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shadow-bringer-ao3 · 14 days ago

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Gekko Hayate's Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Team

Hayate wasn’t meant to get a genin team but Kakashi is out of the village (and there’s rumors he left the village but Hokage-sama has yet to say anything one way or the other) and he got stuck with the man’s assigned team. He’d only had a handful of days to learn exactly what the kids are like and while he’s done harder in less time, he still doesn’t get to do quite as much recon as he would like.

Umino-sensei is a great help, at least, and is willing to give him a summary of how the trio act in the Academy. He also manages to get some information out of the other Academy sensei but none of the rest of them are half as helpful. Plus, with the whole incident with Mizuki fresh in everyone’s minds, the Academy sensei have gotten even more paranoid and prickly.

So, when it comes down to it, Hayate has only the basic idea of what kind of team he’s going to get; a self-absorbed boy too obsessed with a tragedy to even remotely think about working with someone, a loud, annoying boy that scrapped along the bottom of the class for the entirety of the time he was in the Academy and failed the graduation test three times, and a naive girl that doesn’t know the first thing about the world she’s walking into and is more interested in boys than she is in learning.

The team he gets doesn’t seem to match that at all. They’re quiet when he first picks them up, staring at him like they’re not sure what to make of him. Hayate gets those looks a lot so it doesn’t bother him, really. When he was younger, his sickly nature always made people underestimate him. Even now, with an entry in the bingo book and a name made for himself because of his skill with a sword, people, shinobi, will see him hacking his lungs out and assume they got it wrong. The kids aren’t giving him quite the same look (it doesn’t seem like it’s the coughing taking them off guard) but they still look at him like he’s not what they expected.

When their personalities start shining through their surprise, it’s clear whatever information he got from the Academy is horribly outdated at best or a complete lie at worst. Sasuke is quiet and stand-off-ish, sure, but he also joins Sakura in teasing Naruto and he has no issue with his new teammates draping themselves over him and he doesn’t really snap at them even once. Sakura is affectionate but not over the top and though she has a habit of making her expression wide and innocent, that just makes all the threats she makes and the lack of reaction she has to the truth of shinobi life stand out even more. Naruto is the closest to what the Academy told him— he’s loud and Hayate can see him annoying people with his tendency to talk (and drape) over people and he’s definitely not a genius but, then again, it’s just as clear that’s less because he’s actually stupid and more because he learns with his body, not with books and scrolls.

It’s like everyone at the Academy took a quick glance at the three and decided who they are based solely on their shallow first impressions. If they were this far off with Hayate’s team, he can’t imagine the complaints some of the other genin sensei might be harboring.

“Um, Gekko-sensei?” Sakura asks hesitantly and Hayate blinks his attention back to the here and now. The kids are done with the food they ordered and are now watching him with big, unblinking eyes. It would be cute, maybe, if it wasn’t quite so creepy.

“Yes, Sakura-chan?” Hayate prompts, resolving to ignore the way the boys still have yet to blink.

“Aren’t you going to give us a test?” she asks.

“A test?” Hayate repeats. They had already passes their graduation test.

Sakura nods. “You know, to see if you want to take us on as a team.” Hayate blinks.

“You mean like the bell test?” Sakura hesitates before bobbing her head in another nod. She must have read about it in some scroll she found somewhere. “It’s up to the jounin whether or not to give their teams a test. Team 7 has historically been party to some variation of the bell test but I wasn’t in Team 7 myself so I didn’t plan on it, no.”

“You mean Ka—” Sasuke elbows Naruto in the side. “Jounin-sensei don’t have to give their team a test and if they fail they get sent back to the Academy?” What have these kids been reading? Hayate wonders. He shakes his head.

“Even if a jounin gave their team a test and their team failed, the worst that could happen is the team get sent into the genin corp. Lots of times, the team is picked up by a different jounin-sensei.”

For a moment, the kids just stare at him. Then Naruto bursts out with, “that bastard!” Hayate doesn’t startle at the sudden shout but it’s a close thing. All three of the kids look annoyed and while Sasuke manages to look surprisingly intimidating despite his baby fat and delicate Uchiha features but, of the three of them, Hayate honestly thinks Sakura’s the most dangerous of them.

Sasuke is the Last Uchiha, sure, and Naruto’s the Jinchuuriki, of course, but Sakura has a control over her face and words that makes him a little worried about how good of a liar she’ll be when she’s all grown and trained. He’s a little worried about how good of a liar she is now.

“Someone told you you’d be sent back to the Academy?” Hayate prompts. None of them respond but the looks exchanged makes him think the answer is an emphatic yes— and that whoever told them that has a world of hurt coming.

If they were gullible enough to believe that, Hayate’s sort of glad Kakashi skived off being their sensei. He would have tormented them mercilessly if they had passed his bell test.

Yugao looks up when Hayate comes in, blinking at the haunted look on his face. He walks over to her and stops in front of her, staring down with a far off look in his eyes.

“Hayate?” She asks, concerned. What could have possibly happened with his genin team to make him look like that?

“They’re insane,” Hayate says. Her brow furrows.

“What?”

“Yugao,” he says, like her name is the only thing that can save him, “Yugao, they destroyed training ground eighteen.” Assured that it’s nothing serious, Yugao laughs, reaching up pull him down onto the couch.

“They’re kids,” she says, amused.

“I’m not so sure about that,” Hayate says weakly, curling into her side.

About a week into their new team assignments, Hayate suggests they have a joint training exercise. He’s been oddly closed-lip about his team. He hasn’t been boasting or complaining at all and they guess he aired most of his grievances to Yugao. He also gets this really weird expression when the rest of them talk about their own teams and honestly Kurenai had no idea how to parse it so of course when he brought the suggestion up, she (and Asuma) agreed immediately. Even Gai was interested enough to agree, despite the weird moroseness that’s overtaken him since Kakashi maybe-defected.

And really, it was a good idea. It would let them gauge their teams against other genin at roughly their skill level and also give Asuma, Hayate, and Kurenai’s teams the chance to see how much even just a year of training can offer an advantage. Except Hayate’s clearly insane because Team 7 doesn’t so much spar with the others as they do demolish— even Gai’s team.

They had decided to let the teams fight in a free for all first and expected, reasonably, that Team 3 would take the win handily. Instead, Team 7 split themselves into three, each of the tiny-but-terrifying kids taking on an entire team by themselves. Sasuke beating Team 8 isn’t so surprising— Team 8 might be made of clan heirs that all have their own training but they each have their hang ups and really the trio is best suited for tracking and stealth attacks, not face-to-face fights like the one Sasuke initiated. Still, the way Sasuke doesn’t seem to so much as break a sweat dealing with Team 8 is a blow to the pride. Both to the team itself and to Kurenai as their instructor.

Naruto trouncing Team 10 is much more surprising. He was lowest in the Academy rankings after all and Team 10 is the Ino-Shika-Cho trio; even if they don’t particularly like each other right now, they know how to work together and how to utilize each other to their advantage. They don’t even manage to get a hit off on Naruto before the boy overwhelms them.

Neither of those are as absolutely flabbergasting as Sakura taking on Team 3 on her own and winning, however. Sakura is smart and quick and strong enough to punch a crater into the training ground. Tenten lasts the longest and that’s only because she was the furthest away. Sakura had to deal with the two melee fighters before she could handle the budding weapons mistress.

It’s over in less than a minute and then Team 7 is reconverging. The three start arguing almost immediately but it’s all clearly for fun, a sniping and joking that’s weirdly familiar.

One quiet and dark-haired with a sharp tongue, one loud and brash and brawler, one deceptively strong with a knack for threats and by the sage they’re just the Sannin, aren’t they?

(Except Sasuke is not as cold as Orochimaru. Except they orbit around Naruto in a way the Sannin never did Jiraiya. Except Sakura is rough but she’s kind too and she remembers to assure her team they’re appreciated. Tsunade always forgot that.)

It should have been an easy mission. It should have been an easy mission. Killing a civilian bridge-builder? He could do that in his sleep. Dealing with a Konoha team? Annoying, depending on their level, but still doable. Dealing with a genin team, even if their sensei is the best swordsman to come out of a village other than the Mist? Easy.

So why, Zabuza thinks a little wildly, is he losing?

It had been going to plan. (Really, that should have been the first sign— nothing ever goes to plan.) The four had managed to dodge his first strike but he wasn’t terribly surprised about that. Gekko had ordered the brats to stay with Tazuna and had engaged Zabuza in a sword fight. He had kept up well and in another world Zabuza thinks he would have liked sparring with the man but when it came down to it, he was still the stronger shinobi.

Zabuza knocked Gekko’s sword aside and swung Kubikiribocho around to divest the man of his head and that is where it all went sideways. One of the brats— the dark-haired one that could only be the Last Uchiha —appeared with Gekko’s sword in hand in time to block Kubikiribocho. And he did block Kubikiribocho. The brat doesn’t even have the decency to look like it was hard.

When the pink-haired brat follows up her teammate’s interference with a punch, Zabuza dodges without thought even though, logically, there’s no way a punch from a twelve-year-old genin could hurt him. He finds himself horribly, terribly glad he does when the girl’s punch hits the ground and breaks the forest.

He doesn’t stare at the destruction only because he can’t force himself to look away from the girl. He’s been a shinobi long enough that he knows when he’s outmatched and even though it’s ridiculous and impossible, he knows that these genin are out of his league.

“Do you like having bones?” The little pink-haired menace asks sweetly. Zabuza stares at her.

“What.”

“Do you like having bones?” She repeats. “I could really use some more for my collection.”

“She’s an ironin,” the Uchiha informs, voice bland and emotionless. He’s better at modulating his tone and expression than some ANBU Zabuza’s met. (Or, he thinks, dismayed, the Uchiha really is just supremely bored.)

“An ironin,” Zabuza finds himself repeats. His attention drops unbidden, for just a second, to the massive crater between them.

“I have bad days,” The girl chirps.

“Hey guys, look what I found!” A new voice pipes in and Zabuza realizes with a jolt that the blonde kid has been missing for— a while, at least. How did he miss that? The blonde kid drops into the crater, Haku limp over his shoulder. Zabuza takes a stuttering step forward, sudden, uncomfortable fear gripping him, and he’s brought to an abrupt halt by the Uchiha twitching his sensei’s sword up in warning and the ominous sound of the girl cracking her knuckles.

“I was in the middle of something, Naruto!” The girl complains. The blonde, Naruto, yelps and drops Haku as he throws himself bodily behind the Uchiha. The kids devolve into petty squabbling at an almost alarming speed and Zabuza tears his eyes away from the wildly destructive argument taking place to meet Gekko’s eyes. Are you being paid enough for this? The man’s eyes ask silently.

Absolutely fucking not, Zabuza thinks. He is not ashamed to admit he grabs Haku and flees. He does not need to die to a bunch of preteen brats for pathetic pay Gato probably won’t even deliver on, thank you very much. He has more self-respect than that.

Sai is not meant to have an opinion. He’s not meant to have thoughts or emotions. He was made to be a weapon and nothing more. But Danzo-sama is dead, dead like sleeping, and there’s three shinobi his age that killed him. They killed Sai’s master, the hand that guided his blade, and Sai… doesn’t know what to do. He should kill them. Kill them for what they’ve done, kill them for the threat they make against Konohagakure.

But Sai doesn’t want to. Danzo-sama is dead and Sai feels. He doesn’t know the name of the lightness in his body, the way every breath seems to come easier than the last but it doesn’t feel bad.

“What are you doing?” He finds himself asking when the dark-haired one (Uchiha Sasuke, he knows, and the blonde is Uzumaki Naruto, but he does not know the name of the pink-hair girl that killed Danzo-sama) steps towards Danzo-sama. Uchiha glances at him, just a quick flicker of void-black eyes, and lets out a breath.

“Putting my family to rest,” Uchiha says. He unwraps Danzo-sama's arm and Sai sees only a glimpse of countless cloudy red-and-black eyes before the girl steps up to Uchiha’s side and blocks Sai’s view.

“You should go,” Uzumaki says.

“You killed Danzo-sama,” Sai says and that should mean something but it doesn’t. Not really. A dead shinobi is just a broken tool and no one grieves a broken tool. Not even another tool.

“Yeah,” Uzumaki says. “You saw too much, really, but I don’t want to kill you so you should leave. Tell the Hokage the truth or leave Konoha or whatever.” Uzumaki shrugs. “You can do whatever you want, now.”

“Whatever I want,” Sai echoes. That’s too big, too much. But Sai wants to live, he thinks. Uzumaki should kill him, he thinks. He’s seen too much. Uzumaki just smiles at him. Sai hesitates just a moment, glancing back at Uchiha and the girl but he can’t see what they’re doing and Danzo-sama is dead and Sai wants to live.

He leaves. Maybe he’ll go to Hokage-sama. Maybe he’ll leave Konoha. Maybe he’ll learn the name of the soft and warm feeling in his chest. It doesn’t matter because Danzo-sama is dead and he’s alive and that’s not going to change. Not today.

Hayate wakes up to Sakura’s face disconcertingly close to his. He also can’t move which should probably worry him more than it does but at this point he’s accepted that his team are just three trickster gods pretending very badly to be human and they can do things no person should rightfully be able to do.

“Hello Sakura-chan,” he greets pleasantly because you should always be pleasant to capricious preteen girls and trickster gods both. Sakura pouts at him, having clearly been hoping for a bigger reaction. Hayate’s mostly just glad Yugao is out of Konoha on a mission.

“Hi sensei,” she says back.

“Where are the boys?” He asks. He has little doubt Sasuke and Naruto are around somewhere. He’s not sure the three of them have been separate for longer than the time it takes to go to the bathroom since the team was assigned to him.

“We’re here!” Naruto chirps, leaning happily into his field of view. Sakura gives him a look and pushes him away with one hand.

“We just wanted to say thanks,” Sakura tells him. Hayate blinks.

“For what?” He asks.

“For treating us equal and everything,” Sakura says with a shrug.

“And for being my best sensei ever!” Naruto adds, appearing on the opposite side Hayate last saw him on. “Well, second best. Iruka-sensei’s best.” Naruto pauses for a long moment, contemplating, before amending, “third best.” He does not specify who second place belongs to. Hayate’s not sure if he should take third place as a compliment or not considering third place might also very well be last place.

“I try to do right by you,” Hayate says truthfully. “Why did you need to break into my house?”

“We’re giving you a gift,” Sakura says promptly. “You just woke up a little too early.” Ominous, Hayate thinks.

“What kind of gift?”

“Surprise!” Naruto blurts. “It’s a surprise!”

“Yeah, that,” Sakura agrees. “Goodnight.”

“What—?”

Hayate wakes up. He feels better than he ever has before, well rested and without the near constant sick-ache of joints. He takes a deep breath and he doesn’t cough.

When he gets up, he finds a collection of plants scattered around his apartment. There’s a cactus in a familiar pot he’s fairly sure was owned by Kakashi. In the kitchen, his fridge is filled with tomatoes and tomato based dishes. He eats a bowl of tomato shiso pasta and wonders if he should move.

There’s a sticky note on the door that just says ‘thanks’.

In the wake of Kakashi and Kakashi’s ‘old friend’ and Zetsu’s disappearance, the Akatsuki changes. Pein says it has nothing to do with the strange events of the last month but Itachi is far from convinced. He doesn’t say anything, though, because he quite likes the direction the Akatsuki is taking. The others seem rather ambivalent to the changes though Hidan is complaining about the new, more peaceful route, of course, and Kakuzu is very aggressively arguing that financing a terrorist organization is much, much different than financing the more peaceful organization the Akatsuki has turned into. He seems very stressed about the whole thing. Itachi does not envy him his job.

Itachi and Kisame are just returning from a diplomatic mission to Kirigakure wherein the Yondaime Mizukage was revealed to have been under a genjutsu he only just broke, Terumi Mei was leading a revolution, and Momochi Zabuza had returned with a shinobi with a powerful ice kekkei genkai because he was on the run from ‘a pink-haired hellspawn and her evil sidekicks’. It was a very strange situation and the two of them ended up spending more time in Kiri that expected but now Kiri is under the joint control of Karatachi and Terumi as they try to undo all the damage Karatachi did with under the genjutsu and Itachi and Kisame are back in Ame.

The Akatsuki base is mostly empty, as it often is. Between Pein and Kakuzu, it isn’t often that any of the teams has rest time at the same time so unless there’s a meeting called, they don’t run into each other very often. Itachi doesn’t mind this as the only person besides Kisame in the Akatsuki that he has any real like of is Konan.

Kisame breaks off pretty quickly, aiming for the rooms, and Itachi heads for the kitchen, looking forward to a nice cup of tea to sooth his throat. The kitchen is in pristine condition which means Hidan and Kakuzu have not yet been by and the lights are turned low so Deidara and Sasori have. Sasuke is poking through the fridge looking for something to eat and Itachi offers him a tired half-verbal greeting, pulling his tea out from the cupboard he hid it in.

He’s halfway through making it when Sasuke registers in his mind and he freezes. Surely he imagined it. Surely everything with Kakashi and Kiri and his sickness has left him tired to the point of hallucination. Surely Sasuke, twelve years old and a newly minted genin, is not in the base of operations of the Akatsuki. Itachi turns stiffly away from his tea. Across the kitchen, Sasuke is perched on the counter watching him, swinging his legs and eating a tomato like an apple.

“Hey, Niisan,” Sasuke says blandly. Itachi tries to reach for the callousness he needs to be able to deal with his little brother but it slips through his fingers in the face of Sasuke’s ambivalence.

“How are you here?” He manages eventually.

“What, like it’s hard?” Sasuke asks derisively. “Anyway, stuff was going all weird so we’d thought we’d find sensei here. We were a bit late, clearly, but I figured I’d deal with this,” Sasuke gestures between them, “while I was here.” Itachi straightens out of the slight hunch his sickness and exhaustion left him in, gathering the dregs of his energy. Even in this state, there’s little doubt in him that he’ll be able to defeat Sasuke. His brother was talented but he was never a genius, not like Itachi was. Is.

“So you’re here for your revenge,” he starts. Sasuke is shaking his head before he finishes, taking the wind out of his sails.

“I don’t need revenge—”

“You would let your family die for nothing—?”

“Did you hear,” Sasuke interrupts, not loud but firm, sharp, “that Danzo passed?” Itachi stills. His breath doesn’t catch but it’s close. “It was very sad and all. Natural causes, you know? He was very old.” Sasuke is looking at him impassively and there’s something settled in him that Itachi hasn’t seen— ever, really. Even before Itachi did the unthinkable, the unforgivable, their father’s expectations had left Sasuke near desperate.

“Anyway,” Sasuke continues. “I just wanted to let you know that I know everything and also that Sakura would be willing to heal you if you wanted.” Itachi opens his mouth to… do something but he blinks and Sasuke is gone. The only sign the boy was ever there at all is the tomato core on the counter, just the tough inside that Sasuke never liked.

Good news is, Hayate found his missing team. Bad news is, so did Kakashi-the-maybe-nukenin and his new best friend, Unknown Uchiha. Good news, his team doesn’t appear to be in any distress. Bad news, he’s fairly sure they’re not coming back to Konoha with him.

“Hayate-sensei taught me how to use a sword,” Naruto says, hanging from Kakashi’s shoulders.

“Really?” Kakashi says, not looking away from his book. His Uchiha companion is giving the book the nastiest look. Hayate’s half surprised it hasn’t spontaneously burst into flame.

“Uh-huh!” Naruto slips forward and Kakashi’s book vanishes into thin air so that he can catch the twelve year old in his arms. Sasuke, the only kid standing under his own power, snickers.

“He’s better at it than Sasuke,” Sakura puts in from her perch on the Uchiha’s shoulders. Sasuke’s face twists in offense.

“Everyone has their talents,” Hayate says before it can devolve into an argument or, kami forbid, a brawl.

“Yes, Hayate-sensei,” the three of them chorus. Kakashi arches a brow at the sight.

“Why don’t you ever listen to me that well?” He wonders.

“You sort of suck, sensei,” Naruto informs. He yelps when Kakashi immediately drop him

“Naruto’s right,” Sakura says. Sasuke bobs his head in agreement. The Uchiha snorts.

“At least other people see it now,” he mutters. Kakashi shoots the man a betrayed look before turning his attention to Hayate.

“So are you here to join us or take us back to Konoha kicking and screaming?” He asks.

“I will light someone on fire if I have to go back to Konoha,” the Uchiha adds.

“Don’t listen to him,” Kakashi stage whispers, “he’s too much of a crybaby to do that.”

“Have you forgotten the whole terrorist organization thing?” The Uchiha demands.

“Madara,” the kids and Kakashi all chorus and, as one, look up to glare at the moon. Hayate’s pretty sure he lost the thread of his life around two months ago when he got Team 7. There’s no way this is the real world, right? It has to be some weird and convoluted illusion, probably cast by reflecting the image of a sharingan off the moon or something equally ridiculous.

“Shared custody,” Sakura says suddenly.

“Shared custody?” Kakashi repeats.

“Shared custody,” Sakura agrees. “You know, we spend time with you normally and then when Hayate-sensei is out of Konoha we’ll join him on his mission.”

“I can’t convince any of you to come back to Konoha?” Hayate asks. He gets five shakes of the head. “Then I guess that’ll have to do. I’ll try to keep Shikaku from declaring you all missing nin.”

“Shikaku?” Kakashi asks curiously.

“Hiruzen retired after Danzo died,” Hayate explains.

“What a shame,” Sasuke says emotionlessly.

“Tragic,” the Uchiha agrees.

“Are you going back to Konoha now?” Naruto asks. He pouts when Hayate nods.

“Say bye, pups,” Kakashi prompts.

“Bye, Hayate-sensei,” the kids chorus with varying emotion.

“Bye,” he says back. “I guess I’ll see you next time."

How to Save the World by Hatake Kakashi

#nart fic #originally posted on ao3 #au #time travel #naruto #uzumaki naruto #haruno sakura #uchiha sasuke #gekko hayate #momochi zabuza #sai #hatake kakashi #uchiha obito #humor #outsider pov

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secret-engima · 2 years ago

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Any snippets or headcanon rambles for Calling for Rain? I’m sick and unable to sleep because of how stuffy my head is so I’d love to hear more about Yuriko and Iruka and Hayate’s genin days.

*kicks down door in the All Might Pose* I AM HERE WITH TEAM IRUKA SHENANIGANS FOR THINE AMUSEMENT AND RESTORED HEALTH. @a-world-in-grey

SO. Genin shenanigans with Team Iruka, or should I say *TEAM 7*. Because you just known I gotta distribute that cursed luck around a little. Besides that I feel like there's a very confusing and rapid cycle that the team numbers undergo, with numbers being available for reassignment either when a genin team graduates and separates or are wiped out, or if an intended team is failed by their sensei and sent back to Academy or into the corps. And so *really*, "Team 7" as a moniker by rights should be passed down at least once in between Kakashi's genin years and Naruto's. Probably more than once, considering the fanon that Team 7 has a Reputation™.

Their sensei is a civilian-born OC that I'm still working on the details of but so far I've decided that their sensei is a woman, who is small but mighty (and feral). Has sharp teeth that tends to be seen more often in those descended from the islands of Mist Country, but if you say that in her earshot you better be prepared for the consequences. I want her to have a special skillset but I'm still debating what kind. Anyway.

Like every Team 7, their first C-rank goes absolutely *pear shaped*, this may or may not have been the infamous Mission to Tea, but probably isn't? I cannot remember if I've state otherwise previously but my gut says that their first C-rank was likely something involving not so far afield. Like dealing with bandits bothering merchants in Land of Fire, or running supplies to some of the Konoha outpost towers dotted around the border. This is after the war mind you, so a supply running mission or a bandit dispersal should be a milk run.

I haven't hammered out exactly what happens, but I do know that things go hard south, be that an attack from rogue ninja or from bandits who are more skilled than a C-rank bargains for, and the genin get separated from their sensei in whatever chaos occurs, and during that, Hayate gets a lungful of something poisonous used by the attackers.

You might see where *that* is going down the line in his life.

Cue three kids, running around for at least a few *days*, possibly a week, separated from their sensei, green as grass and feral as wolf pups, trying to stay alive and also keep each other alive. Especially Hayate, who is not doing too hot. They end up running for the nearest village, hoping for a doctor, with Iruka and Yuriko trauma bonding very hard over keeping a wheezy, semi-conscious Hayate alive. The local village doctor *is* able to save Hayate's life, but not completely undo the damage that has been done, which is what leads to Hayate's chronic health/lung issues we see in the canon timeline. Despite his new wheezy condition, all three genin are able to rally and, using Yuriko's spiteful brain, Iruka's genius for traps, and Hayate's streak of common sense, they're able to essentially turn the entire village into a much more lethal version of Home Alone for the bad guys that come after them.

The leader of the bad guys who chased them probably gets through the traps and is Fully Ready for some mass villager and child soldier slaughter but that's about the second their sensei shows up, injured herself but having bested like- the entire rest of whatever group started this conflict, and mauls the guy. There's a lot of blood involved.

Taking Hayate *back* to Konoha to get looked at by medical shinobi is able to improve his condition somewhat, but by now only a healer on the level of Tsunade could fully cure him from the damage that's been done. For most genin, especially a sponsorless orphan genin like Hayate? That would be career ending. Very few jounin would want to deal with the added complications of a chronically ill genin, let alone sit back through the long recovery and rehab/adjustment period he needs to go through.

Hayate's sensei decks the first jounin that tells her to ditch the brat and either pick a new one out of Academy or throw the other two in the corps.

Hayate's team closes ranks around him, helping him through his adjustment period, and even helps getting him a sword master teacher, something he has always been interested in, but had thought impossible after his injury. His sword master, a fierce and elderly Uchiha woman, teaches him not only to master the blade, but to master his body and learn how to wring every drop of strength and lethality out of his new limits.

The team dynamic that formed in that hectic C-rank gets solidified and honed into something tight. Iruka is the trouble magnet, but also the trap master. Yuriko, who grew up in a wealthy merchant household, is the face of the group during anything that involve infiltration (the only time she bothers to use her etiquette lessons). Hayate, with his sword and health limits, is the backup (and often the braincell). Their sensei is basically there to haul their collective butts out of whatever fire Iruka set and forgot to arrange a way to put out. She also grills them on training, running them through team building exercises until they drop.

Some additional things now that I've done backstory building:

Iruka and Hayate have a very respectful and healthy fear of women thanks to their genin teammate and sensei. Arguably especially Yuriko, because they spent more than a few missions sharing a tent with her and know the power of her grudge holding abilities.

Iruka revenge pranks anyone who mocks Hayate for his health issues. *Anyone*. Anbu Hawk of that era had a very very very hard time explaining to his coworkers why his hair spontaneously turning fluorescent blue was totally his own life decision and not that he made the mistake of telling a genin with a cough to "know his limits" while in his chuunin identity and the genin's 14 year old teammate somehow stalked him to his apartment, dismantled his anbu grade security, and put an unremovable, scentless dye in his shampoo and now he has to wait for the dye'd hair to grow out enough to cut the colored part off.

Yuriko's parents were very :/ about her being put on a team with "mere orphans" instead of a clan kid because they already disapproved of her becoming a shinobi (but legally couldn't stop her), but at least if she was on a team with a clan boy there was a chance for marrying in. Yuriko took this as the sign to befriend her two orphan buddies and be the Most Ride Or Die Kunoichi Teammate to ever live. You might have noticed by this comment and the one in CfR about her becoming a genin corps member specifically to get disowned by them and realized she has Issues with her family. Like. Just in general. It's not just her parents. But that's a talk for another post probably.

Their chuunin exam took place in Kiri when Iruka was 16, not long after Iruka decided he wanted to become a chuunin teacher at Academy rather than a jounin (even though he had the potential to do so) which was basically fun trauma times for all. When their teacher told them they had basically been voluntold to go to the exams in Kiri rather than let any of the teams with important clan kids go, they all had a powwow about what they wanted out of this deathtrap of an assignment. Hayate wanted to be promoted to chuunin because he had his sights set on becoming a jounin sword master that would be eligible to take on an apprentice someday, Iruka wanted to be promoted so he could immediately sign up to be an Academy teacher.

Yuriko: I wanna wash out into the genin corps.

Iruka and Hayate, who know that of them Yuriko is actually the most terrifying when it comes to frontline combat: ... um.

Yuriko: my parents have been talking about arranging a marriage of suitable value once I make chuunin or jounin.

Her two friends: ...understandable, sounds like a plan.

You have no idea how many genin from other villages these three managed to terrify. No idea. And the confusion when Yuriko dropped out at the 3rd stage of 1 vs 1 matches was huge.

They were *probably* the only one of the three Konoha teams sent to survive? The other villages had similarly bad losses, one of them (Iwa or Suna maybe) potentially lost *all* the teams they sent. The three of them surviving an exam in Kiri should be far more of a warning flag of these three's skill in general than most people actually realize.

All three of them still hang out when they can, usually just hanging out in an apartment and chatting, but sometimes they spar and let loose, which is *hilarious* and chaotic when you consider their various specialties and that only Hayate officially has jounin rank.

Their sensei is still alive! And doing good all told. She may or may not have another group of brats following on her heels during the current part of CfR's timeline. She comes and checks in on her only Team 7 when she has time.

#SE asks #a world in grey asks #Calling for Rain verse #umino iruka #OC: Yuriko #gekko hayate

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