Tenten likes her teammates best when they are on missions. She enjoys being part of a competent trio, and they treat her like a true teammate instead of the “obligatory” kunoichi. Sometimes men resent having to work with a woman, and she knows how fortunate she is that Neji and Lee treat her as an equal.
Even before graduation, she had expected to end up on a team with them. It isn’t a secret that the best and worst shinobi of the year are always paired together with a clever kunoichi to balance them. Her patient nature had doomed her to the third slot on Team Gai, because it takes a lot of effort to put up with the amount of crazy Lee and Neji bring to their mix.
Not to mention Gai-sensei.
Usually she finds herself amused or gently exasperated by their foibles, and she always has amusing stories to tell her family. She likes them, obsessions and all.
But Tenten still prefers to spend time with them on actual missions when they are at their most productive. Training is all well and good, but training isn’t the best way to gain the respect of others.
The best missions are the ones that force Neji and Lee to focus and keep their mouths shut.
It is a thrill to race through the forest with Neji’s eyes guiding them. Due to their long time as genin, it had only taken seconds to decide their strategy. Their teamwork is flawless, and they are going to reap the fruit of Gai’s endless training.
Team Gai is hunting.
The randomized entrances to the training area means that searching for one specific group of genin isn’t the best plan. After a quick glance to confirm that their entrance is flanked by two foreign teams that they don’t have detailed intel on, Tenten and Neji quickly decide that heading further in and then hunting in the mid range between the tower and the entrances is the best bet.
Tenten is confident in their ability to fight anyone in the exam, but she wants to avoid the Sand team if possible. The redheaded boy radiates bad vibes and reeks of instability. She also wants to stay the hell away from Kabuto’s team, because the “experienced test taker” is up to something nefarious.
Other than that, everyone is fair game.
Neji grumbles when she makes her requests, but doesn’t object. His pride is his major flaw, but he is a good enough shinobi to know that picking risky fights for no reason isn’t going to earn points with the examiners. And of course Lee agrees once Neji and Tenten are on the same page. He is the very definition of a good team player.
They’re moving fast in a spiraling search pattern, gradually moving toward the tower. Teams are more likely to aim directly for the end goal, but Gai’s training has provided them all with the stamina that is way beyond a common genin’s. Eventually, they will spot someone, and it’s a 50-50 chance that the other team will have the right scroll.
A couple hours in, Neji signals a halt, and Tenten and Lee silently join him on the same massive tree branch. He cocks his head slightly, and Tenten knows he has seen something of interest. It takes a moment, but then he shakes his head.
“The remains of a battle are off to the right,” he murmurs. If Neji is speaking instead of using hand signs, there is no one around to overhead them. “There are casualties.”
She winces. “Anyone we know?”
“I can’t tell from here,” he answers.
“Then we must get closer!” Lee pronounces.
Tenten thinks for a second, then nods her agreement. Information is the lifeblood of the ninja, and more is always better.
Neji doesn’t answer immediately. “It’s not pretty,” he warns them, and then makes a leap about fifty degrees to the right of their previous path.
It’s less than seventy meters before the forest opens into a small clearing. Tenten follows Neji as he lands on the ground at the very edge of a circle of carnage.
Her stomach roils as she tries to make sense of what her eyes are telling her.
There is blood everywhere. Intellectually, Tenten knows the average human body contains five liters of blood, but she never realized how far blood can spread. There are three concentrated piles of viscera and bone scattered in the dappled sunlight, but only the vague human-shape that confirms they must have been people once.
They had been pulverized.
Lee is the first to speak. “What could have done this?”
Any shinobi with any skill in ninjutsu would feel the echoes of a malevolent chakra that permeated the clearing. Sometimes Tenten isn’t sure if she is more jealous or sympathetic towards Lee’s chakra-blindness.
“The jutsu from hell,” she answers. “It has to be jounin class at least.”
“Another village must have sent in a ringer,” Neji states. He steps forward slowly, moving to the nearest pile.
Tenten does not want to get any closer. The hair on her skin is standing on end, and all of her instincts are screaming to run the other way.
But she follows Neji without complaint. She chose to be a kunoichi, and she cannot shy away from horror. This is the worst thing she has ever seen, but it is her duty to continue on this path. There is intelligence to be gleaned.
They quickly find the Kusagakure forehead protector among the first pile, identifying the team as not from Konaha. Tenten breathes a little easier when she realizes that the dead aren’t people she knows.
The injuries are all blunt force trauma from all sides, as though something had wrapped around them and squeezed until they popped. It is hard to tell, but there was a strange quality to the few bits of skin she finds, tiny little dots burrowed deeper in some places than others. She has never seen damage like it before, and the only thing she knows for sure is that a traditional weapon wasn’t used.
This is not the remains of a battle. This is an execution site. The poor bastards hadn’t stood a chance.
It is Lee who finds the earth scroll tossed aside, its markings clear underneath the blood-splatter. He doesn’t touch it, instead gesturing for them to come closer.
“Any traps?” he asks.
Neji scans it, and shakes his head, before raising an eyebrow at Tenten. She is the best when it comes to basic traps, and she checks it over carefully as well before reaching out and picking it up.
“Whoever did this is searching for a heaven scroll,” she announces, coming to the obvious conclusion. There is no reason to leave a scroll behind unless it holds no value to the killers.
“Like we are,” Lee says. “This was pointless murder.”
“Sounds like Kirigakure,” Tenten says. Their graduation ceremony is legendary, and there is a reason why it is known as “Bloody Mist.”
“Kiri isn’t participating in this exam,” Neji reminds her.
“Oh,” she says lamely, before tucking the scroll away. Neji has their original, and having a second offers them a variety of options if they encounter another team. “I think we should go. Staying here isn’t a good use of our time.”
“Agreed,” Neji says. “Finding out what happened isn’t our mission.”
And the mission is what matters.
For a second, Lee looks like he is going to protest, but then he nods his agreement as well.
They come together in formation without a thought, so well trained as a team that they move as one. Instead of a line, they form a triangle and start to move. While most would expect a triangle to move like an arrow point, their default is to have Tenten to the right, Lee to the left, and Neji playing rearguard.
Tenten’s natural compassion objects to leaving the dead behind, but this is a test to prove her worthiness of being named chuunin. A shinobi cannot afford to be kind. The mission must be completed, and nothing can change the fact that the dead cannot be helped.
They begin their spiral-sweep pattern again, although this time they move counterclockwise toward the tower. Whomever (whatever) was responsible for the death of the Grass team had been on that course, so the change of tactics is in order.
By entering the exams, they are risking their lives, but there’s no reason to be stupid about it.
A slight shiver rolls up her spine less than two minutes later makes her jerk her fingers, indicating a need to stop. While Neji’s sight is unparalleled, and Lee has better hearing, Tenten is the best sensor of the group. Field control is essential for her fighting style, and since she can’t always see her targets with her eyes, learning to use her chakra to compensate has been a significant part of her training. She’s not a natural, but her chakra awareness is well above average.
Tenten tastes the air, trying to sort through what she is sensing. There are moderately powerful chakra signatures throughout the training ground, but none of them are what caused her to halt.
Tenten has always used a mental analogy of stars in the night sky to picture how chakra sensing works. Most of the chuunin candidates feel like fellow orange stars, more powerful than civilians but nowhere near the level of a jounin’s steady blue-white light. Every now and then they flare brighter, a sign of the battles going on all around, but it’s within an expected range.
She swallows, her throat dry, as she feels a strange double-star not too far away, flaring unevenly as the chakra balance vacillates between an orange-yellow and brilliant, deadly blue that would outshine the Hokage himself. It feels like standing on the edge of a supernova, and everyone in the training ground is too close to avoid getting caught in the wake of the explosion.
For a second, she stops breathing, unable to think of what to do.
“Danger,” she finally chokes out softly, foregoing the hand signs for her voice. For the second time in less than an hour, there’s no point trying to keep silent. The rules have shifted, and the mission objective is meaningless if they can’t survive the next few minutes.
Because they trust her judgment, Lee and Neji don’t waste time with stupid questions. “Is it the source of the massacre?” Lee asks.
“I don’t think so,” Tenten replies. “Whatever is up there isn’t…”
She shakes her head, unable to find the words to explain. There is no way to relay that whatever lies ahead is beyond such a common nightmare as murder in a couple of sentences.
“Can we go around?” Neji asks.
“There is no around.” There is another pulse of chakra, and she has to force herself to breathe as nausea threatens to make her vomit.
Neji covers his mouth, and she knows he’s caught the edge of it this time.
“Then the only way out is through,” Lee says, and his pitch is low and serious.
Tenten shudders at the thought, but Lee grips her shoulder with reassuring firmness, and meets Neji’s eyes squarely.
“Either it’s part of the test, or it’s something that will endanger the village,” said Lee. “If we want to be chuunin, we have to show that we are willing to put our lives on the line.”
He cannot feel the malevolent clash of chakra, but Tenten isn’t fool enough to think that would change his mind.
Rock Lee never could resist being a good guy. There is no way he is going to turn aside if the village is in danger, even if the threat is way beyond their ability to cope with.
And because she is his teammate, she is going to be right next to him.
It’s going to get them killed.