Naruto: Cautious Ninja

Eyes training left as his feet carted to a stop, Naruto saw the door to one of the nearby homes open and a boy around his age come running out, shortly followed by whom he guessed was his younger brother and their mother. The parent stopped the younger of the two from running off prematurely by holding out two bento boxes, all neatly wrapped and ready for them. It was a homemade meal only a loving family member could prepare for her children.

"Hold on, sweetie. You forgot something," the mother exclaimed with humor in her voice.

The older boy skidded clumsily and rushed back, looking slightly abashed, "Oops! Sorry, mum!" the youngster laughed, taking the box from her when it was lowered to him. "What did you make for us today?"

"Did you make us omelets?" the younger brother asked eagerly while tackling his older brother in a playful manner. "Is it omelets?" They looked up to see their mother beaming at them.

"Of course. I made a lot."

"Yay!" both cheered excitedly, after which they then ran off with their bento boxes held overhead, like they were trophies won in contest and needed to be elevated. They celebrated their way down the street, looking back to see their mother waving at them.

"Be careful you two," she yelled out to them.

"We will, mum!" the older brother called.

"Love you!"

Naruto's expression sunk as he watched the two siblings head on their way while their mother saw them off from her home's doorsteps. After a few seconds of looking and seeing the parent walk back inside, upon floundering over the memory of the warm bond he saw that they shared as a family the jinchuriki then turned his gaze back to the road ahead of him again and he shuffled on. With his head and spirit set on an extreme low, he began dragging his feet away to wherever he wanted to go next.

Where? Well… that was a question he would really like answered.

Obviously no one was waiting for him back home. No one was waiting for him anywhere.

"This sucks," he muttered, feeling a lot smaller than he had been before; even after all of his big talk to the villagers about becoming Hokage. Speaking of which, after reaching the end of the road and finding himself in some quiet backstreet the boy was able to get a great spectator's view of the entire monument itself laid out on the horizon.

He gritted his teeth and dropped the paint can he was carrying. The yellow splashed over the ground as he pointed up at the vacant expressions of the four historic faces watching over the entire community.

"What are YOU looking at, huh?" Naruto shouted, ignoring the startled looks of a couple of nearby villagers. "Do you think this bothers me?! Being all alone?! Having no parents?! Being the number one loser?! The dead-last?! HUH?! Well screw you?!"

Rubbing his eyes against his arm vigorously to get rid of any tears he was probably holding back, he then brought his fist around and punched it towards the monument.

"Just you wait! I WILL become Hokage someday! And when I do become Hokage and everyone has acknowledged me as the number one ninja in this village, I will have MY face engraved right next to the rest of your ugly mugs!" Naruto bellowed, his voice carrying over the neighborhood and scaring a few birds out of their roosts. "And believe me when I say this, my face will look a thousand times better than all of yours combined!" Once his words echoed into silence, he heaved in several deep breaths of air before straightening his posture and changing his expression.

From an onlooker's point of view, he looked especially proud at his outburst.

"I will become the greatest Hokage there ever will be. Believe it," Naruto declared under his breath with a small smile, before putting his hands in his pockets and marching off. With all of his yelling and vows being spouted at the top of his lungs, he had completely forgotten about the can of paint he'd dragged all the way out here with him. It had served its purpose anyway, so there was no further need for it.

"A Hokage like that needs to be strong and cool! And I'm going to be both!" the blonde recited quietly with a grin. He nodded affirmatively to himself when he parted from the suburb; heading off to God only knew where his body wanted to take him. "I'm gonna get some training in."

It was still early in the morning, he'd had his fun messing with society, and he had a full day of time left to burn. I mean, what else was there for him to do? It wasn't like he had anything important scheduled for the rest of the day…

OOO

Ninja Academy…

"Ami?"

"Here, sensei," the above girl answered to Iruka, who was currently doing role call for his class as per the usual routine.

Nodding and checking off her name, he then went on to the next.

"Choji?"

"Here!" the Akimichi exclaimed through a bag of chips.

"Satoshi?"

"Here!"

"Kiba?"

"Yo!" came the reply from said Inuzuka, currently sitting with his legs kicked up on his desk somewhere in the back row. The teacher quickly spotted him and nodded in acknowledgement to his presence, but frowned a split second later.

"Feet. Off!" Iruka said in a loud and dangerous tone of voice. The member of the dog clan quickly took his finger out of his ear and did as he was told, lest he be punished for the small act of rebellion. "Better."

With that insubordination quickly dealt with, the man drawled on. "Shino?"

"Here," the Aburame droned back in his usual tone of voice.

"Excellent. Shikamaru?" Iruka exclaimed, looking up. When he received no reply on the first call, the Chunin raised an eyebrow. "Shikamaru Nara?" The class's collective attention immediately began panning left and right for the next few seconds of silence, before all eyes eventually fell onto the middle row in the center of the room where every student within peripheral range could see said boy lying with his face on his desk and arms crossed under his forehead for support. It was plain to see exactly what the problem was, which had Iruka's eye twitching.

"SHIKAMARU NARA!" the teacher yelled out, startling the entire room.

A low groan came from the boy as he slowly raised his head, looking back down towards the front of the class with bags under his eyes and an incredibly drowsy air about his character. He scratched his head when he saw his teacher glaring back up at him.

"I'm here," Shikamaru yawned, figuring that it was him that all the fuss was about. Though the entire reason for his existence here was to sit in conformity with the rest of the cabbage patch, it didn't mean that he had to follow protocol to a tee. It also didn't mean that he couldn't be aware of his surroundings either.