The Legend of Konoha's Shooting Star

The First Test!!

Naruto grinned, feeling very proud of himself for his confident declaration.

"... You won't lose to those bastards? Big words... Showoff..." Kiba said with a smirk, snickering into his hand.

"What a moron... he just turned everyone into his enemy..." Shikamaru said, sweating nervously as he thought of the ramifications of Naruto's actions. He was so glad they weren't on the same team. As annoying as Ino was, at least she knew better than to do that.

"What the hell are you doing!?!" Sakura demanded incredulously, wrapping her arms around her loudmouth teammate's neck in a chokehold.

"I was just speaking the truth!!" Naruto exclaimed defensively, throwing more fuel on the fire.

"I don't think you're squeezing hard enough, Sakura-chan... He's still talking," April said with a radiant shit-eating grin, wishing he would just leave well enough alone. She was glad he wasn't intimidated, but she'd rather not provoke the rest of these trigger-happy genins unless absolutely necessary. 'Well, at least we've probably managed to avoid attracting any offers of false friendship with the way they're all glaring at us...' she thought wryly, sweat-dropping at of all the silent death threats being sent their way. It was a lot easier to tell friend from foe when you knew ahead of time that everyone else in the room hated your guts.

"Hey—guh!" Naruto grunted in pain, feeling indignant, when Sakura followed April's suggestion and squeezed tighter to prevent any more stupidity from leaking out of his mouth.

"E... Everyone... It was just a joke..." Sakura nervously apologized to the rest of the room. "He's quite stupid, and..."

While she was making excuses, the sound ninjas were making trouble.

"Shall we do it...?" the bandaged leader asked his teammates.

"Let's do it," the guy with spiky hair said with a smirk. The four sound ninjas immediately began snaking their way through the crowd at top speed. Though they were suppressing their auras, and none of the other examinees that they passed reacted, April caught a flicker of movement out the corner of her eye. She stopped listening to Sakura's yelling and focused on catching it again.

'There!' she thought, narrowing her eyes slightly once she had them in her sights, keeping her eyes trained on them while they continued to weave through the crowd. 'They're coming...' She noticed in her peripheral vision that Kabuto also had his eyes on them. April wasn't sure who they were aiming for, but she would have put her money on Naruto, so she tensed slightly in anticipation of their attack when guy with the bandaged face began to pull one of his sleeves up, and the guy with spiky hair launched himself into the air above Kabuto and swiftly threw two kunais at him without hesitation. "!" April said, surprised, as her eyes widened with concern, but Kabuto dodged the kunais expertly. Unfortunately, this put Kabuto right where the sound ninjas wanted him. As he slid back out of the path of the kunais, the bandaged leader suddenly appeared before him.

"!!!" Kabuto gasped in alarm. They were now only inches apart when the other ninja began swinging his fist at his face.

"!!" Sasuke gasped when he saw the attack, and his eyes widened as he furrowed his brow.

'These guys are Hidden Sound...' Kabuto thought, gritting his teeth while a bead of sweat slid down the side of his face.

'What's that thing on his arm...?' April wondered, furrowing her brow and frowning at the odd device strapped to it, bending her knees a little in preparation to move. It looked like it might be an armguard, but it had an unusual design.

"!!" Naruto and Sakura flinched in alarm when they realized what was happening behind them.

They all watched as Kabuto managed to cleanly avoid the incoming attack, jumping back just in the nick of time with a triumphant smirk on his face.