Chapter 3

Tensions and Sparks

Sasuke frowned inwardly as he exited the Uchiha District and headed to the public training grounds for an afternoon practice with his team. He needed a way to worm his way into his father's good graces after disgracing himself with his performance on the mission to Wave Country. But how to do that?

Dad wanted to know about Naruto… Sasuke mused. If I find out something about him, something that Itachi doesn't find, that could do it… But what can I find that Itachi isn't looking for?

And then he had a flash of inspiration: He could figure out how Naruto had really defeated Haku.

Perfect.

Satisfied with his goal, he picked up his pace slightly. He would go and train with his team and expand his skills so that someday soon he wouldn't need anyone to defend him. And while he was at that, he'd lean on Naruto until he let slip how he'd really done it.

With his plan of action decided, he allowed himself to daydream of his future.

One day he would find his way out of his older brother's long shadow and earn his father's respect and love. Then, when his brother ascended to clan head, he would distinguish himself enough to become the new Chief of the Military Police. With the clan run by his brother, and the Military Police run by himself, they would both have more free time to look after their families (for they would have families; Itachi had a girlfriend that if the elders approved of her would become his wife, and if Sasuke didn't find a girl on his own, one would be chosen for him) than their father had. And after that, Sasuke would have a son and teach him the ways of the Uchiha.

"The Uchiha are the elite of the elite," he recalled his father telling him one day. "Failure is not an option for us. There is only excellence. That is what my father told me, it is what I tell you now, and it is what you will tell your own son one day. Remember it well, Sasuke."

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura greeted and waved to him as he arrived at the training field.

"Hey, Sasuke, you make it!" Naruto grinned, as if he was making some great joke.

Kakashi was absent; late as usual.

Sasuke ignored them and focused on his goals: improve himself and uncover Naruto's secret technique.

"There is only excellence," he heard his father say as he entered the grounds. "Remember it and live by it. I expect nothing less from a son of mine."

Sasuke's jaw tightened in determination.

I will make you proud dad, just you wait and see…


Naruto plucked at the grass he was sitting on as he waited for the ever-tardy Kakashi-sensei to appear and officially start their practice. It wasn't a lecture day so practice started in the morning so that the afternoon would be free for applying for D-ranks. Normally they would start practice without their sensei and perform target throwing exercises or warm-up activities. But Sasuke was being weird, and Naruto didn't feel like doing anything anyway, so he sat underneath a tree and plucked at the grass.

Iruka treated him differently now that he knew. Before Iruka had sort of liked him; said they were alike because his parents had died in the line of duty when he'd been young and left him an orphan like Naruto (like he thought Naruto was). Now the chuunin treaded carefully around him, like he expected Naruto to suddenly turn around and be a furry monster that would rip his head off.

The boy had offered to look for someplace else to live (living on his own was very appealing; he wouldn't have to worry about making excuses to anyone when he wanted to disappear) but Iruka refused to let him. Iruka swore that he had no problem with what Naruto was and that nothing had changed. Naruto knew that he was lying.

Maybe I could ask Kakashi-sensei if I could sleep on his couch for a while?

"Sorry I'm late!" their silver-haired sensei said cheerfully as he appeared in a puff of smoke. "I had to help a poor man learn how to fish and it took a lot longer than I thought it would!"

"Liar!" Naruto snapped along with Sakura, but he was surprised at Kakashi's sudden appearance; the jounin was one hour less late than usual.

"You wound me," Kakashi-sensei sighed. "Well, let's get started. Warm up children."

They went through the routine of stretches they'd learned in the Academy and then started on running laps. After several circuits of the border of their training ground (Field #11 today) in the trees and on the ground, they stretched some more. And after a five minute rest, it was time to really get started.

"Alright," their sensei spoke cheerfully. "Naruto, Sasuke, go and play nice now, boys."

Naruto jogged out to the center of the clearing, which was at the center of the grounds, and faced off against his rival. Sasuke just kept giving him that weird stare that he'd been giving him all morning, like he was trying to stare through Naruto without using his Sharingan. That, and the aura of grim determination that surrounded him, was really creepy.

"Begin," Kakashi-sensei said…as he pulled out his book to read.

Sasuke blinked—

His eyes were red, one spinning comma-like tomoe in one eye, two spinning tomoe in the other.

He'd turned his Sharingan on.

And then he was on the attack. Naruto tried to block the Uchiha's aggressive blows, but his rival could see the defenses coming and had little trouble slipping around them. In very short order, Naruto found himself battered and pinned to the dirt by Sasuke.

"Where is that strength you used against that Kiri-nin?" Sasuke hissed into his ear as he kept Naruto pressed into the ground. "I'd very much like to see it. It's the least you could do after shaming me like you did."

"Huh?" Naruto wheezed as he vainly tried to wriggle free.

"Sasuke." Kakashi-sensei's tone was almost harsh, something none of them had ever heard in practice. "You can practice using your Sharingan all you like when you train at home, but in team training you will only use your Sharingan when I say you can. Now turn your Sharingan off and let's start over."

With a soft growl Sasuke released him and Naruto staggered to his feet. Before he'd gotten his breath back, Sasuke was on him again. Without his Sharingan active Sasuke only had a slight edge over Naruto, but it was more than enough for the Uchiha to beat his butt again. It only took a few minutes longer.

"I'm waiting," Sasuke snarled as he held Naruto's head in a painful headlock. "Show me this hidden power you seem to have, because I know you didn't beat that Kiri-nin with kage bunshins."

"Hrk!" Naruto choked as he tried to free his head.

He was used to Sasuke beating him in spars. He didn't like it, but he was used to it. However, this time Sasuke was blitzing him harder than he ever had before, and it was like he was fighting Naruto to hurt him.

What is Sasuke's problem today?

"Drop him, Sasuke." Now Kakashi-sensei actually sounded kind of mad.

Naruto flopped to the ground with a wheezy grunt.

"…I don't think I like your attitude this morning, Sasuke" their sensei remarked. "Stay here and help Sakura with her taijutsu katas. Naruto and I are going to take a walk. We'll come back when you calm down."

Rubbing smudges of dirt from his face (and probably making it worse instead of better) Naruto stumbled to his feet and limped into the trees after his departing sensei. Sakura looked confused and worried, and Sasuke looked pissed off. Naruto just felt sore from Sasuke's merciless blows.

Kakashi-sensei led him well out sight and hearing range of where Sasuke and Sakura were training. His orange book was nowhere to be seen. The jounin brought him to a fallen log where Naruto flopped down and rubbed at his most bruised parts. In a half hour or so he'd forget that he'd ever been tossed around by the angry Uchiha boy, but right now he throbbed everywhere.

"Sasuke was being rather rough there," the silver-haired man commented. "Was he threatening you?"

"He wanted me to show him how I beat Haku," Naruto mumbled as he checked to see if his lip was bleeding. "He said that I 'shamed him' somehow."

"Uchiha can be touchy," Kakashi-sensei said. "You defeating Haku where he failed to probably stings his ego a bit."

Naruto grimaced. "Shouldn't he just be glad that he didn't die from that? I would be."

"He should be," his sensei agreed. "But living in prominent clans like the Uchiha clan can be…complicated."

The boy scrunched up his face in thought. Being only five when he'd been kicked out of his mother's family, he hadn't understood a lot of what had been going on around him. But from what little he could remember of it, it was indeed complicated.

"So how did you defeat Haku?" Kakashi-sensei asked as he leaned casually against a tree. "I don't think anyone brought your vague explanation of kage bunshins."

"Um…" Naruto scratched nervously at the back of his head. "I dunno…"

"You don't know?" the jounin repeated dubiously. "It wouldn't happen to have anything to do with lycanthropy, would it?"

The genin shrugged uncomfortably. "I've only ever done it twice. I dunno what it is."

"Try and do it a third time so that I can see it," Kakashi-sensei suggested dryly.

"'Kay."

Naruto scowled in concentration and stared at his right hand. He tried gathering chakra to his palm because he thought that was how he'd done it, but all that happened was that the air around his hand got shimmery like air over hot asphalt. It felt sort of right, but it definitely didn't look right.

What am I missing? he wondered with a pout. Do I have to be pissed off and scared, like when I fought Mizuki and Haku? Or is it something…

I know!

He stopped sending lots of chakra to his hand and instead focused on transforming a bit. He'd been partly transformed both times he'd made the blue fire, so maybe that was necessary. In a few minutes, his fingernails were claws, his canines lengthened into fangs, his whisker markings darkened, his pupils morphed, and then he tried for the fire again.

Sparks.

Flickers.

And then little blue wisps of flame swirled over his fingers.

"Hah!" Naruto crowed and flashed a fanged grin at his watching teacher. "I hit 'em with this! Cool, huh?"


Werewolves didn't produce fire. They certainly didn't produce blue fire. They really weren't known to have any sort of elemental magic, or even any magic beyond the curse that consumed them and made them into beasts.

Blue fire made Kakashi think of all sorts of animal demons. Naruto's altered appearance—the claws, the whisker markings, the eyes—made him think of feline demons, like Nekomata. But when he inhaled the boy's scent, he detected a whiff of fox leaking out around Naruto's usual odor of human boy and ramen noodles.

Aside from a small clan of lesser fox demons who had bound themselves to a summoning contract with a human clan in the Land of Earth, there were no other kinds of fox demons. There had been the Kitsune—shape-shifters and illusionists with elemental affinities all over the board, although most tended towards lightning or fire, and a multitude of tails. However, several centuries ago the various demon-hunter ninja forces had made a concerted effort to hunt them down and exterminate them after they'd attacked several aristocrats in the Lands of Earth, Fire, Lightning, Grass, and Tea in rapid succession.

As far as everyone was concerned, Kitsune were extinct and had been for nearly two hundred and fifty years.

For every bit of information you give us, you generate a dozen more questions…

"It's…not cool?"

Kakashi blinked and found that Naruto's gleeful expression of triumph (that had looked almost maniacal with his fangs and demon eyes) had crumpled into something worried and fearful. His fear leaked into his scent, quickly overwhelming the subtle hint of fox-like scent that Kakashi had noticed earlier. It was no wonder that he'd missed it before back in Wave Country during the night of the full moon.

"It's interesting," the jounin said with a casual shrug. "However, if you want to use it openly, you'll need some kind of excuse."

Naruto tilted his head like a baffled dog. "Excuse?"

"All fire jutsu produce flames in the usual colors: yellow, orange, and red," Kakashi explained. "I have never heard of any jutsu that produces blue flames. And you used no hand seals to generate that fire either. The only way I can think to explain it away would be that it is a kekkei genkai, or"—the more likely explanation is—"that it is the result of having some strong demonic lineage."

It was possible for a new kekkei genkai to appear (because what he was seeing here didn't match anything he'd ever heard of) as the result of some random mutation…but they were usually primitive, with only a trait or two different from the average shinobi. Over multiple generations new traits could emerge and further expand the kekkei genkai. But what he was seeing in Naruto—the physical changes that couldn't be explained by lycanthropy and the blue fire that he only seemed able to produce when transformed—felt too refined to be a sudden mutation. In his gut it didn't feel right.

Having a significant amount of demon blood in him would explain the blue in his fire. Demons could generate flames of just about any color, anywhere from white to green to purple and all the colors in-between. It fit better than a kekkei genkai and yet it didn't, because Uzumaki Kushina had always smelled perfectly human to him. She was a strange one for sure, but she always looked human and smelled human and she'd never ever done anything with any blue fire.

So where had this power come from?

Somehow I get the feeling that nothing is going to be simple with him…

…Wonderful.

"…Going with the kekkei genkai option would be safer," Kakashi advised.

Naruto nodded enthusiastically at that suggestion. He'd gone very pale, causing his dark, broad whisker marks to stand out starkly on his skin. The acrid scent of fear was so strong it was nauseating.

Kakashi sighed deeply.

"Naruto, you need to relax."

"I'm relaxed!" the boy squeaked, looking more anxious than before.

"And you call me a liar," Kakashi teased, trying to put the boy at ease. "Even if I were blind I could smell your fear."

"You can smell it?"

Oddly, this bit of information actually seemed to relax him.

"Hatakes have good noses," the jounin said. "So do the Inuzuka and their canine partners."

"Oh," Naruto muttered, distracted. "Okay…"

The blond boy stared at his claws in thought. His odd chakra flames had long since dissipated, probably due to inattention as he didn't look at all tired. After a good five minutes of uncharacteristic silence, Naruto glanced up at him with a mixture of wariness and curiosity.

"Do you want to see more?"

Kakashi hid his mild dread behind a raised eyebrow. "More of what?"

"Well…" the boy fidgeted. "…What I look like when I'm all furry."

The jounin blinked slowly. "When you transform…fully?"

"Mm-hm," Naruto nodded. "I know werewolves are supposed to get stuck as beasts if they transform all the way—Ebisu lectured everybody on werewolves before the mission to Wave—but I've never been stuck. Well, except during the full moon; I'm stuck until the sun rises and then I can change back."

During the full moon? Kakashi stared at the boy in disbelief. He's looked at the full moon before?

"I don't go crazy or anything," the boy continued in a rush. "I don't run around killing chickens or eating pets or biting people. I'm just me with fur. Really."

"Why go out on the full moon?" the jounin probed. "Why not just stay in? You did that in Wave."

"I didn't go out because you guys were there!" Naruto replied, almost sounding angry. "I felt itchy all night long! It drove me nuts!" The boy pouted and scuffed at the ground with the toe of his sandal. "It's easier to not fight it; just go out into the woods where I won't bother anybody and mess around until morning…"

To stave off a migraine from thinking of the repercussions of this mess, Kakashi pulled out his book and turned his eye to its comforting and familiar words.

"Naruto, stay here and play with your fire. For the time being don't let anyone see you practicing. Next full moon, come and get me before you run off and play in the forest all night." Kakashi turned and walked back to the clearing where Sasuke and Sakura were supposed to be training. "We'll talk more about this later."

"Okay…" And as the jounin continued walking, he heard Naruto mutter: "Did an adult just tell me to play with fire?"

Hatake Kakashi closed his eye, felt the other throb, and swallowed a sigh.

Minato-sensei, I think I hate you…


Sakura fidgeted with a long strand of her pink hair as she watched Sasuke stare darkly in the direction that their sensei had taken Naruto. He seemed so angry, and he'd been downright vicious when he'd sparred with the third member of their squad. She was baffled by it, and a little afraid, too.

"Sasuke-kun…shouldn't-shouldn't we get started?"

He didn't answer right away and she almost wrangled up the nerve to ask again.

"Don't you wonder how he did it?"

The girl flinched at his sudden question. "Wonder how who did what?"

"How Naruto beat that Kiri-nin in the dome of ice mirrors," Sasuke elaborated.

"Oh." She blinked her green eyes. "Not-not really. I just thought it was dumb luck, and that you'd worn the Kiri-nin before you…couldn't fight anymore."

"Hn," the Uchiha sniffed. "I barely did anything to the Kiri-nin. That idiot got in my way before I could do much."

Sakura shifted uneasily. "It still could've been dumb luck," she said weakly.

"Dumb luck to survive, maybe," Sasuke grumbled. "But to win? No way."

"Well, what do you think, then?" the girl asked.

"I don't know," the dark-haired boy shrugged. "But I'll find out. I'll make him tell me."

Her worry was now tinged with dread. "How will you do that?"

"I'll find a way," he promised grimly. "I need to know what he did. He can never make me look weak like that again."

"You didn't look weak!" Sakura protested. "You were very brave!"

The look he gave her made her feel as significant as a bug.

"My father was not impressed."

Sakura bit her lip. "Well, you won't hurt him, right? He's no demon; he's one of us."

"He's an unwanted orphan who washed up here a couple of years ago who happened to have a sprinkling of magic in his blood," Sasuke retorted. "He's not one of us."

"But…he's a part of our team," Sakura protested feebly. "Sure, he's an annoying idiot, but he's a good person…"

"Teams are temporary," the Uchiha said dismissively. "My brother will find out who he is and where he came from, and I will find out what he's capable of. And then maybe dad will be pleased."

Sakura's shoulders slumped as her worry deepened. During the dangers in Wave Country, she felt like they'd forged bonds as a team. But the bonds seemed fragile and tenuous, and already she feared that they were crumbling.