from Academy to Anbu by theriku260

chapter 28

With Naruto…

Naruto had his mouth slightly agape at his rather quirky friend's entrance, when a snap from Tenzo brought him back.

"Time to prepare for the second round. You ready?" Tenzo asked out loud. Naruto gave a tilt of his head to look his captain in the eye.

"Yes, Taicho. I'm ready."

Presently, inside the Forest of Death, with Naruto and team Ro…

When Naruto spotted Orochimaru in disguise as the sannin licked his lips, somehow foolish enough to believe nobody noticed his disguise even when the man stuck a foot long tounge out.

'That or overconfident. We did do a fantastic job of playing the ignorant village,' Naruto mused to himself, idly keeping his hand gripped on a chakra metal kunai, mentally asking the traitor to give him an excuse to fling a Kurama influenced kunai at his slimy head.

Unfortunately, Orochimaru was content to just peer at his old student in a predative way even as Anko managed the miracle of pretending he wasn't there. It had taken much…. therapy from the Third Hokage to ensure Anko's cooperation. Seeing the signal from Tenzo to send fifty clones into the forest for minor additional recon as Anko was starting her spiel, Naruto settled down for an entertaining few minutes, his black cloak and forest contrasting sharply with his mask.

Down in the clearing…

"Alight worthless Maggots!" Anko greeted cheerfully once every genin team had sufficiently gawked at what was the most dangerous place in the Land of Fire and hand in their liability forms. "I hope you're ready to die painfully for my enjoyment!" Multiple genin bristled at her flippant attitude about their lives only to find a kunai in their backpacks curtesy of a hidden Naruto, chains like vipers (not that the genin could see). No genin would show his friend disrespect.

'Heh, you're getting pretty good with those chains, Naruto.' Kurama praised in a bored tone.

'Aww, thanks Kurama, that means' Naruto started to give gratitude for the praise only to be cut off by Kurama.

'It's such an accomplishment to hit unmoving large targets at non vital spots!' The fox finished his 'complement' with a sarcastic smirk, causing the blonde ANBU to mentally roll his eyes at his own foolishness at thinking Kurama could be sincere. He felt a creeping chill run up his spine and turned slightly to face Tenzo.

'Do that again Mouse and I'll tell Dragon you want a training retreat with him.' Tenzo threatened through animated sign language.

'…Of course, Taicho', Naruto signed back with shaky hands that gave away his fear. Hikaru and Yugao shared silent snickers. Down below Anko continued her proctoring speech.

"Right here you brats get to spend two days in my personal playground; the Forest of Death! Inside you'll find roaming wasp spiders, leaches, and ANBU squads to pick your dead husks from the forest floor! But don't worry, you don't have to spend two whole days in there." She assured the now trembling genin. Seeing their unspoken question, the snake summoner continued. "All you maggots have to do is play a little game of cat and mouse."

"C-cat and mouse?" Ino asked uncertainly, already dreading the forest. She knew her team wasn't ready for this but didn't want to look bad by dropping out. Anko got a predatory gleam in her eyes.

"Why yes dearie. See, half the squads here will receive a scroll" here she held up a giant scroll with the kanji for 'mouse' written in large letters and signaling for the assembled teams to split evenly, which happened quickly.

Naruto could feel his eye twitch when Anko sent a wink in his general direction due to the name.

"The other half of the squads will not receive a scroll, but a map of the area. The 'mice' get a twenty minute head start towards the teams that make it with a scroll advance." Anko finished. Kiba took the opportunity to speak his ire.