Chapter Two

"The future belongs to he who has the bishops." - Siegbert Tarrasch

Interlude

Suigetsu and Karin were sitting in chairs around him as Sasuke sat on the bed and waited for the medical ninja to finish rewrapping a wound around his arm. It was that blonde nurse that seemed so popular with the male shinobi. He suspected that half of the injured shinobi were hanging around a day or two longer in the hope that she would come around to check their vitals or rewrap their wounds. Pathetic.

"So do you know what you plan to do now that the war's over, Sasuke?" wondered the girl. "Are you going to return to Konoha?"

Sasuke raised an eyebrow at her. "Frankly, that's none of your business."

Rather than look insulted like others might have, she merely chuckled. "That sounds like the Sasuke, I remember."

"Well I don't remember you," Sasuke snapped rolling his eyes.

She blinked at him. "We talked on the battlefield when you arrived with the Hokages. Don't you remember?"

"Am I supposed to?" he wondered.

The girl sighed. "I'm Yamanaka Ino. We were in the same class at the academy and both took the chunin exams at the same time. Nara Shikamaru and Akimichi Choji are my teammates."

Sasuke blinked at the names. He did remember her. She was always hanging off him and generally being a nuisance. He recognized her on the battlefield when she was standing next to her teammates, but he didn't recognize her in her medical ninja uniform. "That's strange. You aren't like I remember."

Ino finished rolling the bandage and rolled her eyes. "Of course you wouldn't remember someone who was your classmate for seven years. Have a nice life, Sasuke."

Sasuke watched her go curiously. He wasn't sure why he hadn't recognized her. Her identity had been so obvious when she was standing next to her teammates. Sasuke had always paid close attention to Nara Shikamaru because the Nara boy reminded him a lot of his brother, another strategic genius. So Yamanaka Ino was often in that periphery. He couldn't place it, but something felt very different from what he remembered of her from the academy but by the same token something about her felt extremely familiar to him.

He had probably just gotten hit too hard during the war.

Suigetsu chuckled from beside him. "Why are you scaring away the pretty nurses, Sasuke?"

"She's not that pretty." Sasuke shrugged.

Suigetsu snorted. "She's very pretty. Are you going blind from overusing your Sharingan? Maybe that's your problem."

"I don't like blondes," said Sasuke.

"Well, that's a little less competition for me," Suigetsu chuckled.

Karin snorted. "Good luck with that, jackass. She's got every other shinobi in the place panting after her. It's pathetic."

"You're just jealous," countered Suigetsu.

"I'm not jealous," Karin snapped. "I'm just as pretty as she is."

Suigetsu laughed out loud at that remark, which caused Karin to growl and hit him over the head. Sasuke rolled his eyes at their antics. "It's weird," Sasuke mused. "I probably should have recognized her. But something feels different about her, something different from the Yamanaka Ino I remembered from the academy."

"Yeah, because she's a hot seventeen year old now instead of a knobbly kneed twelve year old, you dunce," replied Suigetsu.

Karin was silent. As she watched the blonde kunoichi walk over to help another patient, the Uzumaki girl pursed her lips in thought.

Uchiha Sasuke

Compared to the other feats he had accomplished, the jonin examination was a breeze. He had been certain that Kakashi, the Hokage, was going to make him and Naruto go through the next chunin exams after the war. It was just the sort of joke Kakashi enjoyed. However Konoha had awarded both of them as well as Sasuke's teammates battlefield chunin promotions on May 1st. Sasuke only remembered the day because he had checked to make sure that it wasn't April 1st. Konoha didn't want to run the risk of another village trying to lay claim to Sasuke. They wanted to secure the last Uchiha's loyalty. Juugo had gone and fallen in love with some kunoichi from Iwa, so he was settling over there. Karin and Suigetsu joined Sasuke in Konoha.

Sasuke was now working as one of Kakashi's ANBU. It was an elite squad that asked few questions of him and didn't have all the fawning women. It was wonderful. His ANBU captain had been a good guy. His other two teammates weren't the greatest, but he could handle them well enough. The dobe was there of course, but on a different team, which suited him just fine. He would be getting a new team member soon. He wondered who it would be.

Suigetsu was lounging at the table in their kitchen taunting Karin about something or other again. "T&I? Do you really think they'd let a foreign ninja work in that department? Konoha ninjas are soft hearted, but I hope their heads aren't that soft."

When Sasuke returned to Konoha, he moved back into his house in the Uchiha district. Karin and Suigetsu had decided to move in with him too. He was unable to persuade them otherwise.

Karin threw one the rice balls she had made last night at Suigetsu's head which burst into water to avoid the impact. "We're not foreign ninjas here. We've been instated as Konoha ninjas, so I can work wherever I please."

"You do have a lot of experience with torture," Suigetsu muttered around his onigiri. "They'd be lucky to have you."

"What's that supposed to mean?"

Suigetsu shrugged, his eyes glittering. "Just that I'm sure you'll be able to assist the Department in thinking of new and creative ways for torture people."

Karin folded her arms over her chest. She took slight offense to being reminded of the sort of work she was required to do under Orochimaru. "I won't be torturing anyone. I can tell when people are lying by the fluctuations in their chakra. I'm going to be a sort of human lie detector there."

"Hn," muttered Sasuke. "I thought you'd go and work at the hospital or something."

"And have strangers suck on my chakra? No thanks!"

Sasuke made a face. "You would probably just heal people the normal way. No need to use your special ability."

Karin rolled her eyes. "Sure, it would start that way, but if there was a special case, where my special ability could save someone's life, they would make me use it."

"Did you know that they wanted me to take on some kenjutsu apprentices?" said Suigetsu. "Apparently I'm one of the best kenjutsu users in Konoha, little old me. Who would have thought?"

"You are one of the last legendary swordsmen," said Sasuke.

"Are they trying to start the new generation in Kiri?" wondered Karin. "I heard that Chojuro guy was starting it up again."

"Have you been reading my mail?" accused Suigetsu.

"If you leave it open on the table, I'm going to read it," retorted Karin. "Do you think you'll join up with them? Chojuro seemed pretty excited about leading the team with you on it."

"Meh, Chojuro's a pansy."

Karin smiled smugly at him. "Well he did manage to retrieve Samehada, something you were unable to do."

Suigetsu glared at Karin. "That was politics. Kumo gave it back to the swordsmen of Kiri. They couldn't very well hand it over to a random swordsman settled in Konoha. I just plan to steal it back when I get a chance."

Sasuke stood up from the table. "Well I'm going to train with Naruto."

"Later, Sasuke," called Suigetsu and Karin as Sasuke headed outside.

He could still hear them arguing at the table. "I don't see why you won't return to Kiri. It's your village and they're anxious to have you back."

"I don't see you hurrying back to Kusa either."

"Well that's different. I'm not from Kusa, I'm from Uzushiogakure. I was a refugee in Kusa. Besides I have family here."

"You don't have family here," came Suigetsu's voice. "And don't make up some crap about Sasuke."

"Uzumaki Naruto. He's my cousin."

"Nah. He's a distant cousin at best. You'd never heard of him before. And if you go by that logic, you've probably got family in every village. The Uzumaki clan settled all over after their village was destroyed. Konoha, Kusa, Ame, Kiri, Kumo. The Mizukage's a member of the Uzumaki clan too. Maybe you should go to Kiri with me. I bet you'd love that."

"Not on your life, fish breath!"

Interlude

Shikamaru didn't know what the big deal was, why he was kept cooling his heels in the medical tent for so long. Yes, it was standard procedure, but he didn't have anything more serious than chakra exhaustion. Uzumaki Naruto, who probably couldn't even spell chakra exhaustion, let alone know what it was, wandered around the medical tents, shaking hands. He was so excited to meet all of the people who had fought with him in the war. Naruto was a politician at heart. He would make a great Hokage in several years.

Speaking of the kages, he wondered what was going on at the high security tent at the edge of the clearing. Sakura, Shizune, C and some of the other senior medical ninjas were over there trying to patch up the kages.

There were whispers around the camp that all five kages had been very seriously injured in their battle against Uchiha Madara. Shikamaru didn't know for sure what was going on, but from the defeated look in Shizune's eyes when he caught a glimpse of her the previous day, he knew that Tsunade was dead. When the Hokage had been in a coma after Pein's attack, Shizune had been tense and upset and sad, but she hadn't looked so devoid of hope.

Ino wandered about the camp restlessly; she didn't seem to sleep. She had done tremendous work during the war, including communicating via Yamanaka telepathy with every shinobi on the battlefield. Of course Ino had kicked up a fuss when the medical team went to diagnose her when she arrived with the others. She quietly and firmly informed them that she had completed her self-diagnosis and it was chakra exhaustion and she would merely require rest. After she recovered from her chakra exhaustion, she asked to be added to the medical ninja rotation.

Ino had done her medical training under Shizune several years back and was considerably skilled in her own right. Whenever Shikamaru saw her around the medical tents, he always noticed the stares of the injured shinobi and male medical ninjas tracking her movements. She was beautiful of course, but he was growing to hate the dark circles and the dead look in her eyes.

One day as he was sitting in the mess tent and enjoying a late breakfast, Sabaku no Temari sat down across from him. The clatter of her tray caused him to look up surprise. Picking up her spoon and digging into her oatmeal with gusto, she sighed happily. "Beautiful day isn't it."

Shikamaru rolled his eyes. "Sure. I guess Gaara-sama's doing alright then?"

"My baby brother, the Kazekage?" Temari wondered, tapping the back of her spoon against her lips. "Fine as a fiddle. Thanks to Konoha's medical ninjas. That Haruno Sakura really is something. She's saved both my brother's lives now. Not a debt I can easily repay."

Shikamaru smiled at her before returning to his own oatmeal. "I'm sure that she wouldn't want you to feel like you need to repay it."

"I guess she takes after her teammate Uzumaki Naruto in that respect. Have you seen him running around the camp shaking hands and kissing babies? Extraordinary."

"I didn't realize that there were any babies in the camp."

"Meh, it's an expression."

Shikamaru rolled his eyes. He glanced at her. "I guess you can't tell me about the status of any of the other kages."

Temari looked uncomfortable. "I…"

"Tsunade-sama's dead. Isn't she."

Temari blinked in surprise. "That's supposed to be confidential. How did you-"

Shikamaru shrugged. "I saw how upset Shizune looked and made an educated guess."

Temari sighed, "You really are a genius, aren't you, Shikamaru?"

Shikamaru laughed self-deprecatingly, "Not when it comes to human nature. I learned that from Ino."

Temari sat back in her seat before remarking. "Kankuro's starting to get worried about your pretty blonde friend."

"Who, Naruto?"

Temari couldn't help herself. She let out a loud giggle of surprise. "No, not Naruto. Ino."

"Oh. Well that makes two of us," said Shikamaru without missing a beat.

A:N: Please review!