Evaluation
When Minato returns back to the academy class things have changed.
Onikuma-sensei hadn’t been fired but she had to make a formal apology to Minato. Which made things pretty awkward. Minato won’t tell Shikaku, Chouza or Inoichi but he kinda wishes that Onikuma-sensei didn’t have to do anything. A clanborn shinobi apologizing to him is practically unheard of and he’s receiving a lot of scrutiny because of it. Hokage-sama to counteract the negative attention had revealed that Minato had entered the academy early and now a lot of eyes were on him. It probably negated the danger of being kidnapped by the child snatchers but the new attention wasn’t all that great either.
Boys and girls both have been sizing him up and some of them have even been checking him out. They seem to think that being an orphan is the best thing ever. He’s even overheard some of them speculating on how “independent” and “cool” it is to have no parents. That’s what makes Minato’s blood boil, how dare they romanticize being a orphan. It’s horrible to have no parents. It hurts to know that the people who gave birth to you—wanted you—loved you are dead.
He hates those kinds of people. Who would have spat on him at the clan park to suddenly switch to fawning over his life. To have the audacity to come up and tell him how lucky it is to have no parents. His nails had dug into his palms when people like that had come up to him.
It's strange to go from nobody to somebody. Hokage-sama had scheduled his formal evaluation next month and Minato is pretty nervous. He’s smart enough to understand that things won’t ever go back to normal again. If he fails he’ll be in danger both from the Onikuma clan and from the child snatchers.
“Namikaze-san.”
Ah-
Minato snaps his head up and meets the annoyed glare of Onikuma-sensi, dislike thinly veiled in her eyes.
“Namikaze-san, the question?”
Er–Minato quickly scans the board and carefully walks down to take the piece of chalk waiting in her hand. As he walks down he carefully avoids the tripping attempts and the hands that try to touch him. A lot of kids had been trying to take the clanless orphan down a peg while others have tried to get close to him to further themselves.
He takes the chalk and quickly solves the math problem and then walks back up when Onikuma-sensei can’t find fault in his answer.
He’s been studying and training every single minute of every day. He’s told Shikaku to tell Chouza and Inoichi so they don’t think he’s blowing them off.
When he gets back to his seat Shikaku sends him an approving blink while Chouza slips him a roasted sugary chestnut. This might be Minato’s favorite thing about the academy. Having people to care for and people caring about you heals a loneliness that he hadn't even known he had. He quietly resolves to himself that if he ever gets a family he’ll treasure them. Make sure that they know they were loved so if he ever died they would never doubt his love for them. He thinks that if he ever has kids he wants a boy first and then a girl. An older brother and younger sister sound nice so they won’t ever be lonely like he always was.
The sudden longing for a family hits him and the intensity makes his heart hurt for a second. He wants a family more than anything he thinks. He’s seen his friends with their parents sometimes and he wants that, more than anything he had ever wanted.
Minato promises himself that if he should ever have a family he would treasure them. Place them before all else.
He sighs a little and discreetly flips open the textbook that he had bribed an upperclassman to give him. There goes two months allowance. Worth it though.
The month goes by quickly, way too quickly. Minato had studied and reviewed and wheedled every bit of information that Shikaku, Chouza and Inoichi could give him. He had also run laps and sparred against Inouchi when he had been willing. Minato had also been tricked into playing shogi with Shikaku but it had been a nice unwinding activity. He had also studied plants and a little bit of how chakra works with Chouza. He was ready.
Minato was not ready.
He thought he was going to puke.
He had definitely not accounted for how terrifying the evaluation would be. Apparently he also had to retake the academy test too because—well he hadn’t actually been given a reason.
Yuhi Shinku and two Anbu members were watching him. He recognized one of them, the Wolf Anbu who had taken him to the Hokage’s office the first time when he thought he was gonna be killed. The second Anbu was the one who unsettled him. They had a blank mask and an air of stillness distinctly blank. Like they had been wiped of personality. Maybe they were special ops or something.
The alarm went off and the exam started.
The exams were both worse and better than Minato had expected.
The written section had been harder than he had remembered but they probably had changed it up since he already took it. It still had been a piece of cake though. Once he had calmed down and his brain actually kicked into gear he sped through the questions. It had been more nerve wracking than hard because of the physiological element to it. They hadn’t told him the time, only the amount of time he had to complete the exam so he had to predict how long he could take on each question. Studying up until 2am really did help!
The physical evaluation had been annoying though. He had to run laps for an unspecified amount of time until the instructor, Yuhi Shinku had commanded him to stop. He had also had to complete a parkour course and climb structures. It hadn’t been as bad as the hell Inoichi had put him through when he had been training but it had been pretty bad. The worst part was that he had been ordered not to drink water for five minutes after he had completed the physical to test his compliance to orders.
After they had finished, Yuhi Shinku had told him that his results would be given to him the next day and to go home.
He unlocks the door to his small room in the Genin apartments. The Hokage had placed him there because the only other open options to his budget had been in the red light district. Which well–he was still five so Genin apartments it was! His neighbors was really loud and all lame too which was kind of a letdown since he had been hoping for tips. His neighbor to the right had actually been named the “Eternal Genin”. Minato really hoped that wasn’t an estimate on his future and it was just pure luck that Hokage-sama had placed him next to the weirdo. His neighbor to the left was Azaki Etsuko who was actually really nice and would probably make chunin soon. He would mourn the loss of the only sane neighbor he had. She had made him brownies too and invited him for dinner.
It was strange to no longer be hungry or starving. Chouza slipped him snacks all the time, Azaki-san often gave him leftovers and with both of them he usually even had money left over which he stored as savings or occasionally bought something he wanted. Minato had friends and a full stomach. Sometimes he couldn’t even believe how happy he felt.
Everything was going perfectly.