Update! Heeeey!
I thought I'd go with the oneshot version. They won't be chronological, but I think it'll be obvious in which order to read them. If it's not, I'll post a guide at one point.
iyaoyas: I also thought he got off too easy, but don't have it in me to make this all torture, I don't think. Mostly because I like playing with Sasuke too much. But I'll certainly make him struggle:D
"What did you do."
It wasn't a question as much as it was a threat. "Us?" Sakura squawked. "What did YOU do?" The dobe's chopsticks dropped into his bowl, spraying ramen everywhere. Kakashi raised an eyebrow.
This was, sadly, not a new reaction for Sasuke. He'd garnered stares wherever he went for the past two months, since he'd finally been allowed back into the village proper. But today the stares were absolutely justified, as he limped along, left eye blackened and swollen shut, his arms only haphazardly bandaged, red bleeding through on various spots. He was also pretty sure his nose was broken. Sakura's hands shot out reflexively to help, the green glow of her healing chakra already sparking between her fingers. "DON'T touch me. I'm not allowed to get this healed. What did you do?" Naruto still gaped at him. "We didn't do anything! We just – you've been back for almost half a year, teme! We wanted a mission together! You're already back in the village, it's time you come back to team 7."
Kakashi whistled lowly. "Someone's pissed off the captain."
"Your captain did this?"Sakura's face twisted in a mix of disbelief and anger. No, the captain did not do this. She only gave the command that sent him through hell and back, but the actual dirty work was carried out by the rest of the team. "What the hell, teme! We only wanted a mission!"
"Squad 4", their sensei informed them pointedly, "doesn't take too kindly to someone pulling their members. You can just request someone different, but nobody's going to send an innocent to them."
"So no mission", the blond idiot whined.
Yes mission, actually. The next day Sasaki-taichou informed them that they would be spending two months undercover in Rain. Or at least that had been the plan. Because Sasuke now had a cushy escort mission with team 7, and they were now a man short and so seven weeks turned into nine. When Hotaka 'accidently' broke two of his fingers that day, all medics were suddenly incredibly busy. And he'd thought the hazing was over.
The escort mission went off without a hitch of course. Sasuke found his patience for his old team – and civilians with their naïve, romanticized notions of what it means to be a ninja – had not increased since he was twelve. So 'without a hitch', actually meant they got the bride to her husband-to-be without injuries. It also involved a ridiculous brawl with Naruto, disappointed stares from Kakashi-sensei and Sakura no longer speaking to him.
Why did he feel like this had been inevitable?
And why was he the only one?
The only comfort were the five to seven weeks to himself until the horror squad came back to end him.
It were a long few weeks.
Back at the barracks he was greeted by even colder stares than usual. For the first time in months the word 'traitor' followed him like a bad smell. Very much, and at the same time very unlike, five and a half months ago. He found he hadn't missed it at all.
"If Miki-chan dies, you are getting me another piece of ass", one of his roommates hissed. "As if you ever had a piece of hers", a random tiger mask snorts from behind. "Almost, ok? – I was this close."
"Don't stick your dick in crazy", Tora advised and vanished. But not before delivering a swift, vicious kick to Sasuke's instep.
The next day all his left shoes were gone.
Someone had strung up his training gear along the rafters of barrack 19, home to the perpetually horny seduction squad.
All training grounds were mysteriously booked for squad drills.
The latter forced him to use one of the public grounds close to the compound, where he was immediately circled by a bunch of masked ANBU like vultures. He knew what was coming.
The first blow hit him into the instep. Tora. He was wearing a dog mask now, but the way his foot found the exact sore spot was unmistakable.
He blocked two kicks, aimed to shatter his knees. A cat mask burst from below his feet and was stopped by Sasuke's boot into their face.
Two shadow clones looped their arms through his and restrained them behind his back. They forced him to his knees.
Tora kneeled down in front of him. Beady eyes looked at him through the porcelain mask. A genjutsu blurred colour and shape, but the look was clearly hard.
"Dick move, Uchiha. You don't abandon your squad."
"I didn't ask for this – " "Ah! I don't want to hear it."
"You fucked up", Neko said. The voice was female, he realized distantly. "Next time, you fight it. If she needs to make a choice, Hokage-sama always give ANBU priority. The fox boy may one day take her place, but he hasn't yet. He will bow to the rules."
With that she rolled up her sleeves, tightened her gloves, and delivered a blow to his face that cracked his jaw.
"Consider this a lesson", Tora said. "We're doing you a favor, really."
The next blow shattered his collar bone.
"If we rough you up enough, maybe they'll be satisfied."
He doubted it.
Sasuke's instincts may have landed him in some bizarre and dangerous situations, but in this situation they were spot on.
His squad did not come to find him, right after they arrived. Which probably had to do with their extensive stay at the hospital. Apparently Hotaka had injured his right arm, which currently left him entirely arm-less. Chances were, that he wouldn't be put back on active duty for months. They'd be semi-permanently one man short.
When his captain saw him, jaw re-broken for the fourth time, limping and with two amateurishly taped ribs, she didn't look very merciful at all.
"And you let them beat you?", she seethed. "Some up-start regulation ANBU, who have no business messing around in our squad? And now we're another man short?"
For the first time since his mother's death, he was dragged off by a woman by his ear.
The ANBU healer wasn't as gentle as Sakura.
"I'm not treating traitors", was his first response.
"You're going to do your goddamn job", she snapped. There was a short stand-off, until Sasaki-taichou glared him into submission. The air is forced out of him, as his ribs snap back into place. The jaw gives an almighty crack and the low level head ache disappears. The relief is paired with apprehension.
If their revenge isn't physical pain, then what is it?
Oppressive silence greets Sasuke from the rest of the squad. In a way this is worse. They don't look at him, they don't speak to him. Not that he wants them to, of course. But it is … unsettling. He is hyper alert every minute of the day. Retribution never comes. Or at least not in the way he expects.
Work piled up. Hotaka's job as fukutaichou meant paperwork. He was also their berserker, breaking through enemy lines and making way for others. He did the dirty work.
This was now Sasuke's job.
He didn't sleep anymore; this time not because of his nerves, but because he was doing work for two people. Two ANBU.
Another stack of papers smacked down on his desk. Mikina stared at him with empty eyes. "Priority work." Then she turned on her heels and stomped out.
At the end of the week he went to see Hotaka at the hospital. The burly man was hooked up to machines that continuously pumped a pinkish liquid into his left stump and seemed to induce muscle contractions in his injured arm.
He looked mostly exasperated and tired.
"So you've actually turned up."
He didn't look angry, like the rest of the team. There was some amusement there instead, and it made Sasuke bristle. Who did he think he was laughing at? Who did he think was doing all of his work?
"Do you like your new job?"
He itched to activate his Sharingan, just to scan Hotaka's face. Detect any trace of derision on it. Mockery. But that would have meant defeat, so he controls himself.
"What do you mean?"
"I mean", the man says, very slowly and seriously, "can you do it?"
"Of course I can", Sasuke snaps.
Hotaka laughs and shakes his head to whip his blood red hair out of his eyes.
"You're a bonehead, Uchiha. But as much as Anegimi wants to beat the shit out of you, she also likes you. You're quite brilliant, really. My arm's on it's last leg, so to speak. I won't be able to do this job forever."
Sasuke froze. He didn't want such a job. He didn't even want to be part of this squad.
Hotaka's tone was humorous, but his eyes glinted sharply. "You will perform this job remarkably once I'm gone. You will take very good care of Anegimi."
Then all seriousness vanished from his face, and the goofy grin that Sasuke had come to know from the behemoth returned. "But not yet. I'm ready to get out of here by Monday."
Then he waved over one of the nurses, who promptly frog marched Sasuke out of the room.
"If I don't need to catch up on paperwork, I'll even call off the dogs!" Hotaka boomed after him, and this time he was most definitely laughing.
