The Silent Prodigy: Book 1

Chapter 6: You Pass!

Mai's POV

    "Well, I guess we failed." I muttered and everyone glared at me. And by everyone I mean Sakura, Sasuke, and Naruto who was tied up to a post because he tried to eat before the exercise was done. 

    Kakashi stood before us as everyone's stomach growled and said, "Uh oh, stomach's growling huh? That's too bad. Oh and about this exercise, well I've decided I won't send any of you back to the academy." Naruto and Sakura started cheering while Sasuke smirked at that. I rolled my eyes, no one did anything. There's no way that Kakashi would let them pass. 

    "I'm dropping all of you, besides Mai, from the program entirely," I looked up in shock as he said that. He wouldn't just drop them right? Sure they could fail, but dropping them? I looked over at my sister as she glared at me. I knew nothing good was going to come from this.

    "Drop us from the program?" Naruto asked looking bewildered. "You can't just kick us out, why would you do that?"

    "Because you don't think like ninja." He replied. "You think like little kids, like brats." Sasuke snapped in anger and rushed at him. Kakashi immediately pinned him down and sat on him. "You think it's all about you, you never even thought about what this test was really about. Well, one of you did and that's why I passed her. Care to explain Mai?" He asked as everyone looked at me.

    "Why do you think we were put on a four man squad?" I asked quietly as they all looked at me with frustration. "The answer is teamwork."

    "But if that's the case than why was she allowed to pass?" Sakura whined. "She never attempted to pair up with us."

    He studied me for a second before turning towards my sister, "It's because she knew that none of you would pair up with her, since you all have too much of an ego." Great, now everyone would be even more ticked off at me.

    "But you only had three bells and there are four of us, how is that fair?" Sakura exclaimed.

    "I purposely pitted you against each other, I wanted to see if you would overcome that obstacle," Kakashi explained, "and clearly you did not. Sakura, you only focused on Sasuke and you barely knew where he was half the time," Sakura looked down at her feet as he said this. "Naruto, you acted solo. And as for Sasuke, you purposely labeled the other three as hindrances and worked on your own. Well clearly that didn't work did it?" Kakashi leered at them with disdain. He suddenly pulls out his kunai and presses it against Sasuke's throat. "Sakura! Kill Naruto and Mai or Sasuke dies!"

   "Wh-what?" They exclaimed, astonished at Kakashi's order. I merely stood there knowing it was not my place to interfere with Kakashi's teachings.

   "This is what will happen when you put your own selfish individual actions before teamwork," He lectured as he stood up, putting away the kunai that had previously been at Sasuke's throat. "Every mission is a life-risking assignment," he walked towards the KIA stone . "The names of shinobi engraved on this stone are heros."

    "That's it!" Naruto exclaimed with glee. "I want my name engraved on there too."

   'Baka,' I thought in my head. Those names are for the shinobi who have passed on. I peered closely at the names. Sure enough, the two names I saw on the memorial stones were there. 'As far as I know, mother never mentioned a relative by the name of Kaori Haruno.' I placed my hand to my chin as I pondered. 

   "These are all shinobi that have been killed in action," the mood immediatly became somber as Kakashi stated this. "My closest friends names are engraved in this stone." At that moment I realized there was a lot more to our teacher then he put off. For someone to be able to put off a care free vibe, while holding on to the pain of losing your loved ones...it was unfathomable and took years to overcome. Most shinobi never overcome the loss. I understood having to put up a facade in order to protect not only yourself, but the few people that remain precious to you from seeing your true feelings.