Nindo: The path of laziness

In an ever cloudy and rainy place like the village of Kirikagure, one of the only time in a day to see the sun is right after it rises or right before it sets, when it is below the cloud layer. Such a weather can possibly explained by the geographical specificity of the Land of Water, which is mainly insular. Whatever the reasons may be however, a fact remains; this weather influenced the young Sîn Nara to grow into a gloomy young man. Of course the near constant pressure applied on him by his mother during his young years didn't help much, and as a result he never was quite the social one.

Still, he earned the thrust of his teammates since the Genin graduation due to his keen intellect that on many occasions helped the group out of a though spot. Together they worked, trained, fought and made it through the various step of the life of a ninja to the point of Chuunin. The recent exams have just allowed the final member of their team to get this promotion, and as he watches the sun set at last, Sîn ponders how this will affect his life. Sure he is happy for the poor Chiro who had failed 3 times to get the spot, but a full Chuunin team means tougher missions...and more efforts. "What a drag..." were the words that naturally came to his mind as a result of this thought process, resulting in an ever gloomier attitude than usual. Thus, he had isolated himself from the small party Lyia and their sensei had organized for Chiro to gaze at the setting sun alone, in peace.

Little did he know that Chiro didn't intent to let Sîn escape so easily, and after tracking him down to his usual spot, he prepared some kind of a surprise attack. The boy believed this would shake up his partner a bit and hopefully force him to join the little celebration in his honour. With a mischievous smile, he sent a clone to attack his opponent directly from behind, but without much subtlety, knowing Sîn would block him. Evidently, the lazy shinobi heard the clone approach at full speed, but not intent on moving an inch to block the stupid attack, he merely formed the rat seal and sent out his shadow to intercept the foolish attacker.

"Shadow possession...success. What do you want Chiro ?" he stated out loud in a monotone voice. Hidden in a nearby tree, the real Chiro laughed at how his supposedly "much wiser" colleague had fallen for such a basic trick. Now that Sîn was focused on the clone, surely he would get his chance for an opening and thus make him realize how much stronger he had now become. "I'll show him ! Now that I'm a Chuunin he won't have any other choice than paying attention to me, than respecting me !" the boy thought, as he prepared to form the hand seals for his own technique.

"I said, what do you want, Chiro ?" Sîn repeated, in a more insistent voice, but now also turning his head toward...the very tree Chiro was hiding in. Surprised at this sudden discovery, the latter figured he'd fasten the execution of his jutsu...only to find out he no longer had control over his body. Then he noticed it; the small and stretched out line of shadow coming from the the rock toward his tree up to where it connected with his own. Sîn had only caught the clone to make Chiro believe his little stupid plan had worked, diverting his attention and making him vulnerable to a another shadow possession.

"DAMN IT, how did you know ?" he shouted, angered by his new failure.

"*Sigh* You were laughing in you beard so loud a deaf old man would've heard you." Sîn replied with his usual annoyed voice.

Jumping down from the rock he was standing on, Sîn forced at the same time Chiro to jump from his tree because of hi jutsu. Slowly, the two ninjas walked toward each other, one nonchalantly, the other reluctantly, but powerless behind the technique at such a close range, and at a time of day where shadows stretched the most. Once they were face to face and at about a meter of each other, Chiro began to except some retribution from Sîn for his reckless and stupid attack, like a slap or something.

Yet his partner didn't do that, he instead released his jutsu on the spot and put his hand on Chiro's shoulder while smiling and saying: "Good job on your graduation, buddy." It was once of the few time he addressed his teammate as a real friend, and though destabilized by it, Chiro was over-happy and he rushed to take Sîn his arms. The latter stopped him before he could do so at to signify "Hey I appreciate you but don't go too far." The newly graduated had a little goofy grin, and nodded to say that he understood, before pointing behind him with his thumb.

"Yeah you're right, Lyia must be worried sick so lets go back." Sîn replied to the sign, following his partner as he turned his heels and headed back to the village. Partys were a pain-in-the-ass, but they were sometime necessary, if only to consolidate the bonds in a team. Still, the Nara clan ninja couldn't help but think that he would be some much more satisfied to be free of teamwork and not have to account for anyone else other than himself....

Sîn's team was quite an heterogeneous group compared to other 4 people cells in the village, due to specific circumstances. Its three young members happened to have 2 year spans between each other, the youngest originally being at 12 and the elder at 16. The reason behind this was that the oldest member had spent extra-time in the Academy due to terrible results while the youngest one had been promoted early due to his family's influence and a bit of innate talents. Lyia was actually the only one with a regular course, but unlike one could expect from a Nara clan member, Sîn wasn't the one to skip years, but actually the one who found himself stuck 2 more years at the Academy. Having been constantly pressured by his mother in a domain where he held little interest had resulted in a total absence of effort put in his training. His younger teammate, Chiro, had however an incredible passion for the life of a shinobi, and thus his family had used contacts with the academy leaders to get him graduated earlier to the rank of Genin. And so, under the guidance of the very diplomatic and wise Inei-sensei, the three ninjas from different ages, lead by different motives and with drastically different methods had been reunited in a team.

It had been 4 years since they had got out of the Academy, and over that time they had somehow worked out their differences; Sîn dealing with Chiro's immaturity, Chiro with his senpai's cold attitude, and Lyia with their constant bickering. Their much older sensei had used his vast experience and knowledge to also exploit correctly all their strength for the numerous and various missions they had completed. And over time, the original tendency of excellency eventually inverted itself; Chiro's willpower proving to be not enough for the Chuunin exams while Sîn's lazy wisdom eventually paid off, making him the first one to reach the higher grade and Chiro the last. As usual, Lyia was in the middle of the line, though Sîn suspected she limited her efforts in that domain as to not further damage Chiro's feelings by leaving him the only Genin after only 2 years. In any case, they were now 16, 18 and 20, all chuunin working alongside their jounin sensei, and ready to take higher grade missions... B ones to be sure...

For that reason, the team had now been assembled in the early morning, ready to head out for the Kage's office and request a new mission if any were available...

After leaving the Kage's house, the team directly headed toward the village's gate to get on their way. Just before the exited though, Inei stopped them and took a good look at his team; three promising young ninjas. Sure none of them could be called a genius given their current age and capabilities, but they sure had more promise than the average ninja of the village. Inei was an old man already, in the later half of his fifties, and he had already trained many teams of shinobis for the Hidden Mist Village... this was likely his last shot at being a sensei. His hopes were to make this the greatest team he had ever formed, as the ultimate produce of his years of teaching and his last contribution to this fair village.

Sîn, for his part, didn't care much about the other people's ambition for him, either they be his mother, sensei, the authorities of the village or anyone else. None of it was really worth the effort anyway in his mind, and thus he just worked his way as easily as possible through the shinobi life. Hence his maintained chuunin position at his age while some argued he would have had the talent to pass on to jounin a while ago.

Back to the mission at hand, Inei, after a small pause, addressed his group in a voice where pride transpired heavily:

"Today is the day we take on or first B, and maybe A ranked mission. It is our duty to fulfil it at the best of our capabilities, no matter what. Does any of you have any questions, comments or hesitations about this ?"

First to talk was as usual Chiro, once again too enthusiast about this:

"We shall get through this like a fluke, just watch me go !"

Annoyed as usual, Sîn couldn't help but add on a detached tone:

"Whatever, just don't get yourself killed, carrying a body back to the village would be a drag..."

And in the end, Lyia raised her voice to cut the argument:

"Stop it you kiddies... we shall complete this mission as it goes Inei-sensei."

The old man nodded, and after his signal, they jumped at hyperspeed away from the village, begginning their journey to the southern border.