The Celestial Charge (A Naruto FF)

Chapter One - Enter, Team Minoru!

"You won't be winning today!" Suddenly, he darted around the blonde man, poised to grab the young Genin, who snapped out of her panic and slightly stumbled at the same moment.

Time seemed to speed up for the Jōnin, who was turning with his arm outstretched to grab the bandit. His fingers just barely brushed the sleeve of Boss's broken arm. Inwardly cursing at himself for missing, he opened his mouth to warn his students.

"Suzuki!" The two boys turned their heads towards their sensei at his panicked shout. Their eyes widened as they saw the bandit leader get closer to Suzuki's back with each step, and both leaped forwards to intercept him. But to the three shinobi, Boss was moving too fast, and they were moving too slow.

With a sickening crunch, dark red blood arced through the air, splattering on the faces of the horrified pair of boys as more started to soak through the material of Suzuki's two shirts.

Her crop top was slowly being colored a purplish-red, and the color slowly dripped off the end of her shirt as gravity pulled the dark liquid down to saturate the ground.

The world around the blue-haired boy disappeared, the blood in his veins turning to ice as his mind slowly blanked out while his horrified brown eye stared into surprised light blue ones. Suzuki coughed once, her skin pale compared to the splash of color that was now trickling out from between her slightly parted lips.

A cry of anguish pierced the air, rising like the high keening screech of a falcon in flight, and it was later that the boy realized that the cry was his own.

"SUZUKI!"

*Flashback End*

*Present Day*

"-rou. Jirou!" The voice of his Jōnin sensei snapped the boy out of his thoughts, a shiver going down his spine as he remembered that fateful day. His brown eyes rose to meet an irritated gaze. He realized his sensei must have been calling his name for awhile, since the man was normally hard to anger.

"Ah - sorry Minoru-sensei."

The man's gaze softened slightly, recognizing the numb, yet emotional look in Jirou's eyes and the empty sigh. Minoru relived the same thing his student just did four to five nights a week - the time when he had failed as a sensei.

"Don't apologize to me, apologize to Lord Hokage." The Jōnin gently admonished his student, gesturing with one gloved hand towards the old man sitting behind the long desk in front of them.

There were several people sitting on both sides of the Hokage, each shuffling through a stack of papers. The large window behind them shed sunlight in the large room in the administration section of the Academy.

Smoke drifted up from the red pipe clasped between the old man's lips, dissipating just above his red and white hat, emblazoned with the Kanji for "fire". A white haori rested over his red kimono, which was tied with a white sash. Three lines stretched down his tanned skin under his dark eyes, stopping on his cheeks just above his pale goatee.

"Sorry Lord Hokage." Jirou bowed his head.

A sigh from Hiruzen Sarutobi caused another puff of smoke to rise from his pipe and permeate the air around him. He understood that what the boy was going through was tough, especially at such a young age. Pulling his pipe from his mouth, the Third Hokage cleared his throat before addressing the three shinobi in front of him.