Chapter 3 The Day Before It All Went Wrong

"Alvarcus! You're 8 now! You know what that means!" Okaa-san is terribly happy today. You would think it was her birthday not mine. "You get to go to school!"

Oh. Yeah that is right. That is this year, the year I get to crush my caretakers dreams of me being a timid baker by becoming the one thing they demanded I never become; a brutal, lying, cheating, murdering shinobi. This is going to be fun.

"Okaa-san, otou-san, I don't want to go to school." I think it is best to try to ease them into this. No need to drop a bombshell on them.

"Don't be silly Alvarcus, you can't stay home all day! You'll have so much fun there! You'll meet kids your age, learn interesting things, read new books! I know how much you like reading. I swear you need to go outside more! It seems like no matter how much sun you get you're always pale."

"Okaa-san I read outside all the time! Besides, that's not what I meant. I don't want to go to school. I want to go to the Academy." Dead silence follows my declaration. No one moves. No one breathes.

"No." Fujita replies.

"Yes. I want to." I will not give up on this.

"No!" He said more forcefully.

"Yes!" If he wanted to escalate this, then fine.

"My son will not become like him!"

"I want to protect my family!" I yell in his face.

Fujita and Namika are stunned into silence. I've never yelled at either of my parents before, I don't think I've even raised my voice at them. I've always been a perfect mild mannered child.

"Shinobi lie. They cheat. They steal. They kill. I know that! I don't want to do that! I want to protect my family! There are shinobi out there right now! What is stopping them from getting us? Other shinobi! I don't trust them! What happens if we get invaded? What happens if Konoha falls? Who is going to defend us? Who is going to protect us from those who want to hurt us? From those who want to kill us?"

Both of my parents look shocked. They have nothing to say. There is nothing to say.

"No one. That's who. No one will come to save us, no one will protect us. Since no one else will, I'll do it. I'll protect our family."

Fujita and Namika look at each other. They're both close to agreeing. They need one more push.

"Please kaa-san? Please tou-san? I want this. Really. I do." Never before have I called my parents that. I've always been formal. I've never even called them parents to myself before. They have always been landlords, caretakers, never parents. But they grew on me. I meant every word I said. I would protect my family. I will! I will get them to agree, and then I will show them how good a shinobi I can be!

"Okay. You can." Kaa-san whispers. Tou-san looks shocked that she caved in so soon.

"Namika, what about..." Tou-san halfheartedly tries to come up with a reason for me to not become a shinobi.

"Fujita. Look at him. You see the fire in his eyes. The furnace in his heart. He truly wants this. Look."

He does. Tou-san stares at me for a long time. He is internally fighting something. I can see it. Half of him wants to give in and let me become a shinobi. The other half is demanding that he shields me from that life, the life of a killer. After an uncomfortably long time, he makes up his mind.

"Fine. We will enroll you to the Academy on one condition. This is non-negotiable. If you can't do this then you can not go. Understand?" He put both his hands on my shoulders and came down to my height. He stared me straight in my eyes. I nodded. "Good. My one condition: you can not die. I forbid it. Under no circumstances are you allowed to die. You must always come back home to us."

"Yes tou-san. I agree." I never planned on dying to begin with. It will be easy to stay true to that. Hopefully. There is a ridiculous list of monsters out there. Good thing I plan on my name being on that list.

One Month Later, First Day of the Academy

"Do you have all your supplies?" Kaa-san is worryingly running around and gathering up pointless things for me to take to the Academy.

"Yes kaa-san." I groan out. We packed everything I could possibly need last night, she made a huge event out of it.

"Your notebooks? Pencils? Erasers? Bento?"

"Yes kaa-san. We went over everything three times." That's not including the two times we went over the list last night. Yes, she made a list.

"Let's check one more time just to be safe." She reaches out for my bag.

I pull it out of her reach. "We are going to be late! I can't be late on my first day!"

"Oh fine! They grow up so fast! Just last month you turned 8! Already so independent!"

"Let's go!" I grab her hand and start pulling her out of our house. "Come on slowpoke! Let's go!"

I am so excited! I get to go to shinobi school! I'm going to learn how to walk on walls! How to spit fire! How to make earth walls! How to shoot lightning like laser beams out of my eyeballs! Okay, maybe not that last one. I don't know if anyone can do that. Maybe I could invent the technique?

"Come on kaa-san! Hurry up!"

Later that Day, At the Academy

I was wrong. I hate this. I hate this so much. Why do I want to do this? Awesome elemental powers are not worth this. Nothing is worth this.

They are teaching me math. MATH. Math for 8 years old kids. I know my damn multiplication tables already! I vaguely recall calculus and statistics! I can't believe I'm sitting through math for kids. I'll take a page out of Shikamaru's book and nap. He is already doing it anyways.

I put my head down on the desk. Close my eyes and -

"Alvarcus! Shikamaru! Wake up! You can sleep at home!" Damn it. Stupid Mizuki-sensei. Making me stay awake. This is the worst first day ever.

Don't get me wrong, being in the Rookie Nine's class is definitely going to be interesting. I even have a nice spot way in the back corner. Ah, kiddie characters. They look so much like the anime. But not animated. You know if they were real this is how they would look. Because they are real. That's right, it is official. I am in the Naruto universe or utterly insane. Better than that I am in Naruto's class. This is where the plot happens. This is where the cool things start.

This, is the beginning.

The first year at the academy was... boring. Very boring. Math was a ridiculous part of the "shinobi toolkit" as Iruka-sensei would say. Whatever. I don't need math to be a bad ass. I hope. I slept, read or drew through all those lessons anyway. History? I know more history than the teachers. Cannon was very full of important historical events. I could practically teach that section myself. I would also give an unbiased view. There is a lot of "Konoha is the best" propaganda being thrown at us.

Geography. Now that was interesting, and completely glossed over. We covered it for one day. That is it. We were handed maps of the Elemental Nations and told to study. We weren't even tested over it. I suppose they thought if we graduated from the Academy our respective jonin senseis would show us around. How hilarious.

Reading and writing were too easy. I know how to write already and I learned how to read before that. I slept through all those lessons. I didn't see a reason to stay awake for them.

They tested us on all of our subjects. Repeatedly. I didn't care. I just put down whatever I thought was good enough. I guessed on math, I made up history, and had sloppy handwriting. It was good to slack off in school while knowing I could beat any of these kids at any subject. I already did my time at school, I don't see the point in doing it again.

Slowly but surly I became known as the weird kid in the back. I deserve that title, I didn't try to make friends. I ate lunches by myself. I only answered questions when forced to. I would rather read or draw than talk with kids. Kinda obvious that would happen eventually. Kids are blunt. They say it how they see it, and I was the weird kid in the back of the classroom from their point of view.

Things didn't get interesting until the second year. That is when we started taijutsu and conditioning. Otherwise known as PE class. Running, sit ups, running, push ups, and running again. I swear the senseis were cardio freaks. That's okay though, shinobi need to be able to run for days on end. It is a small thing to sacrifice to my goal of ultimate badassery!

There is one thing I learned, and I learned it quickly. I am terrible at taijutsu. How did I figure this out? When Naruto of all people put my ass on the ground. Every. Damn. Day. He was my designated taijutsu partner.

That kid has way too much energy. He just goes and goes and goes all day long. Even if my form is better, even if my strength is greater, even if the senseis purposefully sabotage him, he just keeps going. The only times I won a spar were if the senseis were grading on form or skill, not on who actually won. That's right, whenever we sparred he won because I couldn't make him stay down. It was super frustrating, but also explainable. He has the demon fox to provide energy for him. I don't. In a real fight to the death I would walk away the victor. In a staged fight with only our fists and no kunai or shuriken? He wins. Every time.

I didn't always fight Naruto though. Every Friday we would draw names for an opponent. Surprisingly I actually wasn't the worst at taijutsu. I easily placed above all the girls thanks to being a boy. That and the girls were more obsessed with looking pretty for "Sasuke-kun!"

Even in a real life twist of an anime, the dreaded fan girls still exist. They are after Sasuke big time. Poor kid, those girls are scary.

I also placed in the middle of the boys. Delightful mediocrity, not good, not bad, just average. I can live with that for now. Once I get a jonin sensei, then I will start striving for improvement.

All in all it was a good second year. Gotta say that running all the time does wonders for physical health. It certainly made helping out around the bakery easier.

The third year was the best. They finally started us on the basic three. The henge, bushin, and kawarmi. I soaked it up like a sponge. By the end of the year, my henge of the Hokage was... bad. It was really bad. In my defense I only saw the guy once! And that was at a village announcement. Henge of my parents? Easy. Henge of Iruka or Mizuki? Easy. Henge of a guy I've seen once? Ridiculously hard.

My bushin was above average. Turns out that my chakra naturally wants to take my shape, and my older mind makes multitasking easier. Little known fact about the basic bushin: you need to tell it what to do. Unlike the kage bushin, the basic bushin does not have a mind of it's own. That might be why so many shinobi use elemental clones.

The kawarmi came the easiest to me. No idea why, I just had a knack for it. Which really pissed off some fellow students, considering that everyone else had to struggle with it. That made me proud, especially knowing that it will save my life down the road.

Fourth year. That was total hell. It was the mother of all reviews. All we did was go over old material, work on taijutsu, work on throwing, and work on the basic three. Review, review, review.

Until the last day. Graduation day. The day the story really takes off. The day before it all went wrong.