1 chap 1

Today was the day. Today was March 5, the day that this year's class would finally end their time in the academy and become full fledge ninja of the village. The graduation exams had been held just two days ago with all but one student graduating. This student was Uzumaki Naruto. Naruto was the village prankster and the class clown. He was also considered the 'dead last' of the class and everyone thought of him and his proclaiming that he would become Hokage as a complete and utter joke. No matter how much Naruto tried, he couldn't manage to succeed for some reason. Even the simplest jutsu, such as the Clone Jutsu, were too much for Naruto and as such, Iruka was reluctantly forced to fail Naruto.

Iruka didn't want to fail the blonde child that he had become emotionally attached to, but seeing as the child had failed to perform even the simplest jutsu, was forced to decide that Naruto was not quite ready to be a ninja. Frankly, Iruka was beginning to doubt that Naruto would ever be able to graduate. And then THAT event happened.

On the evening of March 3, Naruto stole the Forbidden Scroll of Sealing as an attempt to earn some 'extra credit' and pass the exam. It was on this night that Iruka and Naruto did battle with the traitorous Mizuki, one of the now former academy teacher. It was also on this night that Naruto finally learned why his life had practically been a living hell. He was the Kyuubi no Kitsune, or rather the Kyuubi was sealed inside him.

Just under twelve years ago, the Kyuubi no Kitsune attacked the village, resulting in many deaths and a great deal of destruction. Seeing no other way to defeat the beast, the Yondaime Hokage, the greatest shinobi of his time, sealed away the great beast into a newborn infant. This infant was Uzumaki Naruto.

Now, Naruto wasn't the Kyuubi nor was he some manifestation of the Kyuubi. The Yondaime had made one last wish that Naruto be regarded as a hero of the village for keeping the Kyuubi at bay. Unfortunately, the Yondaime's dying wish was ignored and the village began to torment the child. This upset the Sandaime Hokage, who had returned to his former position after the death of his successor, and many laws were enacted. The most notable was to forbid the village from even mentioning the Kyuubi. Unfortunately, this resulted in the village shunning Naruto, leaving him to contemplate why the village hated him. What was worse was that the child was an orphan, not knowing the love that only a parent could give him. Whenever he would ask the Sandaime about his parents, the Hokage would just bypass the answer to the question by saying they were "great people". This and the shroud of secrets surrounding Naruto only served to further the young child's misery.

And then it happened. After years of constantly failing to master even the simplest of jutsu, Naruto finally did it. In a time where his and his sensei's life, one of the few people who had actually acknowledged him, Naruto finally performed the Clone Jutsu…or rather the Shadow Clone Jutsu. This was a jonin-level technique that told Iruka enough…Naruto was in fact ready to become a ninja. As such, Iruka decided to pass Naruto, by giving him the Leaf headband off his own head.

Looking around the class room, Iruka couldn't help but feel an overwhelming sense of pride come to him. All 27 students in his class had managed to pass. This was a rare accomplishment that he would be sure to rub in the face of the other teachers later. He only wished that ALL of his class would become true genin.

"Alright class, I would like to congratulate you all for becoming ninja" the instructor announced. "I have your team assignments right here. After I call out your teams, you will be dismissed for the morning and report back here this afternoon to meet your new senseis."

With that Iruka began announcing the team assignments. "Team 7 will be Haruno Sakura, Uzumaki Naruto, and Uchiha Sasuke." Sakura was happy that she was on Sasuke's team, but mad that Naruto was also there. Naruto was happy for being with Sakura, but mad that he got stuck with Sasuke. Sasuke, well he hated both of them. Hinata was also a little disappointed that she would not be with Naruto. "Team 8 will be Hyuga Hinata, Inuzuka Kiba, and Aburame Shino. Team 10 will be Yamanaka Ino, Nara Shikamaru, and Akimichi Chouji." The class was dismissed.

With the newly minted genin given the rest of the morning off, Naruto figured now would be a good time to ask his crush and now teammate, Haruno Sakura, to grab lunch with him. Unfortunately, this turned out like any other attempt to get to spend some time with her. She rejected him, rather harshly. It was no secret who Sakura liked as it was the same guy most of the other girls in his class. She was an avid fan girl of Naruto's other teammate, Uchiha Sasuke. Naruto didn't like Sasuke, simply because of all the attention Sasuke got and the slight rivalry the two had developed during the academy, although Naruto constantly got his ass handed to him by said Uchiha.

Unfortunately for Sakura, she was shot down just as harshly when she tried to see if Sasuke wanted to grab lunch. Instead, Sasuke simply went off to brood about some unknown issue. It was then that she realized what she was treating Naruto like...in fact, this actually got her to think about being nicer to the blonde the next time they ran into each other.

All of the genin met back at the classroom after lunch break and awaited for their new senseis to come and collect them. While the other teams left with their senseis, Naruto, Sakura, and Sasuke were left alone in the classroom, waiting…and waiting…and waiting. They had been waiting for just over two hours before someone finally came into the room. It was their jonin sensei, who had somehow managed to fall for one of Naruto's more obvious and ridiculous traps. Naruto had wedged an eraser in the door, which would fall when the door opened. For Naruto, the trap worked perfectly and their new sensei was bonked square on the head as the eraser bounced off his gravity defying silver hair.

For their sensei, this gave him a bad fist impression. All he really said to them was "My first impression is…I don't like you" before taking them away to the roof of the academy for introductions.

Their sensei went first, introducing himself as Hatake Kakashi, a jonin in Konoha. Unfortunately, this was all Team 7 got out of their sensei as the remainder of his answers were rather…vague.

Naruto followed up. Unlike Kakashi, Naruto basically read off his autobiography for the most part, stating his dream to become Hokage and his absolute love for ramen. His hobbies included eating ramen and pulling pranks. Kakashi sent him an intriguing look, almost as if he knew Naruto from a long time ago and was slightly curious as to how the boy had grown.