Title: What Your Eyes Can See
Author: D.L. SchizoAuthoress
Rating: PG
Warnings: some language
Date: March 9th, 2006
"What Your Eyes Can See"
Sasuke pushes himself during his private training with Kakashi-sensei, following the preliminary matches of the Chuunin Exam. He has to. It's slightly more than what Kakashi demands, although the silver-haired jounin demands a lot.
When Kakashi orders him to practice his taijutsu, Sasuke throws himself into it wholeheartedly, determined to improve. He is so zealous in his punching drills, in fact, that the torn-up, bloodied condition of his hands sometimes passes unnoticed by him for several minutes.
You saw his hands, right?
Naruto's words echo in Sasuke's mind, mockingly. When he recalls his fight with Rock Lee, Sasuke grits his teeth and pushes himself farther, trying to reduce the time between his strikes. He must improve. He must!
'What good is this Sharingan of mine,' Sasuke thinks once, as he tries to keep up with Kakashi-sensei's movements, 'this damned bloodline limitation that makes me such a 'genius'?'
His body is not as strong as his mind, nor is it as fast. He, too, must become a hard-working type. He must constantly train his body in the taijutsu style that his Sharingan saw. In Gai-sensei's style.
In Rock Lee's style.
That fuzzy eyebrow guy must have trained a lot, every day...
Every single day of that month, under the watchful eye of Kakashi whether he knows it or not, Sasuke practices. He learns more and more, once he's gotten past the stumbling block of his speed. He learns how to dash from place to place as quickly as Lee had, how to let his body flow with each strike to maximize the damage dealt.
And every day, Sasuke thinks of Rock Lee. Kakashi has told him of the outcome of Lee's match against Gaara. To think of Lee, who had to work so hard -- and against such odds -- so badly hurt... Sasuke shies away from the image of Lee lying in a hospital bed, unable to deal with or explain the pain in his heart when he contemplates such a thing. But as he improves daily, becoming stronger and faster, he cannot help but wonder.
'How long did it take Lee to become this strong? This fast?'
Sasuke knows that he still has an unfair advantage, an advantage that Rock Lee will never have. He is an Uchiha, after all. A genius.
Trained more than you.
As Sasuke is taught the Chidori, he realizes that Lee could not beat him now. For some reason, that makes him sad. Lee would be a much more tolerable rival than Naruto...more polite, at least. But now Sasuke has surpassed him, while Lee falls behind, too badly injured to train.
Part of Sasuke is bothered, occupied with finding out the reason why the thought of Lee pushes him to greater lengths the way that it does. He wonders, absently, as he spars with his teacher, why he is also wishing that he could face off with Lee once again.
That's all there is to it.
And Sasuke wonders, watching the sunset, when Lee will run those five hundred laps around the training grounds. He is sure that Lee will, no matter how long it takes for him to get back into proper condition.
He hopes that Lee will want some company when he does.