the first pidgeon

The colossal trees of the forest of death loomed before us as we approached, a wary quiet settling over everyone as something called to us, something just beyond our senses yet inexplicably and undeniably it persisted, it stayed, it was there. It was as if some unknown foe from just beyond the darkness under the gigantic trees watched us, wearing the shadows which wreathed it as it's cloak, waiting patiently, as if it knew we would come to it, that we would seek it out, and that we, the trespassers of the forest would perish within. Of course, if there actually was anything inside looking at us, the actual reason it wasn't attacking was probably the large iron fence rather than som fear of the world outside the forrest.

"welcome to the next part of the exams, the ominously named 'forest of death', now, I don't want you to think that just because of the name it's a dangerous horrific place that'll probably kill you... I want you to think it's a dangerous horrific place that'll probably kill you because of the giant animals, poisonous plants, venomous plants, and the tons of rival shinobi entering the forest with you. Any questions?" she paused for a moment, clearly just doing it for showmanship, which I could always respect, before continueing "good, now-"

"wait a moment, please" I called out, ready to ask a very important question "I just need to confirm something, you said venomous plants, right?" I asked.

"yes" she asked, her eyes twinkling with amusement.

"but doesn't venomous mean that, for example, it bites me, and I die?" I ask.

"indeed there are" she said.

"okay, last question, I promise" - I said, although it was more directed at the annoyed crowd surrounding us then Anko - "but how big are these, I asume, man-eating plants?"

"well, that's a pretty broad question since there are a lot of them in there, but I would say that they go from the size of a rat, to the size of a boulder"

"okay, but just to be clear on all fronts, how venomous exactly are they?"

I kept questioning her until eventually all the foreign participants glares transitioned from annoyed to angry, and kept going all the way to hateful. Anko played along, mostly due to the ever increasing fun she seemed to find in my apparent obliviousness to the hole I dug myself in by taking up everyone's time, finally she cut me off when a cat masked anbu with purple hair came up to give her a message. She was clearly from some administrative force possibly taking pity on the fool painting a target on his back, possibly simply tired of the long wait.

"okay, while your questions about poisons, plants, and strange fixation on platepuses were fun, we do have to get on with this whole thing. Now, the exam is pretty simple, every team gets either an earth scroll or a heaven scroll, then you enter the forest from different points, and all you gotta do is get the kind of scroll you don't have, make your way to the tower in the middle, there's around ten kilometers, and BAM! You've made it to the tournament. Oh, and you have five days to do it, after that it's too late" Anko said, spending infinitely less time on the actual explanation than my questioning.

After she finished people in the classic look of flak jackets and headbands started to walk around between the teams. Luckily, there were still twenty-seven teams left, which gave me just enough time for the second part of the dastardly, devious, and yet incredibly loose idea I called a plan. That plan was rather simple. Use the fact that I had already established myself as an absolute moron to go around trying to make friends with everyone as if I had no idea that they thought I was annoying. To use their expectation of an idiot to my advantage I had to wring out every point of dexterity and every grain of skill I had for sleight of hand to slip small metal disc's disguised as the smallest one-ryo coin into any pocket, bag, satchel and hood I could find. because if there was one thing I knew, it was that no one in the entire world, not even the most organized person would know whether or not they had a penny in their pocket and that if they noticed that penny, anyone in their right mind would assume that they had always had it. Eventually we had to start moving to our entrance, armed with a heaven-scroll and guided by a man with a completely blank face in place of our 'jonin sensei'. Before that, I did manage to sneak my little devices into the pocket of anyone I hadn't already given one on our walk over to the forest, ensuring the first part of my plan.

"What the hell was that?" Hoshi hissed.

"What do you mean?" I asked, not looking at her as we walked, instead I watched the fence as I measured the approximate distance between each entrance.

"I mean, why the hell did you paint a giant target on or back by annoying everyone, then go around personally irritating as many teams as you could get your hands on" She said, her eyes like coals, ready to flare up at the slightest spark of anger.

"I would recommend hearing the reasoning behind his actions, I have read the reports on him, and although his plans are always flawed, there is always a reasoning behind his plans" Sai said.

"Thank you, Sai, now, two things, firstly, I did not paint a target on our back" - I gestured to the three of us where we stood, waiting outside the gate - "I did paint a target on our back" - this time I only gestured at Sai and I - "you are not part of our group after the first stage, as a matter of fact, I have it on very good authority that your exact orders for the second stage of the exams were along the lines of 'go hide in a hollow tree until the exams end'. Secondly, I do, in fact, have a plan" suddenly, the doors to the forest swung open, letting us enter.

Being inside the forest was just as dreadful as looking at it from the outside cause you to imagine, with the only difference being that I now surprisingly knew about a lot of the dangers in here, replacing my former fear of the unknown with a brand-new fear of the, well, known. Standing right next to the trees did give a whole new appreciation for their size, though, and the sheer width they had was astounding, each being almost half as wide as they were tall. Beyond that were the many branches as they desperately searched for a single beam of sunlight to soak in. None of that light reached down here to the ground, leavening us in the dim light reminiscent of dusk, staring at the heavy leaves in search of the light we knew to be just out of reach. There were also the many roots searching for any spot of ground to claim for themselves, practically covering the ground in roots as tall and wide as me, with many smaller plants apparently having learnt to grow on the surrounding behemoths to survive in the forest, the sparse space not covered in roots being nowhere near enough to support an ecosystem.

"Can you honestly say that you prefer exploring this dreary, danger filled place over just setting up camp in a nice tree crown with some sunlight and relaxing for five days?" I asked.

"I don't feel particularly worried about the 'danger filled' part, after all the inane and useless questions you asked I have to assume that we know everything about this place" she said.

"which will only let you be more relaxed in your happy little treetop" I said.

"why do you want me to leave so badly? I am useful, competent, and fill a hole in your team" she growled.

"look, I don't doubt that you're useful, but I don't care that you're useful either" I said, crouching down to draw an approximation of the forest, the tower was in the middle, and the circle had a radius of ten, so it was easy finding the circumference, then I used the fact that we walked past a couple of entrances to decide how many and where they were.

"why not?" she asked.

"because right now, I have a deal with the universe, as long as I don't make any choices, the people I care about won't get hurt, I don't get why, but that's just how it is right now, so when Danzo tells me that you have to go away, you have to go away" I said, exasperated with both her and the universe.

"what the hell are you doing anyway?" she asked, clearly and obviously trying to redirect my attention, but it didn't really matter if she did.

"oh, it's actually something I'm pretty proud of, you see, when I was walking around 'making friends' I was actually giving everyone one-ryo coin lookalikes. The difference is that I replaced the typical characters with fuinjutsu characters, the only function that seal has is to write the distance, and the direction to a paired coin. Now, since we have a distance and direction to everyone, we can make sure that be around to help whenever one of the Konoha team's have matching coordinates with another team. It's not perfect, but it's the best way I can see to have a shot at our mission" I said.

"that's… pretty impressive" Hoshi said.

"yes, based on your prior mission reports, it is surprising for you to create such a thought through plan" Sai said

"it's nothing, really, preparation and information are just the best tools a fuinjutsu specialist can have, and, well, I had preparation time on my other missions, but my information was pretty limited" I said.

"why are you suddenly acting humble, weren't you just hours earlier talking about 'spreading your magnificent presence to those in need'?" Hoshi asked.

"of course I was, I'm perfectly comfortable being arrogant with no basis, but I can't just claim credit for something I'm actually somewhat competent at" I scoffed.

I arranged the matching coins to the general area of each team, before we studied the rough map. One team was already moving steadily towards another marker, but it wasn't a Konoha group, so it didn't really matter. Most of the Konoha teams were somewhat clumped together, with only one or two teams separating them, all except Naruto, Sasuke, and Sakura, who had five teams separating them from the team with Neiji, Rock lee, and Tenten.

"okay, if we get the average priority level for each team we can see that team seven and team ten are the most important, with team eight being ever so slightly below them in priority, and team three being the least important. I think the best choice is to make our way to right next to team three, that way we have about equal distance between the two most important groups. I know it's not ideal, but when they are on opposite sides of their little half-circle, it's our best option" I said.

"that would be correct, under normal circumstances, but you seem to have forgotten Neji Hyuga's byakugan. Because that, I propose we instead make sure that there is one team between us and team three, and four teams between us and team seven" Sai said.

"good thing you remembered, now let's go Sai" I said.

"yes, let's all go, including me" Hoshi said, crossing her arms in front of us.

"look, we appreciate your enthusiasm, but no, just- no" I said.

I picked up all the tokens from the ground and slotted them into the tablet I had made for them, which would vibrate whenever two tokens matched.

"you can't stop me from going with you, I need to go through with this" she said.

"why? What could you possibly gain from hunting down other teams, and four Konoha teams?"

"I- I just… I need this, okay?" she said, her arms uncrossing, although she did nothing new with them, she simply stood there, uncertainty and desperation clear.

In the silence that followed I wondered, Should I just let her come with us? She has to have a great reason to defy Danzo, and she seemed to really need to do this, like it was important to her, as if the world would shatter the moment we left her here. But I couldn't, the simple truth was that if I let her come with us, something horrible would happen, maybe to us, maybe to someone else I cared, maybe to her.

"no… I'm sorry, I want to help, I really do, but I just can't risk the wellbeing of those I care about for you, I just can't, it would be a completely different matter if it was just me, but I can't let them pay for my stupidity… not anymore" I said, before swinging off into the forest with Sai behind me