A/N: Realized that skipping back to the present would be odd if done too soon.
Act III.
Pleasantries
Then: Sasuke.
Ducking under the branch, Sasuke stepped over a protruding root and paused to look over his shoulder once more.
This should be far enough.
Crouching down, he once again checked his surroundings. He sensed no one nearby. With one last cautious look around, he climbed the adjacent tree, swinging himself up from branch to branch with ease.
The past two days had been… interesting. In some ways, he was almost glad that Naruto was on his team. The boy definitely drew attention like none other. And while Sakura's attention was often diverted towards scolding the blond, he knew she had her own suspicions that something was wrong with him by the way her eyes often lingered on his neck. Absently, he touched the mark again.
It still stung, like the lingering burn that followed a shot of firewhiskey.
Realizing his thoughts had wandered again, he closed his eyes and shook his head. Despite his efforts, his thoughts had been scrambled as of late, often drifting off into analyses of some random aspect of his life. It almost felt like the aftereffects of a concussion that'd sneak up on him whenever he relaxed his guard.
Letting out a slow breath, he emptied his mind and focused his attention on identifying the ambient sounds around him. After his fifth breath, he dropped down to a crouch. He couldn't dawdle much longer without raising his teammates' concern.
He had said that he was only gathering firewood.
Outstretching his hand, he whispered, "Accio Heaven Scroll."
Quickly, he stood up and casted the disillusionment spell.
The first day after the attack –after he'd 'awakened'– he had considered quitting the exam. As he was then, his instincts were all muddled, the ingrained responses were all wrong. He wanted to react to branches snapping by flicking his fingers forward, while somehow grabbing for a kunai to hurl at the same time. He wanted to cast a feather-light charm when he knew he could just augment his muscles with chakra.
It made him hesitate.
It made him slow.
And if it was one thing he was certain about, it was that he couldn't be slow. (Because slowness was equated to stupidity and was quite separate from caution. Slowness was cowardly, and he
was not
a coward.)
.
And he knew he was the type of person to dwell (because he had to, you had to reflect on everything that had gone wrong so that it could never happen again, because he wasn't an idiot), the combination of his memories had only made him that much more… critical. (obsessive).
And he knew that his racing thoughts were a distraction, but by the second day, when the bruises on the girl – on Sakura – had changed colors, he also realized, that the best chances of him uncovering why he was awake, of removing whatever he'd been branded with, was for him to meet this Orochimaru character.
There was no way that man's presence in the exam was sanctioned. Even if that man had been allowed into the exam, either case would only further cement his suspicions – that he couldn't place his trust in the authorities.
He would know – he'd been one such authority, leading a lamb to slaughter. The very one he'd sworn to protect.
He snapped his head to the right as he heard an abnormally loud whisper of leaves brushing against one another. Muscles tightening, he turned his focus inwards, reaching out with all of his senses.
In any case, whether or not he wanted to continue with the exam in his current handicapped state, he still needed to get his team out of the forest – the sooner the better. Since he wasn't sure if they'd only be allowed to enter the tower with both scrolls, well…
He held up a hand just in time for the first scroll to slam into it. Swiftly, he casted two finite incantatem's successively.
…it wouldn't matter now.
Despite his quick reaction time, he still had to scramble to catch the second scroll with his other hand. He heard a soft thud to his left that was followed by another one to his far right.
With any luck, the teams that he'd just stolen from would arrive at the same time and be too preoccupied with fighting each other rather than pursuing him.
Still, he didn't want to test his fortune. He had no idea how fast the spell moved the scrolls – and how fast the scrolls' owners could run, which was why he'd pushed his team to as close to the tower as possible via the treetops.
Shoving one scroll down his shirt, he held the other one in his hand and sprinted towards the campsite just in time to see a silver-haired teen gripping Naruto's wrist, backed up by two other teenagers.
Skidding to a halt, he angled his body so that the hand holding the scroll was out of sight. The only thing that held him back from attacking was the Konoha insignia on the forehead protectors of all three intruders. Upon the sound of his arrival, the silver-haired boy looked up, while the two behind him tensed.
Sasuke narrowed his eyes. That face…
"Ah, Sasuke-kun!" The kid stepped away from Naruto and raised a hand in greeting.
Wasn't this the boy that had introduced himself at the start of the exam? The seven-time exam retaker…. Kabuto?
Relaxing his posture, he straightened from the defensive crouch, and circled around closer to where Sakura was standing, "What do you want?"
This time, Kabuto raised both hands, almost placatingly while his teammates stiffened in apparent anger at his brusque question, "Relax – it just looked like your teammates were about to make a grave mistake is all…"
Although the boy was by all appearances friendly and apparently well-intentioned, something about the boy's closed eye smile made Sasuke's hackles rise. Sure, the teen might be a veteran of the exam, but those words seemed almost… playful – as if the boy was needling him for a reaction.
He kept silent and waited. He was tempted to reach out with his legilimancy, but the throbbing in his neck had only seemed to worsen with the spells that he had casted. While he wasn't certain if surface legilimancy would aggravate the mark, he felt certain that the situation hadn't warranted such a gamble just yet.
From his left, he heard Sakura speak up, "I… uh – what do you mean Kabuto-san?"
"Weren't you guys about to open that scroll? Or was I mistaken?"
At his words, Sakura stiffened in obvious guilt while Naruto pouted and opened his mouth.
From the corner of his eyes, Sasuke saw one of Kabuto's teammates shift his weight to the side, clearly impatient. From the way the older boy was taking his time, Sasuke suspected that Kabuto's team already had their scrolls.
Before Naruto could protest, Kabuto lowered his hands and took up a lecturing tone with one hand on his waist and the other held up, "In previous exams, those that ignored the rules were knocked out, placed under a genjutsu until the end of the test."
Immediately Naruto assumed a contrite expression and laughed uneasily, "Aaahh, we got luckyyy-"
Impatient, Sasuke stepped forward and gave Kabuto a stiff nod, "Thank you for your advice, but as you know, we're low on time."
Licking his lips, he shot Kabuto's companion another look before adding, "Leave."
As Naruto waved his arms up over his head, raging at his apparent rudeness, Kabuto only smiled, "Maaa, there's no need to be like that."
Sasuke tensed as Kabuto's teammate with the sunglasses stepped forward, "Kabuto."
Kabuto looked over his shoulder, "Relax… Yoroi."
Yoroi stepped back quickly.
Somehow, he seemed almost… cowed. Sasuke tensed. His knowledge of body language from another life was conflicting with what he was familiar with now and then. Still, he couldn't deny that all of his instincts agreed that something was off –maybe not dangerous, but … off.
Kabuto looked back and offered in a mild voice, "We could help."
He heard Naruto straighten in apparent interest, but Sakura placed a hand on Naruto's shoulder, preempting whatever it was the blond had been planning to say. He glanced at her out of the corner of his eye to see her watching him. Apparently, he hadn't been disguising his unease as well as he thought.
The pain pulsed again, radiating outwards and back like waves lapping at the shore. Annoyed, he shuffled his awareness of the pain to the side, into the deep recesses of his mind. Again, he replied curtly, "No, thank you."
With a shrug, Kabuto started to turn away, "If you're sure…" He then paused mid-step, "Ah, don't tell me you were afraid we'd poach on you?"
He stepped forward, in front of Sakura and signaled at her behind his back. Get ready to run to the Tower.
To his dismay, she shuffled forward, as if afraid, "Sasuke-kun…" His irritation was only heightened when he felt her bring up one hand to cling to his arm.
Naruto was frowning and shaking his head, "Whaaat? Noo – you helped us!"
Then he felt her squeeze in slight pulses. Are you sure we can outrun them?
Irritation abating, he signed back, We'll have to. At the same time, Kabuto reached slowly behind his back, "Ahh, you shouldn't trust so easily Naruto-kun."
As Naruto squinted his eyes in confusion, Sakura gave him tighter squeezes with her hand, We don't have the scrolls. They won't let us in.
"Luckily, you met me," bringing his arm back around, Kabuto showed them his hand, which held two scrolls – the very pair needed to pass the exam.
From the way Kabuto's teammates' brows were furrowed above their cloth masks, Sasuke could tell that they weren't exactly pleased with the latest move. Still, they made no motion to interfere.
He signaled again, Yes we do.
Tugging his arm out of Sakura's grasp, he met Kabuto's studious look and replied, "Then you guys should go – before someone takes them from you."
Kabuto gave him a careless shrug and an almost apologetic look at Sakura and Naruto, as if to say I tried. With an almost mocking bow, like that of an adult pandering to the demands of a recalcitrant child, he turned around, "Well then, I'm off."
He remained still as Sakura finally punched Naruto to quiet the boy's protests and watched as Kabuto led his team away. His eyes never stopped following the man, and he was rewarded when the boy looked back for the briefest of moments.
Gritting his teeth in preparation, he launched his mind forward and skimmed the boy's surface thoughts. It wasn't quite legilimency, and to his relief, there was no pain.
Kabuto looked away and soon it was just his team.
o
Other than a brief scuffle with some giant spiders, it took them maybe another seven minutes to reach the tower. With the way Sakura was panting, he almost felt bad for pushing his team that hard. Regardless, as he brought up the rear guard, he couldn't help but breathe out a sigh of relief as he heard the sound of Sakura opening the tower's doors.
Of course, that was when Kabuto's team emerged from the brush. He couldn't help the twinge of satisfaction at the genuine flash of surprise in the boy's eyes.
Sounding impressed, Kabuto smiled, "You beat us to the tower; you didn't need our help at all."
He met Kabuto's assessing eyes and spoke over Naruto's attempts to boast and be modest at the same time, "We got lucky."
With that, he turned around and shoved both of his teammates into the room.
.
Spies and kids equipped with destructive power and no true comprehension of what they held.
He hated them both.
A/N Cont. Next chapter might be really short, just a heads up. Not really sure yet.
Not proofread the most carefully, but again, this is for plowing through writer's block for TT XP. Please point out any mistakes you see.
Conception Note:
Accio. I figured the scrolls that were stuck in packs or other things would take longer to arrive, since the 'item' would be bigger and would crash into more things. ...kinda like electrophoresis (yes I went there :P)
As always, thoughts and comments are greatly appreciated.
Thank you for reviewing. I've been really surprised at the interest in this drabble-fic XD: Gelasia Kidd, tyog56, Grey-Rain-Cloud, emmalleigh, Mirthful Malady, Lady Lianna Kari, WRose, Why881992883840002882818839, My Ashland, The-Dancing-Fox, thunder18, laelruin, Willy Wonka is Wonking, fellow, HAL23, Slytherson
