Disclaimer: Saying I owned Naruto would be a lie. And a great fiction writer like me never lies. Ever.

I was getting more and more frustrated with my team. They were loud, obnoxious, weird and just plain idiotic. But at least Sai had stopped following me home all the time, he now realized that he couldn't follow me and instead just tried to be my friend by calling me Sakura's bitch or pretty boy. personally I hated both And forced myself to ignore him. Naruto had been worse though, he often crashed my time with Sakura, she had even started to make a bento for him when ever we had lunch. Nothing would get him to leave, not my glaring, not my subtle threats, and my not so subtle threats only got Sakura to say, "Sasuke, Naruto-san is your friend. Don't be so mean."

"Yeah Sasuke-teme, don't be mean." The hit Naruto got wasn't satisfying enough for me.

Naruto was unbearable during missions too, he tried to out do me at everything, failing and getting hurt each time. Me having to save him from getting himself killed which only made him angrier. I shook my head, that dobe would never learn.

So when Kakashi commented on our teamwork failing, it was an understatement. I scoffed when Naruto went off about it being my fault. The dobe didn't understand that it was his, trying to outdo me, I wasn't even trying and I was winning whatever game he thought we were playing. He wasn't good enough to match to my skills.

I walked off when we were dismissed, it was Tuesday and Sakura wasn't allowed out yet. It had been two months since the start of her punishment and Hiashi showed no sign of letting up. I was in a bad mood, so much so that even Sai backed off after only asking to come to my house once.

I was on my way to my training ground, beating the hell out of a post as I picture Hyuuga Haishi always seemed to cheer me a little. Or just make be hurt enough to ignore my burning rage. It wasn't fair, but then again when was life ever fair for me? I realized that in my desperation to get away from my teammates and the haze of my anger, I was heading the wrong way. I almost swore as I turned around and back tracked.

I extended my chakra senses to try and find my teammates, I didn't want to run into them. It didn't take long to find them but I also sence someone else with them. Three small signatures, kids, no threat, although one of them were frantically moving. A sign of extreme emotional distress, there was also two other chakras. Both large, ninja, but too low to be anything above chunin.

"HEY LET HIM GO." I heard the dobe's voice from here, I sighed. I'd have to save those two idiots now. I silently made my way to where I felt their chakra.

I sat in a tree, watching for a second before I acted. This guy was nothing more then some foreigner punk who thought that they were so powerful picking on children. They made me sick. What was worse was that he was wearing a cat suit and make up, my team was losing to these guys? I took great pleasure at seeing the cat boy's face when my stone hit him. He dropped the kid and clutched his hand. He looked stupidly at the stone on the ground, the one that just hit him.

His gaze traveled to me, I was leaning on the tree. "You ninja are a long way from home and a long way out of your league."

I analyzed the two ninja, one was obviously a wind ninjutsu user, the girl, I could tell this by her giant fan. From what I had gather, the male must have been a puppet user, that thing on his back and his uses of chakra strings make this obvious too.

"Pretty boy, have you changed your mind? Are we going back to your house?" Sai smiled his fake smile. I ignored him, as did everyone else.

"Great, another punk to piss me off." The cat said.

"Get lost." I said, to empathise my point I crushed the stone I'd been playing with, I opened my hand and let the dust fall.

"Oh, so cool!" I heard a squealing voice, for a second I was reminded of the girls at the academy. I ignored both them and Naruto and the kids argument.

Rule one, never take your eyes of a enemy, not if you can help it.

"Hey punk." the guy called. "Get down here." He took the thing off his back, it was most likely his puppet. "Your the kind of pesky snot I hate the most. All attitude and nothing to back it up."

"What?" The blonde said panicked. "Your going to use Karasu for this?" The guy glared at me.

"Kankuro. Back off." There was a gravelly voice that spoke. "Your an embarrassment to our village."

I was completely shocked, I didn't sense anyone near by, even now I could not sense another's chakra. I had gotten good at sensing chakra, really good, but this guy must have been on another level. He was on Sakura's level. She was the only one that he couldn't sense when she hid her chakra, although his teammates didn't know how and his sensei didn't have a need to ever hide his. He was silent too. I had not heard even his breathing, not even now, I even felt for a genjutsu. There was none. This guy was really good, maybe even jounin good. My eyes traveled to him, I didn't move though, just looked at him from the corner on my eyes. He was standing on a branch of the same tree as me, his feet stuck to the underside of the branch. He was short, but he still gave the impression of being taller, being better. I felt the overwhelming want to fight this boy. To test my skills against his, I wanted to us him as a stepping stone on my journey to become stronger.

"G-Gaara." I heard someone stutter out, though my focus was on this boy, who must have been Gaara, and I didn't know who said it.

"Have you forgotten the real reason we came here?" He was ignoring me, ignoring my team and the kids. His only focus was on the boy in the cat suit, Kankuro.

"I-I k-know. I-I mean, th-they challenged us. They started the whole thing really." He stuttered out quickly. "See, here's what happened-" he was interrupted by the red head again.

"Shut up." Kankuro stared to sweat as the boy narrowed his eyes. "Or I'll kill you."

This made the boy backtrack instantly before agreeing with the red head ninja.

Gaara turned to me next, "I'm sorry for any trouble he caused." One glance into his eyes and I knew that this boy was evil. He had a look in his empty jade eyes that radiated killing intent. It felt as if he had planned my death at least a hundred times in the two minutes I'd seen him. I didn't like the evil look in his eyes. I shuddered the thought of those eyes meeting Sakura's warm emerald eyes.

I did not reply to his words and, instead, watched wordlessly as he disappeared in a whirl of sand. I'd never seen a jutsu like that.

"Let's go, we didn't come here to play games." The other two quickly agreed. They turned and walked away.

"Wait." Sai called out but they did not stop until he called a second time.

"Yes?" It was the girl who spoke, she looked slightly irritated.

"I have read it is polite to invite guest inside to have tea. Would you like to come to pretty-boys house. I've never been either but I read that friends often sleep over at each others house and have pillow fights. Would you like to join us, Suna-nin?" I rolled my eyes.

"We're here for the chunin exams, not to have tea." She shook her head.

"What's that?" Naruto said scratching his head.

"Are you brainless as well as dickless? Pretty-boy, I don't think we should invite Naruto to tea, maybe we shouldn't invite the Suna-nin either. How about just you and me go to your house?" Again he was ignored.

"Well I've never heard of the chunin exams. Believe it."

"I believe," she stretched, "that you are an idiot, a totally clueless one at that."

"Hey boss." One of the kids said, "those are the exams that every gennin takes to become a chunin." I rolled my eyes, a kid was smarter than him, the dobe was so embarrassing.

"Oh yeah, I'm totally going to take those things."

The red head muttered something before turning around and walking off. The other two followed soon after.

I jumped down from the tree and spoke, I needed to know who this boy was.

"Hey you, identify yourself." I spoke loud enough for them to hear, yet I did not yell like the dobe often did.

The blonde girl stopped and turned around, she let out a hum and smiled. "You mean me?" She battered her eyelashes and placed a hand on her chest. She reminded me slightly of the academy girls, though at least she wasn't screaming in my ears. It was even more painful since his ears were so sensitive now.

"No. Him. The guy with the gourd on his back." I pointed to him. Sure, I knew his name was Gaara, the other boy had said as much, but I wanted confirmation, I also wanted his last name. It was nice to know a potential enemies name, it gave you the opportunity to learn more about them.

The two others looked perplexed, shortly meeting each others gaze before looking at their leaders back. He turned slowly, his sandals slapping against the dirt ground. How was I not able to hear those deafening steps before now?

"My name," he spoke quietly but his voice sounded loud in the silence that had fallen over the group. "Is Sabaku no Gaara. I am also curious as to who are you."

I felt the smirk when it graced my face, I was right, his name was Gaara. "I am Uchiha Sasuke."

we stared at each other, sizing each other up, the only sound was the wind blowing.

"Hi there. Bet you want to know my name." Naruto interrupted, but before he could go on his usual rant about becoming Hokage, Gaara spoke.

"I could care less about who you are." With those final words the Suna-ninja left. My smirk widen slightly, thing were getting interesting around here.

We had been waiting for Kakashi for an three hours now. You would have thought that Naruto would have gotten use to the long, boring hours spent waiting. I internally shook my head as he went on about being sick of their sensei's lateness.

"I've read a book about the importance of punctuality. It was very interesting, maybe I could lend it to Scarecrow-sensei." I rolled my eyes at Sai's stupid nicknames, I looked away from the two. First thing in the morning and they were already driving me nuts.

I turned when I felt Kakashi's chakra signature flare, a second later he popped into being by a puff of smoke.

"Sorry I'm late I was lost on the path of life." The white haired man said.

Naruto then went off yelling again. "You lair!"

"I've never heard of this place. Is it close by the market, maybe I should pick up a map and go visit this path. Is it very difficult to navigate though. It must be if you get lost on it." Kakashi ignored Sai.

"I know this is sudden, but I've nominated you three for the chunnin exams." He said. "Here are you application forms."

"Application forms?"

"Your repeating me Naruto." Kakashi chimed. "It's voluntary, it is up to each of you. If you don't feel ready then, you can wait until next year." I got a sense that he wasn't telling us something but it was soon pushed aside when Naruto attacked Kakashi, declaring him the best as he tried to kiss the jounin.

Kakashi pushed him off and hand us each our forms, he gave us more instructions. "If you wish to enter the exams fill out this form, sign it and bring it to room 301 at the academy at three pm five days from now." With that said he left.

We all were too excited for the exams to realize that we had waited three hours and we had not trained at all. I couldn't wait for these exams, I hoped I'd get to fight that guy, Gaara. Winning against him would be another step closer to killing that man. I smirked, not even Naruto's disturbing giggles could pull it from my face. Sai seemed very quiet, but that mattered little, at least he wasn't asking to go to my house.

It was Saturday. I was waiting in my private training grounds for Sakura. Kakashi had informed us that we had to meet on monday for the exams. I couldn't wait to tell Sakura, I'd been waiting for so long, I had to fight my instinct to run straight to her and tell her. However, Sakura's restrictions were clear. Weekday access was forbidden. I would have ignored it and went to see her anyway, but Sakura valued her father and his rules, so I waited for the weekend.

I was training half-heartedly, I had only gotten a few scraps and bruses, for the first time nothing was cracked or broken. When Sakura walked onto the training ground at tweleve I was instantly by her side. I took her hand and lead her into the middle of the training ground. She giggled at my impatiance as I let go of her had and quickly set up the blanket. I lead her to the middle and helped her sit.

"What's got you in such a happy mood?" She smiled brightly at me letting out another little giggle.

"I've been entered into the chunin exams." I smiled slightly.

She grinned back, she threw herself into my arms, hugging me before pulling back and speaking. "That is amazing Sasuke. Soon your going to be a jounin at this rate, maybe even an ANBU."

I was pleased with her reaction.

"Oh, I've got good news too." Sakura said. My stomach dropped. Could this be it, could Sakura finally be becoming a ninja. That would be the only thing that could top this. I could imagine us going on missions together, becoming stronger together. Fighting side by side in, not only training, but in missions too. Hopefully we wouldn't have to fight ninja on Zabuza or Haku's level yet.

"My father said that my punishment will be over after next week. Your allowed back to to the compound then and I'm allowed out." She grinned again but I found my smile falling. It was good news, but not what I wanted to hear. But I smiled and said I was happy. We trained for the rest of the day and the next. We were working on my training because of my exams. Sakura healing me every time I got hurt. I really wish she was a ninja.

I was standing with the dobe, I was early and, surprisingly, so was Naruto. We were waiting on Sai, he was always on time, we had planned to meet at two thirty outside. I knew he wouldn't get here until then. When he did arrived, it was at two thirty on the dot. He was not smiling, he looked paler and he had a slight blackness under his eyes pointing to the fact that he had not slept very well, if at all.

"Ohayou Naruto, Sasuke." I was shocked for a second. He had not used any of his stupid nicknames. What was up with him.

"Hey freak. Let's hurry up and go in, I wanna hurry up and get this done, I'll be a chunin in no time. Believe it." Naruto, of course, didn't notice the oddities of our teammate.

I couldn't stand it and I found words out of my mouth before I could comprehend them. "Do you two want to come over to my house next weekend for dinner?" I kicked myself, I didn't even like Sai, I didn't know why I was trying to be nice to him, to make him feel better. But, I guess, we were still teammates and if something was wrong with Sai it would hinder our performance.

I saw shock in his eyes before he smiled, it was not his normal, fake, smile either, it was, for the first time I'd seen, a real smile. "Thank you pretty-boy, I'd love too." Again I kicked myself, why did I want him to go back to the way he was? He was an obnoxious little sh-

"Come on teme, freak. Let's go!" Naruto ran inside. I shook my head as he ran into the door, he'd tried to push it open. I walked over and took the handle of the door, ignoring the dobe who was sitting there rubbing his head that now sported a slight bump. I pulled the door open and walked inside, the others trailed after me.

I'd felt it in the stairway, Genjutsu. One that made it seem as if we'd traveled up three fights of stairs instead of two. I dispelled it, no one could be that foolish to fall for such a trap, not least ninjas, even if they were gennin. I knew I was wrong when I saw a crowd forming in front of the door that said 301. Becoming a chunin would be cherry tomatoes if these were my opponates.

"Let us through, we're headed to the third floor." I spoke, I knew that if I'd let Naruto or, kami frobid, Sai, to talk they would get into a fight or insult everyone here. Most likely both. "And while your at it drop the genjutsu."

Murmurings went through the crowd, "Genjutsu?" and "What is he talking about?" and "This kids crazy."

"You saw through our genjutsu huh?" The one of the left said taking down his jutsu.

"Please, even Sai saw through it, and he's the worst at genjutsu on our team." I said, and it was true, Sai knew this wasn't the third floor, I had, after all, dispelled the genjutsu in the stairway.

"Your right pretty boy, this is only the second floor." Sai smiled.

"Right." Naruto nodded, I almost rolled my eyes, he probably didn't even kow what we were talking about. I had heard him muttering about victory ramen a few seconds ago.

"I'm surprised you saw that, but did you see this?" And with that he swung, getting ready to kick me, I did the same, if I'd put enough force into my kick I should be able to take him off enough to unbalance him and drop him to the ground. From there it would only be three simple steps until both he, and his friend, were unconscious. For a brief second I gave thought to their third member. Every one here was grouped into threes, their squads, but there were only two people standing in front of the doors. My musings were cut short when there was a blur of green and a my kick was block. I was stunned, completely so, there was a ninja standing in the middle of the two of us and he was blocking each kick. What amazing chakra ability he must have, to be able to block my kick and also be able to hide his chakra so well. It was even better then Sakura's, at least with Sakura I could feel he chakra while I was touching her. With this guy, if I had not seen his moves in action, I'd think he was a civilian.

The two boys managed to sneak away, out of the hallway and away from the crowd. My eyes were sizing up the green ninja. He walked over to his team. A girl with buns and a boy with long hair. I narrowed my eyes, I knew that arrogant posture and those glaring eyes.

The team walked over to mine, Hyuuga Neji leading them. They stopped in front of me and my team.

"Uchiha." Neji greeted.

"Hyuuga." I replied.

"Haven't seen you around the compound lately. Haven't broken up with my cousin have you?" Neji was smirking, he must have known the reason I was no longer a constant presence in the Hyuuga compound anymore.

"Who's this guy teme? You're not cheating on Sakura-chan are you? Cause if you are I'll beat you up and she can be my girlfriend." He giggle in a perverted way at the end. Both Neji and I shot a glare at him.

"Of course Sakura's bitch wouldn't be cheating on her." Sai said smiling. "Grow a brain dickless."

I ignored my idiotic teammates and turned back to the long haired Hyuuga.

"Why so protective Hyuuga? I would think you'd be happy that Sakura's safe and not dead. Or did you conveniently forget that I was the one who protected her from those missing-nin." I glared coldly, it wasn't true, I'd fought one, and sadly lost, but at least I'd fought to protect her.

"She wouldn't have even been there if it had not been for you." His cold eye burned hot as he glared at me.

"Whatever, she's not a child, she's her own person, it was her choice to stay." I said.

He huffed silently. "Uchiha." He said ending our conversation.

"Hyuuga." I smirked at him walking away, I'd won this time.

I stared at the boy from my position on the ground. How had I lost to this freak. He was an...idiot. I didn't know how it was even possible. I understood how the dobe got taken down so fast, he was the worst ninja ever. But to have taken me down. This boy may have been an idiot, a werido and a freak, but he was strong and fast.

He was also talking to a turtle. The dobe was going on about how the turtle was his sensei, all I could think was I was taken down by a complete loser. The meeting with the boy, Rock Lee, he had said his name was, and his real sensei passed in a blur after that.

Still I couldn't believe how badly I had lost. I clenched my fist as he told me I was practice, that I was only a stepping stone he stepped on to get to his real goal. It infuriated me and I vowed that when I fought that boy again, he would lose. He'd pay, I'd have vengeance. And it didn't have anything to do with the big eyebrow boy declaring him my raival in the race to win Sakura's love. How the freak knew her, I had no idea. But that wasn't the point. Rock Lee would pay because Uchiha Sasuke was an avenger.

Sasuke walked into the room with his teammates, his mood was lifted after the little talk they'd had with their sensei. he cheerful mood vanished when he saw the room of gennin. They were all older, some were twice his age and double his height.

"Sasuke-kun!" I cringed as I heard the high pitched voice, soon I felt the weight of someone on my back. I glared at the ground.

"Oh Sasuke-kun. I missed your brooding good looks. I bet you missed me too." She was hugging my head and stroking me as if I was a cat.

"I don't think you noticed, but you seem to have a hooker on top of you. You better get rid of it before your girlfriend sees. I've read that girls don't like to see their boyfriends with whores." Sai smiled, pointing to the blonde that was on my back.

"Your such an idiot Sai. Sakura can't see anything, 'sides she's not here." The dobe shook his head ironically.

"You have a girlfriend Sasuke-kun. I can't believe that. I'm the prettiest, nicest, most-" She cut herself off, before dropping off of me and stepping closer to Sai.

"WHAT DO YOU MEAN? I'M NOT A HOOKER OR A WHORE! I'M A LADY." She screamed.

"Yes." Sai nodded, smiling not at all phased by her screaming. "A lady of the night."

She was stopped from screaming, I mean, she was stopped from replying, when her teammates came over.

"Oh. It's you guys." The lazy drawl came from the side. " I knew this was going to be troublesome but I didn't think it would be this lame." He sighed as the boy next to him carried on munching on his chips.

"So you three baka's are here." Naruto, again ironically, said.

"Hey you know what pipsqueak ah forget it. Threathening is too troublesome." Shikamaru slummed back into a hunch.

"I don't care what you say. Sasuke-kun is mine. If he has a girlfriend, it's me." She pokes her tongue out to Sai.

"Well, well. What do you know. It looks like the whole gangs back together again." Another voice commented.

I turned to see Hinata and her team.

"H-Hello N-Naruto-kun." Hinata stuttered out. "Sasuke-san." She added politely.

"Hinata-san." I replied.

She shyly stepped forward and reached out, handing me a scroll. It was familiar. "Nee-chan asked me to give you this. She wishes you luck."

I took it, almost smiling but thought better of it. "Aa." I said, placing it in one of my weapon pouches.

"Why is your little sister giving Sasuke-kun gifts." Ino screeched. We all flinched.

"W-well, Hanabi-chan d-did-n't, m-my older sis-ter d-did." She ran then, hiding behind her teammates.

"Sasuke-teme. Are you cheating on Sakura-chan with Hinata's older sister?" Naruto pointed at ke accusingly.

I sighed. "Dobe, Sakura is Hinata's older sister."

I ignored them after that. All their yelling was giving me a head ache. So I ignored them all, Naruto idiotic comments, Ino's whining denial, Sai's insults and everyone else. I didn't start paying attention again until a new voice entered the noise.

"Wow guys, your drawing a lot of attention to yourselves. You better be quiet." The man, Kabuto, went on. The most interesting thing about him was his ninja cards. I gleaned a little information on both Gaara and Lee, before Kabuto was attacked. Those sound ninja looked dangerous too. But before I could figure out their jutsu trick, the proctor for the first exam arrived along with some other ninja.

"It's time to begin." the scarred man in front smirked. "I'm Morino Ibiki and I'm the proctor for the first part of the chunin exams."

I meant to make it longer but oh well. This chapter goes to Griffindork93 you win this one. But next one...okay so you'll probably win that one too, but the one after that...all mine. Going to work of 'Taking Bloodlines.' Love me.

R&R.