A week later…
As per the usual route, after waking up early that morning to get some additional training in with Tayuya, Naruto soon found himself up in the academy building sitting quietly in his homeroom, middle row, center, alongside dozens of his other fellow graduates. Thanks to all the excitement that had been bottled up inside him all week, the jinchuriki had barely been able to keep still and had sought any and all means of physical exercise in an attempt to put a dampener on his accelerator.
While the events involving Konohamaru did divert his attention for a brief period of time, it was nothing too consequential. He learned later on, through a rather strange phenomenon of memory relapse of his clones dispelling, that his doppelgangers and the kid had gotten into all sorts of trouble that day. Following a little run in with the grandson's guardian Ebisu, Konohamaru then decided he no longer wanted Naruto as a teacher, but as a rival.
They both wanted the throne that was the Hokage's seat, a challenge Naruto gladly accepted.
He was a good kid with a spirit that managed to add even more NOS to Naruto's. The prospect of another challenger in the race to the top revved the jinchuriki and made him even more determined to get stronger.
This explained why he was more cheerful today than usual and had been one of the first to arrive in class that morning to oversee the timely arrival of the others.
Naruto was unable to stop his legs from bouncing along the floor as he looked around at all the familiar faces ready and waiting for the day ahead. While some like Sasuke and Shino passed the time by keeping to themselves and sitting quietly, Choji and Shikamaru kept their persons occupied through conversation, as did many of the other students. It was basically same-old, same-old around the room, which gave the jinchuriki plenty of time to meditate on his own thoughts, unless someone decided to drop by and say hi.
"Let's see," Naruto thought, holding up his fingers and deciding to make a summary for himself, "Not counting the jutsu I learned in the academy and the material from my personal bag of tricks, I have a total of two: Jet Hand and Shadow Clone Jutsu."
It was reassuring for him to know that he did in fact have techniques he could fall back on if push came to shove. On their own they packed a hell of a punch, but now it was all a matter of working on them, making them stronger, faster, and coming up with new and creative ideas on how to execute them. The possibilities were endless.
He could think on them now and practice with them later, but all he was doing at this time was cutting down on minutes.
"Hmm… I wonder what Tayuya-chan is doing right now?" Naruto thought aloud to himself, gazing up towards the ceiling in thought. "She was supposed to meet up with Anko-sensei today. Perhaps some of the Jonin really are going to bring their apprentices together to form a team?"
If that were the case, Naruto was sure Tayuya would tell him about it at the end of the day. He just needed to be patient and ride through his schedule first.
"Lost in thought?" a voice spoke up beside Naruto, who turned to see Shikamaru Nara standing beside him with his hands in his pockets. The jinchuriki noted the boy was wearing his headband around his arm. "That's new."
"Hey, Shikamaru. Surprised to see you're not taking a nap," Naruto also noted with a smirk. "That's new."
The Nara rolled his shoulder tiredly, "I would like to, but everyone's making so much noise it's impossible to get any shut eye."
"Normally that wouldn't be a problem for you," Naruto said, leaning back in his seat with his hands behind his head. "Maybe you're tense because nobody knows what's actually going to happen with this team assignment thing. I mean… are they going to let us choose what teams we're gonna be on or are the teachers going to decide for us?"
"It's probably going to be the latter," the boy answered, sliding into a seat in the row across from the jinchuriki. "Think about it; if we were given the choice of who we wanted to be on a team with, wouldn't they have mentioned it in the registration forms or at the graduation ceremony?"
Naruto squinted in his usual, fox-like manner and looked ahead of him thoughtfully. "Hmm, yeah. I guess they would have."
"Maybe it'll turn out to be one of those lucky draws from the hat or something," Shikamaru shrugged, before swinging his legs up onto his desk and throwing his hands behind him. "Either way, it doesn't matter to me. I have absolutely no problem with being partnered up with anybody in this class. As long as it doesn't involve a lot of work, then I'm cool with it."
"I sometimes wonder how you even survived the academy," Naruto murmured, staring oddly at the Nara who looked ready to nod out right where he was lying.
Shikamaru yawned in response, "By doing the bare minimum, Naruto. The bare minimum." Typical slacker attitude, just what you'd expect from a master of the art. There were of course several other students in the class that fell under the same character, chief among which included Choji and Naruto himself. But that was all old news that was better left for the books. The main thing was that a lot of them had changed drastically since the days they were kids and skipping school, even though Shikamaru looked as though he hadn't grown one bit. "I see you've still got your goggles with you."
"Oh yeah," Naruto chuckled, grabbing the pair hanging around his neck and pulling on them. "These things have been pretty useful to me. I'm hanging onto them." He didn't know when he would need them again, but it was better to have them and not use them, then not to have them when something serious came up. "Don't suppose you're thinking of changing your wardrobe?"
"No way. Too much effort," Shikamaru replied. "This look suits me best."
"Yeah… the easy, just rolled out of bed look." Obviously his classmate would pick a combination of clothes that were the simplest to put on and didn't require any effort or forethought. Naruto just rolled his eyes in amusement and went on to thinking again.
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