Naruto: The Sarutobi Who Can't Spark

Weeks had passed since Team 9 embarked on their journey as Genin, and the monotonous D-rank missions had become an unavoidable reality. What they had once anticipated as thrilling adventures in the life of shinobi had instead been reduced to grueling, mundane tasks. From cat catching to farming, their missions seemed to test their patience more than their skills.

Another day, another meaningless task, Sora thought as he trudged toward the Mission Assignment Desk. Dreamed of becoming a Shinobi, and imagined of protecting the village from dangerous threats but, instead, here he was, counting down the days until their next trivial assignment.

The trio with their supervisor stood before the Mission Assignment Desk, their expressions a mixture of hope and resignation.

Genma, the Chūnin handling assignments, shuffled through his papers with deliberate slowness, a knowing smirk playing at the corners of his mouth.

Izumi shifted uncomfortably beside Sora. She'd been unusually quiet lately, no doubt processing the same disappointment that plagued them all.

"Alright," Genma announced, drawing out the moment, "Your next assignment is..." He paused for dramatic effect, "Babysitting."

Izumi's face drained of color so quickly it was as if someone had pulled a plug. "Babysitting?" she echoed, her voice barely above a whisper.

Beside her, Sora's groan was loud enough to echo off the walls. "Please," he pleaded, "tell me we're at least protecting the kid from rogue shinobi or something exciting like that." Anything would be better than another civilian task, he thought bitterly. At this rate, they'll be better prepared for housework than actual combat.

Genma's smirk widened as he leaned back in his chair. "Nope. Just babysitting a particularly energetic brat while his parents attend the Feudal Lord (Daimyō)'s meeting. Should be right up your alley—especially after how flawlessly you handled those runaway cats."

Izumi exchanged weary glances with Sora, her shoulders slumping in perfect synchronization. She knew better than to protest—it would be unsightly. "Maybe this is the real test," she said slowly.

Sora replied, "What? Not our skills or strength, but our ability to swallow our pride and persevere?" Even as he accepted the mission scroll, he couldn't help but wonder how many more D-rank missions stood between them and real shinobi work.

Raijin, meanwhile, let out a quiet sigh, his posture betraying a hint of resignation. Babysitting, it seemed, was pushing his absolute limit.

What caught them off guard, however, was Ryouka tagging along. Given their squad leader's usual hands-off approach to menial missions, her presence was unexpected. Then again, since the task indirectly involved the Feudal Lord, it made sense—at least to some degree.

…

Their charge, four-year-old Hiro, proved to be a force of nature that made their previous mission with the cats seem like a peaceful meditation session. Within the first ten minutes of their arrival, he had managed to create more chaos than what seemed physically possible for someone his size.

"Left!" Sora shouted as another projectile of mashed vegetables sailed through the air.

His warning came too late - Izumi caught the full brunt of it on her shoulder. Her uniform already bore the battle scars of similar attacks. "How does he keep getting more food? We cleared the table ten minutes ago!"

"Where's his secret stash?" Raijin asked, wiping vegetable matter from his clothes.

Izumi's long hair had proven irresistible to small, sticky hands. After the third time Hiro had used it as a climbing rope, she had resorted to tying it in a tight bun though that did little to stop him from yanking at it again.

"Watch out, Raijin! He's going for your legs!" she warned, exasperation clear in her voice.

Raijin barely had time to react before Hiro lunged, tiny hands reaching for his shin. His patience was wearing thin, and when the child attempted to bite him, he swiftly sidestepped, dodging the attack with the kind of reflexes usually reserved for actual combat.

Amidst the chaos, Sora couldn't help but glance around the house. It was well-kept, sure, but nowhere near grand enough to belong to the Daimyō himself. He scoffed, quickly piecing it together—this had to be the Feudal Lord's relatives' brat, not the heir to the Land of Fire. And yet here they were, fully-trained Genin, reduced to glorified babysitters.

He let out a frustrated sigh as he caught the slippery little menace, holding him at arm's length as the little kid wriggled furiously. "This is... unexpected," he muttered, staring at the squirming child as if trying to decipher how something so small could be such a handful.

Before he could get a better grip, Hiro had already slipped free and was on the offensive—this time armed with wooden blocks.

"Unexpected?" Raijin scoffed, ducking as a block whizzed past his head. "This is warfare. Pure psychological warfare."

"I think this might be worse than the cats," Izumi muttered, performing an impressive dodge roll to avoid another projectile. "At least the cats had a clear objective—run away. This kid's strategy seems to be pure chaos."

Sora intercepted another escape attempt, lifting Hiro by the back of his shirt. "He's certainly more aggressive. I don't remember the cats trying to eat us." He turned to Raijin. "Any brilliant ideas?"

"What about Genjutsu?" Raijin suggested desperately.

"Absolutely not," Izumi cut in. "Remember what Ryouka-sensei said about using Jutsu on civilians? Besides, I have a better idea."

Sora snorted, throwing a glance toward their supervisor, who remained seated in the corner, arms crossed and entirely unbothered. "'I'm only here to supervise. Don't expect me to lift a finger,' remember?" he said, mimicking Ryouka's monotone voice with exaggerated indifference.

Raijin let out a quiet chuckle, amused despite this predicament.

"Desperate times call for desperate measures," Izumi muttered, ignoring Sora's mimic. She knelt before the squirming child, adopting what she hoped was an engaging expression. "Listen, Hiro-chan," she began, using her most persuasive voice. If you behave, we'll teach you a cool ninja trick."

For the first time since their arrival, Hiro stopped moving. His eyes widened with interest. "Really? Like fire Jutsu?"

"More like the ancient art of sitting still," Raijin interjected, maintaining his grip on the boy.

The look of betrayal on Hiro's face was almost comical. "That sounds boring," he declared, already beginning to squirm again.

"Wait!" Sora jumped in, inspiration striking. "What if we told you, it's a special technique that all great shinobi must master? Even the Hokage had to learn it."

Hiro paused again, suspicious but intrigued. "Really?"

"Oh yes," Izumi caught on, nodding sagely. "It's called... the Shadow Stillness Technique."

"Cool… I've never heard of that," Hiro pouted, though his struggles had lessened.

"That's because it's a secret technique," Raijin added, his voice unusually animated. "Only the most dedicated shinobi learn it."

The next few hours passed in what they would later call controlled chaos. Through a combination of made-up ninja techniques, improvised games, and what Raijin termed "tactical bribery", they managed to keep Hiro somewhat contained.

By the time his parents returned, Team 9 was utterly spent. They left the house with newfound respect for anyone who could handle children on a daily basis.

"Never again," Izumi declared as they finally left the house, their mission complete. "Next time, I'll take double cat duty."

"Agreed," Raijin nodded, picking something unidentifiable from his black-tied hair. "Though I have to admit, that Shadow Stillness Technique might actually be useful for future missions."

+++

Their next mission seemed simple enough on paper: assist an elderly merchant with various tasks around his shop. However, like everything else in their new lives as Genin, the reality proved far more challenging than the description suggested.

"Look at this list," Sora held up the scroll, which unfurled like a banner. "When he said, 'various tasks,' I thought maybe three or four things. Not the entire village's worth of errands."

"At least deliveries sound ninja-like," Izumi offered, though even her optimism wavered as she hefted a sack of rice. "Sort of."

"Delivery missions are typically about speed and stealth," Sora commented, stacking crates. "Not about reorganizing someone's entire storage room."

The list of chores the merchant presented them with seemed to unfold endlessly, like some cursed scroll. It began with basic errands—fetching groceries from the market, carrying sacks of rice to the storeroom—but quickly expanded to include cleaning out years of accumulated storage, organizing inventory, and delivering packages to what felt like every corner of the village.

"I swear," Sora panted, setting down a particularly heavy bag, "this is just unpaid labor disguised as ninja training." He wiped his brow, leaving a streak of dust across his forehead. "My arms feel like they're about to fall off."

Izumi smiled dryly, scanning the list. "And look—we're not even halfway through. Next up is... cleaning the entire storefront. Joy."

Raijin and Sora paused mid-lift, "Could be worse," they muttered synchronously before returning to their methodical rhythm.

"How exactly could this be worse?" Izumi's shoulders slumped slightly as she watched them work with machine-like efficiency. The scroll in her hands seemed to grow heavier with each passing moment.

"Could be more cats."

Sora's laugh echoed through the storage room, disturbing a layer of dust that had settled on the nearby shelves.

…

Then the trio fell into a steady rhythm, with Izumi setting the pace, while Sora and Raijin found increasingly creative ways to complain.

At one point, they had to carry an entire stack of crates together. Meanwhile, Izumi grappled with a single crate, her frustration visible in the way she bit her lower lip and adjusted her grip repeatedly.

"Show-off," Izumi muttered, though there was a hint of admiration in her tone.

Sora asked suddenly, "Hey, either of you ever wonder if Ryouka-sensei is just making this up as she goes?"

"All the time," Raijin grunted, adjusting his grip on the crates. "But then she probably went through much more worse than our pesky little labor."

"And she survived to torture us with it," Sora snorted.

Despite their frustrations, they managed to complete the errands by the end of the day. However, their exhaustion was palpable as they returned to report their success.

+++

Their final mission of the week found them at a local farm, too fed up to even question why shinobi were being assigned agricultural work. The farmer, a cheerful man with sun-weathered skin, greeted them with enthusiasm that seemed almost offensive given their state of fatigue.

"All you gotta do is dig up the sweet potatoes," he explained, handing each of them a shovel with a bright smile. "Good luck youngins!"

The three young ninjas exchanged frustrated looks before reluctantly accepting their tools and getting to work.

"Sweet potatoes," Sora repeated flatly. "I learned three different earth techniques just for this?"

Izumi's exhausted sigh seemed to come from the depths of her soul as she struck the soil. "At this point, we might as well change professions," she mused, already imagining alternative career paths. "I hear Ichiraku Ramen is hiring."

Sora paused in his digging to wipe a mixture of sweat and dirt from his face. "Who knew being a ninja meant becoming a farmer? They definitely left this part out at the Academy." He paused, wiping sweat from his face. "Though I suppose we could use earth-style Jutsu..."

"And get reported for property damage?" Izumi scoffed. "Remember the tree incident?"

"That was one time!"

"One time too many," Raijin snorted, steadily working through his section.

Hours passed under the relentless sun, transforming the young ninjas into increasingly disheveled versions of themselves. Their hands developed blisters despite their calluses from weapons training, their clothes became indistinguishable from the soil they worked on, and their patience wore thinner with each potato unearthed.

When they finally trudged back to the village, where Ryouka waited, looking annoyingly fresh and composed.

"Done whining?" she asked, unimpressed.

Izumi opened her mouth, likely to protest that their complaints were entirely justified, but quickly thought better of it and shut it again.

"I'll take that as a yes. Good," Ryouka said, straightening up. Her next words fell like a hammer blow: "Training tomorrow. Be on time." And with that, she vanished in a swirl of leaves, leaving them to contemplate being a ninja.

The trio collectively slumped against the nearest wall, letting out synchronous sighs that spoke volumes about their day.

"This is never going to end, is it?" Izumi groaned, letting her head fall back against the wall.

"Maybe that's the point," Raijin mused. "Breaking us down to build us up."

"That's... surprisingly deep," Sora admitted. "Still doesn't make me feel better about smelling like potatoes."

"We survive today as well," Raijin said with a wry smile.

Sora, despite his exhaustion—or perhaps because of it—found himself chuckling. "Barely," he admitted. "But I suppose that counts for something."

He glanced at his teammates. "Think we should get dinner? I hear Ichiraku is hiring."

"Don't even joke about that," Izumi warned, but she was smiling too. "Though food does sound good."

+++