Empty Glass Jars

ATAIRA

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Rating: M, PG-16 Language, violence, lime, shonen-ai

Disclaimer: Naruto belongs solely to its creator and the people who control its name and empire. I make absolutely no profit from Naruto.

Summary: Even as their lives seem to cross more and more, Sasuke and Sai pursue perfection, power and release. But nothing ever comes easily, and both will pay the price too willingly.

AN: I know everyone thought about this, so please excuse me for acting my bad, bad thoughts. Blame Kishimoto-san!

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Orochimaru was a little annoyed when he had to move from his top secret, evil, underground lair for the fifth time that month. It seemed as if Sunagakure had some kind of ping on his location, what with their constant scouting of his movements. He sighed and scratched his head. He'd have to remember to tell Kabuto to comb through the riffraff in their current location and kill off possible spies.

"Kabuto," Immediately after he called out, the bespectacled shinobi appeared by his side, "are you prepared for our trip yet?"

Kabuto took out a small notebook and opened to a page full of lists, "I'm only missing about three different snake toxins, but for the most part, I think I'm ready."

"You were on your way to get them just now?"

"Yes, I'm heading to the burrows now."

"Where are you guys going?" Suddenly they were both alerted to the presence of Orochimaru's young charge. The Uchiha boy was balancing on a stalagmite in the shadows. They could make out his reddish eyes whirling slightly, reading Kabuto's small book from far away. Kabuto snapped it closed and put it away.

"We're going apple-picking, Sasuke," Orochimaru suddenly smiled, "I thought you were supposed to be training, finished early?"

"I want to go, too," Sasuke ignored Orochimaru's question. They stared pensively at each other, and Kabuto grumbled and disappeared. He didn't even bother wondering whether or not he'd have to accommodate another person into his carefully thought out plans. Sasuke just had to flash his sharingan eyes and Orochimaru couldn't resist anything his pretty doll asked. Kabuto frowned when the sleepy snake barely lifted its head when he approached it. Nothing in this damn lair had any respect for him.

-----

When they had reached the lookout point, Kabuto quickly took out his calculation tools to see how long the poison could last before it start to lose its sharpness. Orochimaru leaned against a tree and looked down into the valley pass. It was fairly narrow between the hulking forest-covered mountains. Here was where the path wound tightly; where a large caravan would have trouble passing the slender twisting path. Orochimaru nodded to himself.

"I see them," Sasuke suddenly pointed to the turn of the pass where a line of vehicles seemed to be entering the valley, "You haven't yet explained why we're targeting such a weak shinobi."

Kabuto's eyebrow raised, "He's one of kazekage's special committee of advisors, and you have the gall to call him weak?"

Sasuke's eyes suddenly narrowed at the main carriage, which bore the proud Sunagakure insignia. The red sharingan swirled rapidly, piercing into the carriage and examining its passenger before slowing and turning onto Orochimaru, "He's weak." and the unspoken message was clear to the older men. You two were making such a big deal about preparing for this mission, and the target wasn't worth a single kunai throw. Orochimaru smiled in a placating manner.

"We can't just kill him, Sasuke-kun. We need to use the poisons Kabuto prepared from my own test subjects. Completely untraceable-- not even I could tell what killed him. we need to make sure that the people who find Tsuzuki-san have no clue who killed him, or things may get nasty for us again," he explained calmly even though his eyes were flicking back and forth, watching as the long line of lavish vehicles came closer to their lookout spot, "He's heading the investigation that's tailing me and following us all over the place. I'm sure there's some kind of alliance with Konohagakure as well, because his information is very accurate."

Kabuto was already fitting the crystal vials to what looked like some kind of spraying apparatus. He noticed Sasuke's scrutiny and waved the weapon at him, "It ejects the fluid as a gas into his personal carriage. Once inhaled, it takes about 40 seconds to fully paralyze his central nervous system. I'm not quite sure what happens to the physical poison after that, but I hypothesize that it is absorbed into the system--"

"Shh," Orochimaru's pupils suddenly stilled, and his eyes narrowed slightly. The caravan was nearly in front of them, and Orochimaru's hypersensitive hearing could make out the horses' footfalls against the dirt road. Kabuto frowned, they weren't close enough for him to move in and shoot the poison into the carriage, still another 305.9 feet... But before his train of thought even completed, he felt a shudder rush through him.

"Your theory was correct, Kabuto," Orochimaru whispered, "Someone's arrived…oh! He's gone now." Sasuke turned to his mentor, a question in the knit in his eyebrows. Kabuto, on the other hand, understood. No matter how much stronger Sasuke thought he was in comparison to his mentor, Orochimaru was called a legendary sannin for a reason. He could pick out a presence no matter how well cloaked it was. His tongue was now flicking out and tasting the air around them.

"Let's get closer," he said suddenly. In a glimmer of muted chakra, they disappeared to reappear lower on the mountain, closer to the pass. Their presences were instinctively subdued, practically invisible to any of the Suna shinobi. Sasuke noticed that Kabuto had already dismantled the peculiar shooting weapon and put it away.

"They actually sent someone, I can't believe it," Orochimaru was grinning wickedly to himself. Then, in what must have been a blink of an eye, the caravan of traveling Suna vehicles they were watching was thrown into chaos.

Something had attacked from the other side of the valley pass. Immediately Sasuke's eyes flashed red again, whirring and watching the fight break out. But almost as soon as Sasuke could focus on the caravan, the fight was over. The Suna shinobi first attacked didn't even have the time to draw a weapon, and the quick jutsus the later-attacked constructed were completely useless against an attacker going so fast that he was nearly invisible. Sasuke looked around quickly and only saw how the horses bolted, their killed riders still in mid-fall. The attacker was gone, and the only evidence he was there was the warm blood quickly staining desert uniforms. There wasn't any sign of human life in the whole caravan.

Before Orochimaru could stop him (Kabuto didn't even bother), Sasuke took off. His eyes were already miles ahead of him, watching the black-clothed nin maneuver through the dense forested mountains as if they were open meadows. He was quickly gaining on him though, his fingers already itching with flashes of blue. His blood was boiling and he had to admit that he was intrigued.

Being locked inside lairs was getting boring and his boredom was his reason for muscling his way into Orochimaru and Kabuto's mission. He had hoped to experience some action in the beginning, felt a bit down when he heard of Kabuto's lame poison plan, and now he discovered someone who just took out an entire Suna caravan in less than 30 seconds. Sasuke shivered with excitement; he had found an attacker almost as good as himself.

Suddenly, he dodged his head, already seeing and anticipating the attack. It was probing, a mere shuriken. But the sword following was not a question; it was meant to kill. Sasuke dodged rapid attacks, each one followed swiftly, cleanly. The attacker was so fast the only time he could break his intense concentration was when the attacker fell back to attempt an escape. Sasuke also jumped back to another tree branch and caught a glimpse of the other's face as he turned to escape.

A white mask with red swirls, black ties anchoring it behind the head.

Sasuke smirked. Just as he first suspected-- a Konohagakure ANBU. But Sasuke also had a weird feeling that he was familiar with the ANBU, but the ANBU shinobi's chakra signature, his presence and aura, were completely restrained. Sasuke tried to pinpoint why the ANBU seemed so familiar to him while he chased him through the forest. He decided he'd just have to follow him and force him to fight and reveal his identity. The mask would be a nice souvenir for his troubles and he was sure it would look nice in his sparse room.

The ANBU nin dodged quite a few of his jutsus easily, and finally stopped when he'd reached a clearing where the trees were not quite as dense. Sasuke, always right on his tail, threw a fistful of chidori to distract him and then attacked rapidly in a fluid sequence of hand to hand attacks, each one boosted with a deadly chakra that forced a defensive chakra-supported response. But each reaction he got was extremely controlled, as the ANBU had to make sure his identity remained completely concealed. But with each burst of defensive chakra, Sasuke could feel the recognition growing, and finally--

Sasuke broke through a suddenly weak defense, his chakra-sharpened hands cutting through cloth, metal-plating, flak and skin--

Shit...Sasuke withdrew his hands from an extremely well made copy. The copy burst into a little faceless doll that fell to the forest floor. It had replaced the ANBU at the last moment, which explained the fall of his defense. He should have seen that, but he was distracted by that growing desire to uncover the Konoha nin's identity. Sasuke mentally berated himself as he continued jumping from tree to tree, shadowing the ANBU. They were going at breakneck speeds now, causing the branches they jumped on to explode from the violent pulses of chakra that propelled them faster and faster.

A clear smile was on Sasuke's face now. This ANBU was good, and it annoyed him slightly that some mere underling of Konoha could keep him running this fast for this long. Sasuke could feel his pulse racing, blood rising and anticipating the kill. It would be a pleasure to destroy this slippery ANBU. He stopped abruptly on a sturdy tree branch, and spread his feet far apart for leverage. He hadn't quite perfected this technique that he could execute it while in motion. Without wasting another second, he broke the thumb on his left hand.

Sasuke quickly twisted his hands in a blur of seals and felt the chakra coursing wildly through his body. The chakra that burst forth actually pushed back on his arms and shoved him back angrily, whining and screaming in fury. Searing heat forced him to close his eyes, his hair blown away from his face, and the smell of pure destruction quickly overcame him. Everything in its path was immediately vaporized and everything further away from the initial wave blew up in a flash of chakra-fueled fire

Sasuke detested having to resort to such a powerful fire-jutsu just to stop the ANBU shinobi. He really had been hoping for a hand-to-hand combat and the opportunity to test his reflexes on another ninja.

But the fire-jutsu had done as he intended. When the blast finally stilled, it had completely seared the entire face of the mountain, leaving a charred wasteland littered with blackened stumps and (what?!) a Konohagakure ninja crouched close to the ground. In a whirl of blackened char and splinters, Sasuke stood before the crouched ninja.

The white mask was still amazingly intact, but the ties were completely burned-- the only thing holding the mask up to the ANBU's face was a trembling hand. The other hand was held out in front of him, and traces of the defensive barrier jutsu were still crackling around his fingers. But Sasuke was glad to see that most of the shinobi's gloves and sleeves were burned off, even if the skin wasn't.

Shit! Sasuke's frown deepened, not a drop of blood yet! He stepped closer to shinobi kneeled before him, watching for any surprise attacks and also watching just in case he had anymore dolls to replace himself with.

"Who are you?" Sasuke looked over the slender body, masculine shoulders and pale forearms. The shinobi just crouched there, his chest heaving, probably from powering a jutsu strong enough to guard him from the fierce fire blast. Kabuto generally complained whenever Sasuke used that particular jutsu on him during the training spars.

Sasuke was about to strike out again, this time with the long zai he had kept on his belt, but he could see the trickle of chakra suddenly burst from the ANBU shinobi. This time, Sasuke didn't fall back and let the other run, and he pressed on, the zai already aimed at a huge open spot on the ANBU's chest.

But the escape-jutsu was faster than he expected, and it was far more complex than any escape-jutsu he'd ever witnessed. The zai cut into the others' personal space, chakra-sharpened blade slicing into the metal guard on the others' chest, and suddenly Sasuke's zai lost its tension. The tip fell slightly and struck air.

The shinobi escaped. Sasuke stared at the empty space, where none of the air had even been displaced in the sudden escape. He immediately tried to find the ANBU shinobi again, his eyes scanning the mountainsides rapidly, piercing through the dense forest. Nothing. It was like as if he'd completely disappeared from this side of the mountain ridge, possibly into the desert on the other side.

"Aaahhh give it up," Kabuto landed behind Sasuke, shouldering his bag with an annoyed expression on his face, "he's probably already outside the Konoha gates by now."

"What?" Sasuke snapped, "How could he be there?" They were at least three countries away from Konoha. But Kabuto merely took off his glasses to wipe them with the edge of his shirt.

"The jutsu he used," he breathed on a lens, peering into it, "it's one of those quasi-forbidden types, something about the amount of power it draws from one's life force in order to execute such a rapid withdrawal from this current timeframe. Only certain level jounin are allowed to use them, and that includes anyone on an ANBU rank mission. Although I'm surprised he didn't try to kill you instead of going through such lengths to escape."

"Of course he wouldn't try to kill Sasuke-kun." Orochimaru had slunk up behind both of his favorite underlings, "Didn't you hear him last time he paid a visit, Kabuto?" he was picking up the ashes from the burnt ground and throwing them in the still air, "Some heartfelt nonsense about 'protecting Sasuke's bonds.' He was very sincere; I could almost taste the emotion in the air. Sasuke-kun, look at the state of this forest! You still need to learn control."

But Sasuke wasn't listening. In fact, there was a dull buzzing in his head that sparked when he recalled that pale smiling face. It was that boy who was so insignificant that Sasuke had totally ignored his presence in the entire underground cave. He couldn't believe it, that mere shinobi had eluded him for so long?! "Was that...that feminine weakling from the old base? The one with Team 7?"

"Yeah," Orochimaru frowned at Sasuke, staring at his ward quizzically before shrugging, "I always forget people can't identify others by the smell of their body."

"He was weak when I first met him!" Sasuke turned to Orochimaru with a furious expression on his face, "Why the hell was he so fast today? Didn't I quell him with one look last time?" there was a sparkle of chakra touching his fingertips and his eyes were angry red slits. His mentor looked unimpressed.

"You met him when he was on an espionage-type mission where the objective was to assimilate and then assassinate. Of course he had to be as harmless as possible around us." Orochimaru explained, "Today was different. If he was wearing an ANBU mask then that means he had no restraints. You got to see him with no fetters today, and he's a surprisingly good match, isn't he, Sasuke-kun?" Kabuto groaned…that wasn't going to go well with the boy and his inferiority issues.

Sasuke felt like as if someone had taken a jackhammer to his first five spinal nerves. The anger was translating to pain in his body-- self loathing and shock coursed through him, "That bastard was a fucking worm a month ago!" and a month later he was able to erect a barrier strong enough to guard himself from a full frontal fire-blast jutsu?! "What happened?!"

"He was hiding his power from you, get over it." Kabuto finally snapped, annoyed with the continual Uchiha angst, "Now let's go. I have to write a blackmail letter to Tsunade-sama AND start packing so we can move to the next base--" Orochimaru sighed, he hated all of this moving, "--because you failed to kill your replacement buddy, and now he's going to tell his superiors that he's sighted us. It'll take three hours to get going, so I don't want to dally--"

A quick glare after catching Kabuto's eye was all it took to shut up the grey-haired man and make him stumble back a few feet, seeing a death that involved many different shaped suitcases. Sasuke stalked away, his angry prowl disturbing the ashes swirling in the cooling air.

"So..." Orochimaru said to Kabuto, who was shaking his head and wiping the sudden sweat from his forehead, "Not only does he have Naruto-kun to compare himself to, but now this girly man. Ah, Kabuto, what was his name again?"

"Sai," Kabuto coughed, "At least that was his name for that mission."

Orochimaru sighed unhappily as he performed a few hand seals, "I hate it when they change their names all the time, just like changing lairs every week. You finally get used to one when..." he slowly disappeared from sight, "...you have to leave it behind."

-----

Tsunade had the decency to pull her robe closed before she admitted the ANBU shinobi standing outside her door. It came in quietly, and (even though, for some reason, it was holding its mask to its face with one hand) stood before her in a firm stance that belied no injury. She nodded to it and opened her desk drawer to take out its file. She opened the file on her desk and uncapped a pen.

"Mission accomplished." the ANBU shinobi said automatically. Tsunade checked a box on the top paper, "Unharmed." another box was checked, although she glanced upwards at the shinobi while marking the paper. She wasn't even going to ask it the obvious question; there was no way its chakra flow was that messed up from a simple assassination mission. Plus, it could read the question Tsunade's eyes and body language, "Unsuccessful escape, met with resistance not involved with what was indicated in mission parameters."

"Elaborate."

"Was pursued by missing-nin Uchiha Sasuke. He was accompanied, though not at the time of pursuit, with missing-nins Yakushi Kabuto and Orochimaru."

Tsunade's interest was increased tenfold, "But you did not kill them, even though they were possible witnesses?"

"It was not in the mission parameters."

This was one thing that irked her about this ANBU shinobi in particular. It followed its mission instructions faultlessly. It could have gained some kind of information from a fight with Sasuke, although, after brief consideration, it could have also died if Kabuto and Oro decided to join Sasuke. Tsunade jotted a few lines on the mission assignment paper. If she knew Orochimaru had already targeted Tsuzuki, she and kazekage wouldn't have had to risk this messy plan. So much for being two steps ahead…

She interrogated the shinobi briefly on where exactly it had met the resistance, how long the chase and skirmish had taken, and the level of threat the shinobi had encountered from the resistance. After a few more questions she needed for more boring official reasons, Tsunade closed the file and put it back into the drawer.

"Mission end." she said. Immediately the ANBU shinobi lowered its mask and put it away inside its chest armor. Tsunade inspected the smiling face and snapped her fingers and pointed to the chair across her desk.

"Sit. You look like crap," she said before leaning forward, "Tell me, what did he do? Your gloves are gone and you look like--"

Sai's smile disappeared, a sign of how tired he was, "-crap. Yes, you said. He's mastered some kind of fire-blast technique. You should go with some jounin and inspect it yourself. I'll go with you if you require my assistance."

"We heard news of the blast from a band of nomadic desert families that felt some of the outer shocks. How many salas has the bastard pumped into it?"

Sai looked pensive for a moment, staring at the dark blinds, "I'd say...400 salas. Maybe 500, but I wasn't really able to gauge it properly, considering I was being hit almost head-on."

"400!"

Sai nodded, still smiling, "Strangely enough, there wasn't a mushroom cloud..." at that point Tsunade wasn't listening. She quickly shot him out of her office into the direction of the hospital, a little annoyed that he wasn't dead after being attacked with 400 salas of chakra. She huffed angrily, another testament that there was no power greater than youth, like it or not. Well, at least he was limping a little! She grinned to herself as she fiddled with the ties that hung near her waist. The children of the village never ceased to amaze her, ANBU prodigies or not. Really, she was starting to feel as if her body was starting to fail her faster than she expected.

Tsunade stared pensively at the dark curtains, her sigh covered by the rustling sound her robe made as she dropped it on her desk. At least there were some things that her body could still do in its old age.

"Shizune," she called out into thin air. Immediately the shinobi appeared beside her, a wicked smile forming on the small face.

-----

He never understood the unfailing ability for his team mates to show up on time. One would think that after the first two times Kakashi-sensei showed up excessively late, they would use that extra hour and a half to do something else more productive than stand around.

But Sai nevertheless joined his team mates early that morning. Naruto ignored his presence completely and Sakura immediately greeted him with ill-concealed excitement.

"Good morning!"

"Good morning," Sai responded, "Why is your expression so animated today?"

"You haven't heard yet because you were doing your special training," Sakura said, "But news is that three days ago Tsuzuki-san of Sunagakure, one of Konoha's biggest allies in the search for Akatsuki and Orochimaru, was assassinated on the way here!"

"No way!" Sai gasped. Perfect intake of breath, eyebrows shot up nicely.

"Yeah, everyone is shocked! A lot of people suspected that it was inside politics-- that Gaara had assigned the mission to someone within their force, but every single Suna nin was accounted for. So the conspiracy theorists had nothing to go on."

"Why would anyone suspect Gaara?" Sai sat next to Naruto, who was faking sleep against a tree. Sakura crouched before them.

"Well, Tsuzuki was supposed to be one of Gaara's biggest opponents in his committee, and he had special backing from a lot of lords, something that Gaara could never gain. But because there's no evidence of foul play, people were pointing at someone else."

"Who?"

"Konoha, of course. Tsunade still supports Gaara even if the lords of Fire Country don't. It was a speculation that she had cut a secret deal with the kazekage. But when the elders started to call for a trial, the coroner's report came through."

"All this speculation before a report was heard?"

"Of course. It ends up," Sakura was nearly vibrating with excitement, "Tsuzuki-san and his bodyguards were all killed by the same technique only identified with one person!"

Sai's eyes widened perfectly, a facial expression he knew was right for this situation, "Whose technique?"

"Sasuke's!"

"IT'S ALL BULLSHIT!" Naruto, who had obviously been listening all along, suddenly stood and yelled loudly, "Sasuke doesn't care a rat's ass about politics! People just like blaming things on him because he's a missing-nin! Well I'm going to bring him back and clear this mess up! It's so annoying when someone's accused for something they didn't do!"

"Sakura-chan," Sai smiled suddenly, "Naruto sounds really homo when he says these things, doesn't he? Haven't you noticed this?"

"AGH! BASTARD!!"

Before either of them could start a fight, a voice floated upon them from the treetops, "Sakura-chan, you missed the most important part of all." Kakashi dropped lightly in front of the rest of Team 7, "Tsunade-sama has given us a green light to carry out an investigation to find Sasuke."

"I was going to say that," Sakura grumbled, "Before the dobe totally interrupted." But Naruto didn't even hear her, already filled with renewed fighting spirit when reminded of Tsunade's promise to them. He was already lost in an internal monologue filled with valiant promises and painful memories.

"So, Sai-kun," Kakashi suddenly leaned into Sai's territory, "Do you think you might know something that we don't?"

"Whaaat?!" Naruto suddenly snapped out of his reverie and looked furious, "Does this Root guy know something that we don't?! What the hell, tell us whatever you heard, you bastard!"

Sakura stepped forwards as well, "Kakashi-sensei, I don't understand…why would you say that?" But Kakashi waited patiently, his visible eye in a smiling arch even though he was dangerously in another jounin's personal space. Sai could feel the pressure of Naruto's threatening aura and Sakura's slightly suspicious stare.

But the white mask with red swirls was not attached to his face anymore. That person was not the one being questioned now.

"Why Kakashi-sensei, I wouldn't know anything you don't already know."

Kakashi understood just as well as any other ANBU shinobi that what happened while one wore the mask stayed strictly with that mask-wearer. The shinobi who took it off was a completely different person altogether. Kakashi looked back and watched as Sakura and Naruto tried to make a protesting Sai carry their knapsacks for them. But Kakashi had been hoping that something…something would have made Sai relent some information.

Sai smiled as he threatened to drop the knapsacks into the deep ravine. It was a perfect smile, one full of equal amounts of humor and threat.

Kakashi turned back and scratched his head. He was getting old, so full of wishful thinking.

To Be Continued…