answers. Written tests. Waiting. Thinking before talking. Then, there was the answer in the file… "Control, sometimes..."

Kazuki did not make a joke. That was surprisingly decent of him. Reina's expression stayed level. "I can work with that."

Akari looked up. Reina moved on before the moment could become bigger.

"Tomorrow morning, Training Ground Seventeen. Six-thirty. Full field kit. Eat before you come."

Kazuki's eyes brightened. "We're training already?"

"You're being evaluated." The brightness increased. Renji went pale.

"Evaluated for what?"

"Whether the three of you are safe and functional enough for me to begin field training you as a team."

Akari felt the same unpleasant twist in her stomach from earlier.

Kazuki looked excited. "What kind of test?"

"A real one."

"Combat?"

"Maybe."

"Against you?"

"Possibly."

"Can we win?"

Reina looked at him for a moment.

"Yes."

Kazuki grinned. Renji gripped his notebook. Akari pursed her lips. "What happens if we don't?"

"Then I decide why you didn't," Reina answered.

Akari frowned. Reina continued.

"I'm not expecting much from three children who were assigned to each other less than an hour ago. I am expecting you to listen, think, and avoid getting each other hurt."

Her eyes moved to Kazuki.

"Especially the last one."

"Why does everybody keep looking at me?"

"Pattern recognition," Renji said quietly.

Reina's mouth moved at one corner. Not a smile exactly. Close. She reached down and, without asking, snapped the loose clasp on Kazuki's kunai pouch shut. He looked down at it.

"That was open?"

"Yes."

"I knew that."

"No, you didn't."

Then she looked at Renji. His hitai-ate was tied so tightly that the metal pressed into his forehead. "Loosen that."

Renji touched it immediately. "Is it wrong?"

"You need to be able to wear your equipment for more than an hour without hurting yourself."

"Oh."

Reina's gaze shifted to Akari. Akari checked herself. Her tunic was fine, maybe a little loose around the shoulders. Her trousers were fine, except for the rip along the cuff, but she had already sewn it back together. Her braid was fine, except that a section of honey-brown hair had worked loose and fallen in front of her face. Reina reached forward and tucked it behind her ear.

Akari blinked. "Thanks."

"You're welcome."

Reina stepped back. "Six-thirty. Training Ground Seventeen. If you're late, the clock still starts without you."

Renji raised one hand halfway, as if they were still in class. "What do we bring?"

"Water. Lunch. Anything you'd normally carry on a mission."

"Okay."

"And eat breakfast."

Kazuki threw his head back and groaned.

"Why does everyone keep saying that?"

"Because children repeatedly discover that they are not immune to needing food."

Akari liked her. That was inconvenient. She did not know Reina well enough to have an opinion this quickly, and tomorrow could still go badly. Akari decided not to examine it too closely.

Reina turned toward the door. "You're done for today. Go home."

Kazuki followed immediately. "Can we see the training ground now?"

"No."

"Why not?"

"Because I'm going there next."

"So?"

"So I don't want you there."

"That means you're setting something up."

Reina stopped in the doorway and looked back at him. "Arakawa."

Kazuki grumbled. "Right. Going home."

Outside, the afternoon sun was bright over Konoha. They stopped at the Academy steps because none of them had any reason to walk in the same direction. That felt strange. For the last hour, they had been a team because a piece of paper said they were. Now they were just three kids standing on a set of steps. Kazuki shoved both hands into his pockets.

"I'm going home. Mom's gonna ask who I got."

Renji nodded. "My parents too."

Kazuki looked at Akari. "What about you?"

The question was casual. Akari shrugged. Kazuki's expression changed. Confusion first. Then recognition. He had heard things. Everybody had. Renji looked down at the steps.

Akari smiled before either of them could say anything stupid. "Six-thirty."

Renji looked up again. "We should probably get there early."

Kazuki groaned. "You would say that."

"She said the clock starts without us."

"That doesn't mean we have to get there before the clock."

"It literally does."

Kazuki's brow furrowed, and he could not seem to find an argument.

Akari walked down the stairs. "See you tomorrow."

Kazuki raised a hand. "Yeah."

Renji did the same a moment later. "Tomorrow."

Akari turned toward the village. She walked home alone.

* * *

By evening, the village had gone amber around the edges. Akari's room caught the last of the light through an open window, laying a narrow stripe across the floorboards and the field gear she had spread out in careful rows.

Two kunai. Six shuriken. Wire. Bandages. A half-used roll of tape. A canteen. A small ration pouch. One smoke bomb she had been saving because smoke bombs were expensive and because she secretly liked having one.

Outside, somebody was setting dishes on a table. A woman called for a child to wash his hands. Farther down the street, someone else shouted that if a pair of sandals were not brought inside immediately, they would stay outside all night.

Nobody called Akari.

No one came in to tell her she was staying up too late. No one asked whether she had packed enough water. No one packed her lunches.

Usually she did not notice. Or she noticed and then found something else to do.

Akari threaded one kunai through her fingers and set it down again. Reina knew about Slipstream. Reina knew about the control problems. Reina had read the file. Akari had a good idea of what was in it. The Academy reports. The incident reports.

The house. The years after.

"Doesn't matter," she told the room. Tomorrow was not about the file. Tomorrow was about whatever Reina had prepared at Training Ground Seventeen. Combat, traps, targets, maybe Reina herself waiting somewhere in the trees. Akari would have Kazuki, who apparently believed fire was a philosophy, and Renji, who seemed to believe activities became safer if somebody wrote down enough rules first.

It was a ridiculous team.

Akari smiled.

She folded her cream-colored tunic and set it beside her bedroll. She set a small alarm clock near the edge of the floor mat and checked the time twice. Then she set her hitai-ate on top of her tunic. A strand of her hair fell loose from her braid. Akari stopped.

For a moment she felt the tiny tug of Reina's fingers tucking her hair at the Academy.

She picked up her canteen, tightened the cap, and heard Reina's voice as clearly as if the jōnin were standing behind her: Eat before you come.

She looked at her ration pouch. She would save it for tomorrow.

Six-thirty.

Training Ground Seventeen.

She was not going to be late.