An Unordinary Shinobi

Chapter 10 - Lunch queues are a new form of t0rture

CW: caps, shouting   ---   TW: fod, v10lence, reference to d34th

Naruto sighed loudly. Again.

'Kit, I am one second away from figuratively strangling you so shut the hell up!' Kurama bellowed. He was trying to have a nice nap, but this was proving to be impossible, considering Naruto's consistent sighing, which the boy was clearly doing just to annoy him.

Grudgingly, Naruto turned his attention back to the notes he was copying. Sera had given him the task of catching up on the previous two lessons during third (which was a cover lesson) and fourth period (art) while she finished duplicates of her current notes for him to read later.

He assumed this setup may also have been a ploy to stop him from causing any more trouble – if it was, it was working. Bored out of his mind, he sighed again, triggering another angry outburst from Kurama, which Naruto ignored.

Even though it was 30 minutes into third period, Naruto hadn't even copied half of Sera's science notes yet. He was too busy annoying Kurama with his whining.

'You should hurry up if you ever want to finish this,' Kurama pointed out.

Uttering profanities under his breath, Naruto started writing. Word after word, line after line. After what seemed like eternity, Naruto finished the last sentence.

'Finally!' Naruto thought whilst massaging his aching hand.

'There's still the maths, remember?' Kurama reminded helpfully. Naruto groaned into his hands and rubbed at his temples. Why did he agree to go to school again?

'Because you were being an idiot, as usual, and you were tempted by food.'

This was one of those times that Naruto wished he could punch Kurama in the face.

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Two gruelling hours later, the bell rang again, this time signalling the start of lunch. Naruto eagerly grabbed his books (notes finally completed) and followed Sera into the steady stream of students heading off to the canteen.

Unlike most of the other students, she didn't seem to be in much of a hurry, so Naruto tried not to let himself get swept up by the flow of people. It was only that they got into the canteen that he found out why the students had been in such a rush.

"What..." he stammered, eyes wide, "WHAT KIND OF 'QUEUES' ARE THESE?!"

Three corners of the canteen housed different lunch stations – hot food of the day, pre-ordered sandwiches, and cold drinks and soup. Trailing from each station was an immense line that snaked along the length of the wall and, in the case of the hot specials, halfway into the corridor, each growing rapidly.

There were minor scuffles dotted around the place as unwelcome students tried to push into the lines and were violently rammed into the corridor. Compared to the orderly, short lines for food at the academy, this was a desperate, cramped excuse of a queue.

Naruto noticed a spot of purple hair out of the corner of his eye. He saw Sera dart into a gap in the drinks queue, and, to his amazement, appeared at his side a minute later, holding two cans of drink and a packet of biscuits. How?

Still in awe at the efficiency at which Sera bought lunch, he let her drag him out of the canteen and into the still fairly cramped corridor. She gazed around for a minute or so, then waved enthusiastically at a seemingly random clump of people.

An indigo-haired person (was it Ronald?) emerged from the crowd, holding a burger. They had a short, animated conversation, which Naruto caught nothing of because of the noise, then headed off to an empty corridor. Because there was nothing else to do, he followed them.