Chapter Four: Uchiha Superiority
Everyone was huddled outside in one of the training grounds, targets circling the class. Many with several gashes and holes in them.
“I know most of you know what a kunai is,” Iruka shouted to the class. Most nodded their heads, some stayed still and listened. “But most of you can’t do this,” Iruka quickly threw the knife directly towards his right and into the dead center of target. He never took his eyes off the class.
I was impressed. Naruto was dumbfounded. And the entire class shrieked from surprise. I turned to look at Sasuke who just rolled his eyes.
“I am going to be putting you in pairs and I’d like you to practice throwing the kunai into the targets, but first we need to go over some precautions.” He continued . “These are not toys and you can seriously hurt someone with these. When you throw them, you hold them in your fore hand and draw you hand across from your chest and throw directly forward. I do not, and I repeat not, want to see any you throwing it over your shoulder because if it flies out of your hand, you could end up hitting another student. No accidents today!”
The pairs were supposed to be boy-girl, but there were a lot more boys than girls, so there were a few people like Naruto who was paired up with Kiba. I was paired with Sasuke. Yeah, put the Uchihas together, that's sure to help the other student's self esteem.
We all stood in line with our partners, waiting to get some kunai. I was watching some of the others try while waiting, and noticed that most didn’t even hit the target. Some cheered when theirs’ finally hit. We got some kunai and Sasuke let me try first. I mimicked Iruka’s movements precisely and let the kunai fly out of my hands. It hit the target on the outer ring and I heard Sasuke scoff.
“I’d like to see you do better your first time!” I yelled at him. He just smirked and grabbed a kunai. I noticed most of the girls watching us by now.
“Fine.” He said, and swiftly he threw the kunai. It hit dead center.
Damn fan girls all squealed and I muttered under my breath, “Real impressive, duck butt.”
“I practice a lot with my brother, I can help you if you want,” He smiled at me and I just sulked and shook my head ‘no’.
“Oh! Help me, Sasuke-kun! I want your help!” the fan girls screamed and Sasuke’s smirk left his face. I, of course, giggled.
‘Okay. You can help me, Sasuke-kun.” I mocked him to cover the fact that I was asking for help. He ignored it and walked closer to me.
“Let me see how you hold it,” He said. I showed him, and he put one hand over mine and the other over the kunai. He turned it a bit, and slid my hand all the way down to the tip. “When you aim, aim a bit higher than where you want to hit depending on the distance. You need to find out where that is because I might throw it a bit harder than you.” I blushed and pushed him back.
“If anything, I throw harder than you!” He ignored my comment.
“Just try it, see if that makes a difference.”
I held it in the motion he had told me to and threw the kunai as hard as I could so that I wouldn’t have to stray my eyes too far from the target. It hit the near inner ring, and I turned and gave Sasuke a bright smile of surprise. After a few more tries, I had it down perfectly in the center. I did, however, have trouble at varying distances but Sasuke said that it would take a while before I get that down. Apparently his brother is a great teacher and an even more amazing ninja.
“I’ll let you meet him. My brother is amazing!” His exact words. Sasuke really looks up to his brother and I can tell he tries pretty hard to keep up.
After a couple more days of training, almost the entire class was able to hit the dead center. Sasuke and I were at the top, which was cool, but it’s only because Sasuke helped me every step of the way. Heh. I’m useless. No talents on my own.
Naruto and Kiba were struggling. Both just weighed each other down.
“Kiba! Kiba! I think I got it! Look, try holding it like this!” He said. I walked over to him, took the kunai out of his hand. He gave me a questionable look, and I just shook my head.
“You need to hold it at the very tip. I thought you’d hold the handle too, but no. You grab it by the ring and throw it like this,” I quickly demonstrated and the kunai hit the center with a low thud. “Try again.” I told him. He did. He failed. Kiba tried too. He failed too, and I sighed. “Hey, Sasuke!” I called over to him. He turned in my direction. “So you think you could figure out what they are doing wrong?” He paused and looked back and forth between Naruto and me.
“Why do you care if they fail?” He asked.
“Naruto is my friend and Kiba has a cute dog.” I smiled, Naruto beamed, and Kiba sulked. Now why is Kiba sad?
Sasuke sighed and reluctantly gave instruction. “Tell the ditz and Kiba to stand up straight.” Ditz? What is a ditz?
“Who are you calling a ditz?!” Naruto screamed to Sasuke.
“You.” Sasuke said with a childish smirk.
“Naruto, what’s a ditz?” I asked him.
When a week finally passed, the entire class could hit the bull’s eye mark. Some were farther than that with the moving targets, and running while aiming. Cough Cough Sasuke and sometimes me with a smile Cough Cough :)
Iruka thought it was time to introduce the concept of Chakra.
“Chakra is the resulting form of energy produced when physical and spiritual energies are mixed. This is the source of energy that ninja use to preform jutsus. Everyone has chakra, but none of you know how to control it. I am assuming at least one of you have been able to access it before, and can probably access it now. Is there anyone who knows what I am talking about?” Iruka-sensei asked the class. No one moved. Eventually, Sakura raised her hand.
“I understand the concept of chakra and have studied it before, but I don’t believe I have ever been able to access it before, sensei.” She spoke formally. She seemed to be trying to suck up to Iruka-sensei, and by the smile on his face, it was probably working.
“I am actually surprised. Every year I have at least one student who can perform at least one jutsu. Anyways, one can access their chakra through hand signs and/or deep concentration. For example,” Iruka closed his eyes and his hands formed to different signs before there was a poof and Iruka was gone. The whole class gasped before we heard his voice again. “Back here.” Sure enough, Iruka was standing at the back of the classroom, right behind me and Naruto, with a small smirk on his face. “I love that, every year.” He said under his breath, low enough so that only Naruto and I could hear it.
“Pfft. I’ve seen my brother do much cooler things than that.” Sasuke muttered and a few girls in the class squealed in delight at Sasuke’s gesture.
“Well we can’t all be protégées like your brother, Sasuke.” Iruka scowled, obviously disappointed with his failed “cool” act. I giggled slightly at the scene and Sasuke just moped. “Anyways, I will be teaching you all how to control and manipulate your chakra.”
“Will that help me become Hokage?” Naruto asked. Iruka made a few hand signs and disappeared back to the front of the classroom.
“You can’t even become a ninja without mastering this skill.” Some of the class gasped as Iruka began to draw a figure on the board. It slowly turned into a diagram of the human circulatory system. “Does anyone recognize what this is?” Iruka-sensei asked the class. Sakura was the first to raise her hand.
“It's the circulatory system. The path our blood stream follows.” Sakura said confidently.
“I was waiting for that answer,” Iruka-sensei said as Sakura smirked, “But you are actually wrong.” Immediately Sakura's smirk faltered and was replaced by an incredulous one. “This is your chakra reservoirs. Just like your blood, like Sakura said, chakra is circulated through your body and is accessible through hand signs and deep concentration. Today we will be accessing this energy.” Iruka-sensei then instructed us to the outside training area where we spent the majority of our time. We crowded around him and he began to explain how to access this “chakra”.
“You can feel the energy coursing through you when you flex your arms or move, right? Concentrate on that energy and channel it through to the palm of your hand. It is much trickier to send it outside your body, but with some more concentration you can eventually fuse it with weapons to make them faster or stronger.” Iruka-sensei told us excitedly.
He showed us various hand signs and had the class copy him as he went. Each hand sign shared a name with an animal, and soon we were memorizing sequences. “The hand sign for a clone jutsu is: Tiger, Boar, Ox, then Dog. To do this jutsu correctly you need to know exactly what will be happening. When preforming the hand signs, focus on the chakra surging through your body. The chakra will take care of the rest for you. You should feel your image lift from your body and form next to you. You know your partners, now go!”
My partner today was Naruto. I was a bit worried, especially because Sasuke helped me so much I wasn't sure if I would be as successful alone. Several students kept forgetting what the order was and when I looked to see how Sasuke was doing, I wasn't surprised to see two of him looking straight at me.
Determined, I placed my hands in the tiger sign and felt a small burst of energy from within myself. Then, the boar. The same energy burst from before jolted through me and began to gather in my midsection. I transitioned to the Ox and concentrated on the flurry of energy within me, and finally as I shifted to Dog, I felt the surge of energy burst as my I could feel it fill every crevice of my body and sift off. Confused by the absence of the odd energy, I looked to my left, and appearing from a cloud of smoke was a perfect replica of myself.
Naruto was just as surprised as I was and quickly exclaimed how cool he thought it was that I got it. “Alright Mallow! See, Sasuke isn't the best! You are!” He grinned widely and I blushed from the attention. The rest of the class heard Naruto's exclamation as well (as they did all things Naruto said) and Sasuke took said comment as a competition. He walked up to me and performed the necessary hand signs and soon I was starring at three Sasukes.
“Beat that Mallow.” He said confidently. I laughed awkwardly and scratched the back of my neck unsure of how he even did that. The rest of the class stared at me, waiting for something to happen. Under the pressure of my entire class, I shakily put each of the hand signs together. When I finished, I quickly closed my eyes, unsure of what I had created. When giggles erupted from the class I opened my eyes to see a broken, curled up Mallow lying on the ground.
It was pathetic.
“Who's the best now, Uzumaki?” Sasuke asked Naruto smugly.
“Shut up you Teme!” Naruto yelled loudly. My face heated in severe embarrassment and I started to run away from the crowd and the fight that quick exploded between Naruto and Sasuke. No one noticed me leave as they were watching Iruka-sensei pull the two adolescent boys apart.