Hey readers. Just wanted to say again that I do not own Naruto. And to be honest, although I love this part, writing it is such a pain. So there will be a little modifying. Happy reading.

The room where everyone met for the chunin exams was crowded. I had entered a little later than the others, really dreading going in. When I had first heard of the chunin exams and what it entailed I had thought nothing of it. I had no thought on it, really.

But now, as I stood before the building, my fear build slowly. What if I saw someone? People were coming into the village, right? This village was no longer only made up of its own villagers. Ninjas from every hidden village was here. Including, ones from the Land of Lightning.

I took a deep breath, trying to calm myself. If I took too long coming in then they might find it suspicious, and that was the last thing I needed.

As soon as I entered the noise bombarded me. Everyone was talking. I walked up to where my team was lingering behind.

"Lea-chan!" Naruto rushed up to me and everyone turned. All eyes were on me. "What took you so long?" I frowned at him. Had I really taken that long? Everyone was staring at me, waiting for an answer.

I gulped, feeling oddly out of place and nervous. "I was doing something. Don't worry about it."

He frowned and cocked his head to the side, looking at me weirdly. I looked away.

The only other persons who were there was Shikamaru and two others and Kiba, Hinata and a guy in a hood.

Shikamaru raised his hand in greeting. "Yo, Lea." I waved at him, my face in passive.

The girl near him crossed her arms, looking me up and down. "Who's she?" she asked. She was really pretty, with long blond hair and ice blue eyes. She was dressed in purple, which complemented her perfectly.

"That's Lea," Shikamaru said, sounding bored. The other guy squinted at me, his hand deep into a bag of chips.

"Lea?" he said. He was fat and he had briefs on his head. "I think I heard that name before. Lea ... Lea..."

"How do you know them, Lea?" Sakura asked me. I opened my mouth to answer but Shikamaru cut in.

"Lea, this is Ino and that's Choji." Ino continued to glare at me but Choji smiled and waved before resuming his eating.

"The party's all here then?" Kiba asked. Akamaru was still on his head and I was glad I was all the way over here.

"My name is Shino," the guy with the round glasses said. "Not that anyone cares."

I blinked at him. I wasn't sure if I should say hi or not.

"Hey, you guys should tone down." I sighed and turned to the direction of the voice. There was so many persons coming into the conversation it was too hard to keep track.

It was a silver haired guy wearing glasses. "You guys are rookies straight out of the academy but you sound like a bunch of screaming teenagers. I'm Kabuto but that's not just it. Look behind you."

I turned and my heart jumped into my throat. The other participants of the exams was so terrifying! They looked like monsters. I backed up, wanting to get away, and backed up straight into Sasuke. He held out his hand to steady me. I looked at him and he was smirking down at me.

"Scared?" he asked. My face grew hot immediately. His hands lingered on my waist and I got out of his grip as quickly as I could.

"Those guys are from the hidden rain," Kabuto continued. "They have short tempers and everyone's nervous about the exams. So tone down before you cause a scene."

"Kabuto-san?" Sakura spoke up. "This is your second time?"

"Nope, my seventh." I raised my eyebrow at that. "This exams is held twice a year so this is my fourth year."

"Wow, then you must know a lot about the chunin exams?"

"I'll share some of what I know with you rookies." He held something up. It looked like a deck of cards. "With these nin-info cards."

"Nin-info?" Kiba said.

"They are infused with chakra. I have four years of information in these two hundred cards." He spread them out on the floor and I tried to get closer. This looked intriguing. "To see them I have to use my chakra."

"You have information on everyone who's taking the test?" Sasuke asked. He looked just as intrigued.

"Who do you want to know about?" Kabuto asked with a smirk.

"Gaara of the Desert." I looked up at him with a frown.

Kabuto swirled the card under his finger then lifted it up. "Gaara of the Desert. Mission history B ranked: 8, C ranked: 1. Wow, impressive for a genin. Since he's from a foreign country he doesn't have much information. He, apparently, returned from all his missions without a scratch."

Sasuke gulped looking intense.

"So basically," Hinata said. "All the persons here makes you lose your confidence."

Kabuto smiled. "Hey, I've been here seven times already."

"This is going to be hard," I heard Naruto whisper. I looked over to him. I was unused to hearing him talk like that. Sakura and I both moved towards him at the same time. I didn't know what to say so I let her do the talking.

"Hey, Naruto don't be so down ..."

Naruto jumped up surprising everyone. "I'm Naruto Uzumaki! And I won't lose to any of you!"

Everyone in the room turned to the sound of Naruto's high pitched voice. Beside me, Sakura's sweat dropped. We had both thought that the competition was making him lose his confidence but no. Naruto was Naruto and will always be Naruto. I smiled a small smile.

"Hey, can I see my nin-info card?" Ino said. Somehow she had moved closer to Sasuke and was now practically rubbing herself on him. I felt sorry for the poor boy.

Kabuto spun the card under his finger again and lifted it over. "Ino Yamanaka. Member of the Yamanaka Clan. Mission history. D ranked: 10. That's it."

Ino puffed out and flipped her hair haughtily. "Sounds good to me," she said but no one was listening to her, except me maybe. Everyone was trying to get information on their selves.

"What's mine?! What's mine?!" Naruto was shouting.

"No, I want to hear mine first!" Kiba was saying, trying to shout over the loud blonde boy.

I sighed, my hand resting on the black sheath of my black sabre. I was still thinking of a good name for it. "You guys do realize that if you do that, you're just exposing all your weaknesses to the same persons you might be going up against." I paused and looked at them. "Right?"

Kiba laughed awkwardly. "Yeah, right, I knew that."

Naruto grinned at me. "Or maybe you want to hear yours but your just too shy." He saddled up to me and I tried pushing him off. "Let's hear Lea's card," he suggested to Kabuto.

"There's no way..."

"I want to hear it too," Sasuke said. I looked at him sharply. He was siding with Naruto on this?

"So do I," Sakura said and I frowned at them all. "No offense Lea. You're nice and all but you're so closed off that we know literally nothing about you."

"So you're going to look at a card to find out about me."

Sasuke shrugged, playing it off cool. "Yeah, why not?"

I threw my hands up, done with the lot of them. "You know what? I don't care. Do what you want."

Kabuto smirked at me and spun another card under his finger. He lifted it up and frowned. "That's weird. There's nothing."

Everyone leaned forward. "Nothing?" Sasuke asked. I raised a brow in confusion. There was nothing?

Kabuto looked up at me, his glasses glinting. "Lea. Who are you?"

Everyone turned to me. I began to feel awkward with all these eyes on me so I laughed. "Stop looking at me," I said trying to sound playful and nonchalant but coming out commanding and mean.

Then out of nowhere two ninjas flew into the air and started attacking Kabuto. I grabbed the hilt of my sword immediately. They threw two kunai and Kabuto dodged them, going backwards. Then one of them, the hunch over one with something weird attached to his arm, threw a punch. Kabuto dodged it.

I straightened and grinned. Looks like Kabuto can take care of myself. Then suddenly, his glasses shattered.

"But he blocked it!" Sasuke said. "How did he glasses break?" I had no answer. I was just as confused as everyone else.

"It probably just glanced his nose," Shikamaru said. "That's what you get for acting like a big shot."

Out of nowhere, only adding to the confusion, Kabuto doubled over and vomited.

"Kabuto-san! Are you okay?" Sakura rushed over to help him but I just stood there. That was disgusting. I looked at everyone. They were obviously desperately trying to figure out what had just happened. Especially Sasuke. I could almost see the wheels turning in his head. It was then that I realized that Neji, Lee and Tenten had joined the group. Or were they here all along? Why had I not seen them before?

Neji caught me looking at him and he looked away, his cheeks turning red. Tenten and Lee smiled and waved at me.

There were three ninjas standing before Kabuto; one girl, and two guys. The guy in the middle, with the hunched back spoke, "Listen up. We, the Three Sound Ninjas, are definite chunins. Write that on your little cards."

"Stop this talking, you worthless bastards!"

A poof appeared and a guy dressed in black with a scarred face, surrounded by a dozen other ninjas appeared.

"Thanks for waiting," he said. "I am Morino Ibiki, the first test examiner for the chunin exams." He pointed to where we were. "Sound ninjas, stop causing trouble. Do you want to fail before you even begin?"

"I'm sorry," the hunch said. He was really starting to creep me out. "We just got carried away, that's all."

I made a sound and he looked at me sharply. Got carried away my ass. They were just trying to show off.

"Let me just say this from now," Ibiki said. "There will be no fighting unless allowed by the examiner. And even then, you are not allowed to kill your opponent. Anyone who disobeys fails immediately. Got it? Instead of wherever you're seated now, you will take one of these tabs and sit in the seat assigned to you."

"What?!" Naruto shouted. "It's a written test?!" I stifled my laugh.

Kakashi's POV

I smirked and walked away. After listening to them talk for the past few minutes, I knew I had nothing to fear. They could do it. I knew they could.

What I still couldn't understand, although I had already suspected it, was what the deal was with Lea. She had no information on her whatsoever. She just showed up and joined this village, making friends and everything, but no one know where she came from, what she was doing before she came, nothing.

I had never bought the story about her stealing food from a couple ninjas. It just didn't fit.

Who was Lea? And what was her story?

-----

A/N: I'm just going to shorten this part a bit, sorry.

-----

Lea's POV

It felt like an hour had passed, but still there were no answers on my paper. I had absolutely no idea what the hell I was supposed to do. This all looked like a bunch of gibberish to me.

I looked around and frowned. What could these people be writing? How did they know the answers? I looked at Sakura, who was trying to be discreet in copying the answers from the person sitting beside her. I stifled a laugh in my hand. I looked over at Sasuke whose eyes were red, darting up and down from his paper to the next, his hand moving as if it were automatic. Looks like everyone was planning on copying.

Lastly, I looked at Naruto. He was sweating a river. He looked so out of place. I was torn between laughing at him and pitying him. I settled on smiling when I saw Hinata push her paper over to him.

I shook my head and leaned back crossing my arms, glad I was placed beside the window. Already there was about 20 persons taken out for being caught cheating and another 10 gave up. It wouldn't take an idiot a hard time to figure out that I should be doing neither of those if I wanted to pass. But since I had no idea what to do I guess I just have to sit back and wait for this thing to be over. What else could I do?

I leaned back and closed my eyes, and soon I was fast asleep.

Sasuke's POV

I'm beginning to think that I have two idiots on my team. Naruto was the obvious first. He was trying to copy from Hinata's paper, but it was so obvious I had to wonder how he wasn't taken out already. The room was already half empty, one more wouldn't make a difference I suppose.

I hope he doesn't get cut out though. I still haven't got my real fight with him. And the chunin exams was the perfect opportunity to show him, and everyone else, that I was much better than him. Not that anyone thought otherwise, except maybe me and Lea. Naruto had a lot of potential, it was just hard to see. That admission however, will never past my lips.

The not-so-obvious second was Lea. I know she was strong. She had to be if she had taken Zabuza out. And I had thought she was serious. But it looks like she was just as carefree and laidback as Shikamaru. Who sleeps during the first chunin test?

I looked back over at her for about the millionth time. Her head was leaning against the window, her hair looking extremely white and angelic. Her mouth was slightly open and her breathing was slow and even. She looked so at peace. I never saw her look so at ease before.

Every time I saw she looked on edge. Even when she was laughing and talking she looked like she was being chased and she couldn't stay in one place for too long. But now, now she looked beautiful. Angelic and beautiful.

"Focus!" I whispered to myself turning away. I was not going to make staring at Lea be my downfall in this exams. That would be a lame and pathetic way to lose.

A hand was going up. I looked up and frowned. What was Naruto doing? Slowly his hand was going up and with each inch all our comrades stared, probably wondering the same thing I was. The ever energetic Naruto who wants to be Hokage is giving up?

Then his hand came slamming down on the desk.

"Are you giving up?" Ibiki asked.

"I will not give up! If I have to pass this stupid test to become Hokage then I'll pass this stupid test. Nothing will stand in my way!" he shouted. I rolled my eyes and smirked. Out of the corner of my eyes I saw Lea jerk out of her sleep, rubbing her hands over her eyes. Wow, she looked so cute. Wait, what?

Ibiki smirked. "I'll ask you again. This is your last chance to give up."

"I don't change my vows. That's my ninja way."

I smirked. Sakura smiled. And Lea leaned back in her chair with a small smile. Of course he wouldn't give up.

Ibiki looked around. Then he spoke. "Interesting. Now to everyone left back," he paused, "Congratulations for passing the first test!"

Everyone drew back in shock. "Ha?" Naruto breathed.

"What do you mean we passed?" Sakura asked.

"Then what was this whole test for?!" Temari asked.

"To test your information gathering skills of course. First, as explained before, success is based on the whole team doing well. This put pressure on each team member to not screw up. But those question was not genin level. We used them to make you guys come to one conclusion to pass. To cheat. To make things interesting, we had two chunins mixed in among you who had the right answers."

"Hahaha! I saw right through that!" Naruto said laughing loudly.

"You didn't see anything, Naruto," Lea said, her eyes closed and her arms crossed. "Shut up and sit down." Naruto sat immediately.

"Those who cheat poorly failed immediately of course," Ibiki continued. He lifted the bandana off his head. Everyone gasped. His head was damaged looking like a cluster of small geysers and wrinkles all over. "Because information is more important than life itself. And on the battlefield and on missions, people will risk their lives to get their hands on it."

He looked like he went through awful torture with all that damage to his head.

"I want you to remember this. All information can be beneficial to your village. So we gather information through cheating."

"But what was the 10th question?" Temari asked.

"The 10th question was the true purpose of this test, 'Take it or leave it'. Those who chose the latter failed along with their teammates. But those who chose to take it, might not get the chance to take the test again. A true leap of faith."

I looked down. I had never thought of that. All I thought of was getting the answers and nothing else.

"There's only one person who I had a problem with though." Ibiki pointed to Lea and my heart jumped. "You. You did absolutely nothing. You had no drive to do anything. You didn't cheat, you didn't even attempt the questions."

Lea yawned. "Are you failing me then?" she asked. I frowned. Didn't she care if she failed or not?

Ibiki's face darkened. He motioned to some of the chunins and they started whispering together. What could they be talking about? I looked over at Lea. She was leaning her head against the window again, looking asleep.

"Okay!" Ibiki barked, jolting her awake. "You pass." He faced everyone. "You all pass."

The window broke in, dangerously close to Lea. I resisted the urge to jump up to check if she was okay. She was my teammate, that's why. Nothing more. A dark figure flipped in and a woman appeared.

"No time for celebrating!" she barked. Her hair was spike upwards and black and her teeth had a weird sharpness to it, kind of like Kiba's. "I am the examiner for the second test, Mitarashi Anko! Now let's go!"