Whether she wanted to follow Temari's advice or not was taken out of her hands because the following day, a rumor slipped into the school.

"Did you hear? The freak cheated."

"No way."

"She cheated on the written exam. She sneaked the answers from one of the teachers."

"That's possible. She has three of them living with her after all."

When Suzume came into view, the gossipers immediately ceased and shuffled away from her. She watched them go with an intimidating veneer that motivated the them to never speak again.

Suzume was sitting in the Mathematical Theories class, all of the aces tossing her smug looks and the lows resolutely faced away from her.

The teacher called on her, "New student."

She dutifully rose to her feet. "Yes, sir."

"See if you can solve this." He tapped the chalkboard with his finger where he'd written out an intricate problem.

Suzume felt the eyes stabbing into her as she exited the row and went down to the front.

"We got her," one of the students beside Shiro whispered enthusiastically. "There's no way she can solve that."

Shiro chewed on the end of her pencil. "It's not going to work."

"What?" they asked, surprised. "What do you mean, Shiro-san?"

"Who was it that cooked up such a half assed rumor?" Shiro shifted uncomfortably in her seat while Suzume descended down the steps. "This is just careless."

"Can you explain?"

"Do you think Temari-sensei, Kankuro-sensei, or even Gaara-sensei can get a copy of the promotion exam? The Kazekage advisors are doing everything they can from letting the three of them gain more power. Of course, that also means they don't want any of their people getting any positions, which also goes for a position as minor as a Genin level shinobi."

"So?"

"So." Shiro threw them an irritated glare. "The advisors did everything they could to keep their adoptive sister from advancing to the sixth year. They rigged the written exam. Questions that only jonin level shinobi could answer. Yet she still passed." She watched Suzume lift the chalk to the board. "You guys are underestimating her."

Suzume started to solve and the more she wrote the wider the teacher's eyes became, the more the students became dumbstruck. Once she finished, she turned around to see the whole room in aghast silence, except one person.

She and Shiro stared at each other, calculating. After Suzume bowed to her jaw dropped teacher, she returned to her seat and Shiro's mouth spread into a smirk.

. . .

Fourth years were always a good resource. Old enough to be taken seriously, young, naive, and inexperienced enough to be effortlessly influenced, and with blabbermouths to boot--and she knew all of their favorite flocking sites.

Shiro folded her hands into signs and her appearance changed. She entered the girls' restroom and waited. A few slow minutes passed when she heard what she'd been waiting for. Flushing the empty toilet, she stepped out of her stall and went to wash her hands.

"Did you hear that Akemi from class five is going to try asking Gaara-sensei for a private lesson?"

"Huh? That's never going to happen."

"Right?"

They burst into giggles.

"But, speaking of Gaara-sen." They huddled together. "His sister is in so much trouble, you know, the one everyone calls a freak. People are saying she cheated on the promotion exam."

"Eh? Really? Gaara-sensei doesn't deserve to have an awful girl like her as his sister."

"I heard," the girls twirled around at her voice, "she bribed the examiner."

They all gasped in unison and returned to their huddle like a group of excited birds.

"Bribed the examiner? Bribed the examiner!"

"She's crazy."

"I know right!"

Shiro exited the restroom, her disguise melting off of her as she walked down the hall.

The newly updated rumor swept through the Institute in a few short hours and eventually reached a teacher's ears. Shiro was visiting class 6-1 during free period and looking through a fashion magazine, enjoying a bit of time alone.

Somebody turned a chair around and plopped into it backwards. "Yo, Shiro."

"What is it, Yuudai?" Shiro flipped a page sourly.

The large, muscular boy gave her a once over. "You look really happy about something."

"Do I?" she drawled. Something on the page caught her eye and she circled a product.

"I'm not so sure about what you did."

"You're the one who tried to spread the rumor, aren't you?" Shiro curled her lip in disapproval, her eyes never leaving the magazine. "Sloppy, really sloppy, Yuudai-kun. Leave it to the experts next time."

"Expert. Right. With your expertise, this whole thing might become a scandal. What were you thinking?"

"I was thinking that the Genin Suzume beat down was feeling sorry for herself. I was thinking that maybe she extremely embarrassed she lost to the talentless Suzume. I was thinking that she'd jump for the opportunity to get her soiled pride back."

"You did this on an assumption!" Yuudai said exasperatedly. "You might get expelled for defamation of character!"

A ruckus in the hall brought their eyes to the open door and Shiro saw Suzume being led along by the Concepts and Principles teacher. Shiro smiled and turned back to Yuudai. "Who do you think I am? Now, shut up and stop annoying me." She shooed him away like he was a pesky fly.

Yuudai rolled his eyes, raising his hands in defeat, and made a move to leave. "Alright. No need to be bitchy."

_

Suzume was taken out of free period and led through the hall of whispers, satisfied giggles and rubbernecking. Once they got to the office, she was sent to wait in an interrogation room with dark walls and bitingly bright lights. She saw that the window was tinted and realized she'd have an audience.

Her Concepts and Principles teacher entered the room. While her homeroom teacher was Temari, they thought that she would have a bias towards Suzume and turned to the next in line. The Chunin lowered himself into the opposite chair and crossed his arms and looked past his nose at her in what he thought was an menacing way.

"Just admit that you bribed the examiner."

"I didn't."

"You didn't?" the chunin jeered. "Don't even think for one moment you'll be able to stay in this class after this. If you became a shinobi, it'll shame the entire shinobi population. Pathetic kid."

"What makes you think the rumors are true? Aren't you going to ask for my side of the story?"

"We confirmed the whole thing with your proctor." He took on a tone that implied he was dealing with a naughty toddler who kept denying that they stole a cookie. "She came clean, you should too."

"Why do you believe her?"

"It's your word against a Genin's. A Genin." The teacher tapped the table to emphasize his point. "Of course we'd believe her."

"Just because she's a level higher than me?"

"That and for other reasons."

"Am I disrupting the system, sir?" The temperature plummeted in the room. "Am I something that should be removed?"

"Yes. You'll make a horrible impression on the students."

"The lows."

"Now you're catching on." The man leaned in and laced his fingers on the desk. "We need to keep order, Suzume. By allowing the students to subjugate others separates the failures from the victors early on. It gives us teachers an idea of who we should focus our time on."

"Does bullying equate to strength?" Suzume's voice held fire. "Categorizing students divides them."

"Naturally. That's how the real world works, little brat. Categorized into the strong and the weak and the strong rules the weak. Just look at your guardians. Their power and authority lets them do whatever the shit they want and nobody wants to get in their way because they know their place and you should too. Someone like you has no business clinging onto people like the Sand Siblings—"

"Hey."

The man went red with rage. "'H-Hey'? Excuse me—"

"No, you're not excused." Suzume's attitude did a full 180. She got it now. She's hurting their fragile egos. She was weak and now she's threatening their definition of strength.

She rose out of her seat and examined the man like he was nothing more than a cowering rat. "You're scared."

"W-What—"

Suzume bent forward until she was right in front of his face. "You should be."

"You dare—little shit— I'm your teacher!"

She gave him an unconcerned look. "And?"

Before the shinobi could say a word more, Suzume left the room.

She fumed into the entire office full of teachers and they all locked onto her like a sensory beam. She was caught dead in her tracks and she found her siblings almost instantly. They were gawking at her.

Collecting herself again, she bowed her head and, mumbling an apology, hurried out of the office.

Once she was out of the suffocating building, she threw her head back and took in a sharp breath. She considered going back in and apologizing but decided against it in the same second. Groaning, she crouched down and ran fingers through her hair in distress.

She might've gotten herself expelled.

_ _ _

Her siblings came home at around twelve at night. Suzume was sitting miserably at the dining table and since she was still in her shinobi garb it wouldn't be a farfetched to assume that she's been sitting there ever since she came back home.

Temari opened her mouth.

"I'm sorry," Suzume interjected, ducking her head. "I went overboard."

"As long as you know." Temari pulled off her hair ties to let her hair down. "Well, we didn't really expect you to put up with that for long either."

"We're not mad at you," Gaara said.

"Really?" Suzume said, relieved.

"First thing tomorrow," Kankuro placed his hands on the head of a chair, "we're going over there and having a good talk with them. Everything will be yesterday's news and forgotten, jan."

"No, don't," Suzume said, shocking all three of them. Something steely flared in her expression. She got out of her seat and walked over to the doorway. "I don't need you guys defending me."

"But—" Kankuro was taken aback. "We—"

"If you keep interfering I won't be able to get off your coattails." She paused in her exit to look at them. "I can take care of myself."

The three exchanged looks. Suzume's eyes narrowed and she gazed firmly at them. "Stay out of this one."

"Suzume," Temari began.

"Promise me," she said sternly.

The shinobi hesitated for a second more before consenting and Suzume, satisfied with their answer, disappeared into her room.

The next day, Suzume marched into the teacher's office and straight up to the instructor she had threatened just the day before. She held out a letter for him to accept and he did so tentatively. His eyes became rounder and rounder the more he read and he looked up in astonishment at her.

"Wouldn't you like me to put those Concepts and Principles to practice," Suzume's eyes were dangerous, "sensei?"