"Next, Team 8 will be consisting of Hyuuga Hinata, Inuzuka Kiba, and Aburame Shino. Your instructor and team leader is Yuhi Kurenai," Iruka said loud enough for the above three to hear, looking up to see the squad listed nod or smirk in acknowledgement. He then moved on, "Because Team 9 is being used for a different team we needed to move on to the next number. Yamanaka Ino, Nara Shikamaru and Akimichi Choji, you three are on Team 10 and your Jonin captain is Sarutobi Asuma."
Ino groaned and slammed her head on her desk. Choji, who was sitting beside her and munching on a packet of chips, looked toward her in surprise. "Hey, you okay, Ino?"
"I'm fine," the girl groaned back, her voice muffled by her face being pressed into her desk.
"And that's it for team assignments," Iruka concluded, folding his clipboard under his arm and clicking his pen, "You will be meeting your Jonin instructors here after lunch. Until then I suggest you all get together with your teammates, get to know them and… well… have fun. Good luck to all of you." With that sorted, Iruka took one last look at the class for that hour before turning heel and taking his leave.
Once the door closed behind him, students left and right started to move, either heading on over to meet up with their teammates or leaving individually. Sasuke remained in his seat for the time being, waiting for the rest of the class to move out of his way so that he could make his own march over to the door without distraction. This gave Sakura several moments of quiet time with him that she enjoyed in every possible manner, beaming at him with a light coloring in her cheeks.
"He's so cool," Sakura thought happily, until she was rudely interrupted from her daydreaming session by a light thump on her desk. When the pinkette looked ahead of her, the kunoichi gave a startled yelp when she saw Naruto squatting on top of the desk and grinning right in her face. "What the hell?!"
"Hey Sakura-chan. Want to hang out and have lunch together?" the blonde asked cheerfully.
The girl frowned at him, "Why in the world would I want to have lunch with you?"
"Well… since we're in the same group I just thought that maybe we could talk and get to know each other a little better, you know?" Naruto replied good-naturedly before turning to Sasuke to see him staring at them with one eye. "What do you think, Sasuke?"
Giving the cheerful runt some moments of consideration, the raven haired boy grunted and closed his eyes, "Whatever. Anything's fine with me."
"Sweet," Naruto chirped before grinning back at Sakura, who appeared a little surprised at the Uchiha actually agreeing with the class clown. "So… where can we go eat?"
"How about having lunch with me, shithead?!" a familiar voice suddenly shouted from the class entrance.
The loud voice accompanied by the profanity at the end had every single individual in the room turn in the direction of the call, where everyone saw a girl around their age with redish-pink hair they had never seen before, standing inside the frame. Wearing a khaki battle dress with spandex shorts, a cap and the Konoha headband wrapped around it, the girl made her presence known all around by stepping fully into view with her hands resting comfortably on her hips.
Kiba's eyes went a little wide as he looked the cute newcomer up and down. "Who is that?"
Almost every boy's jaw dropped when they saw the beautiful girl standing in plain sight of them, whereas every other girl in the class stared at her either with suspicion or confusion. Was this person here for their Sasuke-kun? Was she an older Genin here to make fun of them or was she a surprise candidate? Who was she?
And who was this 'shithead' she was calling? No way was it someone in their…
"Tayuya-chan!" Naruto waved back from his spot on the desk, seeing the musician giggle before dashing over to him. "What are you doing here? I thought you were meeting up with Anko-sensei today?"
"Already did. Turns out we were right when we thought that all the individual Genin graduates under apprenticeships would be put together on a single team with a new instructor," Tayuya exclaimed while thumbing herself in the chest. "You're looking at the first member of the new Team 9."
"Wow! That's awesome!" Naruto said, dropping down from the desk to stand in front of her. "Iruka-sensei mentioned that Team 9 was being used by another group. So it's your squad."
"Oh yeah," Tayuya replied, latching onto his arm and hugging him tightly, "I'm so psyched right now. This is going to be awesome!"
"Whoa, yeah, I can tell," Naruto chuckled, feeling how tightly his limb was being squeezed by the girl's surprisingly powerful arms. It was almost like she was trying to pop his left out of its socket, "So who's your teacher? I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that it's not Anko-sensei, seeing as how happy you are."
The musician shook her head. "No, we got some guy named Genma. He's going to be picking us up outside the academy gates after lunch, so we figured we could all stick together and get to know each other before that. Since we don't know much about the other members of our group, I think it's a good idea." She gestured towards the door, "My team's waiting outside if you want to meet them."
"Sure. I'd love to," Naruto grinned back.
As the two laughed and spoke fondly of how thrilled they were to finally be put onto teams, everyone in the class was looking toward them flabbergasted. While those who knew who Naruto was looked like gaping fish, those who knew the jinchuriki personally from the past or had spent the most time with him face to face were simply blown away at the sudden turn of events. Shikamaru was staring with an open jaw, Choji had stopped eating mid-chew, and Kiba, Ino and Sakura were looking at the boy with owlish expressions in play. Even Sasuke was staring with visible disbelief.
"Okay… what the hell? Why is a girl latching onto the class clown like he's her boyfriend?" Ino asked, rubbing her eyes to see if she was hallucinating. Nope. She wasn't. There was in fact a girl, a really beautiful, flesh and bones girl hanging off of Naruto's arm and gazing up at him like he was her whole world.
It was an indisputable observation. The red head that had just entered their class and flocked to Naruto's side was honestly drop-dead gorgeous.
Meanwhile, one other person in the class who was completely beside herself or fretting with concern was in fact the Hyuuga up in the back row. Hands held together worryingly, the young kunoichi gazed towards her idol and his visitor quietly with shimmering eyes, "W-Who is this person?" Hinata thought while pressing her hands to her chest. "I've… never seen her before. Is she a relative of Naruto-kun's… or… or…"
Tayuya, after sharing pleasantries with her flat mate, then turned her attention to Sasuke and Sakura, whom she could see were still staring at them incredulously. "Why doesn't your team come with us? We can have lunch together."
"Great idea," Naruto replied, also looking at the aforementioned pair. "Hey guys, we got ourselves a table!"
"R-Right," Sakura murmured, all the while still trying to come to terms with the fact that a girl was, in front of the entire class, associating with Naruto in a more than 'just good friends' manner.
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