Chapter 10
Sasuke was scheduled to leave for Grass with Udon and Hanabi ten days after his birthday, which would give them about two days after arriving to get settled before the exam. It would be the first time in five months that he had left the village since returning from his absence. He felt like he should be looking forward to it more, and might have, had circumstances not conspired to make sure he was as stressed as possible at all times.
Sakura returned on the ninth day before Sasuke left, though she did so late enough that he didn't actually see her until she woke him up with breakfast on the eighth. She walked in as though she'd never been away, demanded to know what he'd done to his hands (he didn't tell her, obviously), fed him, and then departed with the promise that she'd see him later for dinner. Sasuke had a moment in which he debated being annoyed on principal that she assumed he couldn't feed himself, but the (admittedly rather small) part of him that was nothing more than an eighteen-year-old decided it would be stupid to turn down free food and he left it alone.
Six days before leaving, Sasuke made a list of all the items he'd need for a month-long stay in another ninja village, then meticulously packed everything but the clothing, as he'd obviously need that in the days leading up to departure as well. Then he unpacked and repacked everything with the weapons easily accessible at the top. Then he thought about how Hanabi was still regularly leaving herself open during sparring and replaced some of the rations he'd packed with more medical supplies. Then he decided that Udon, as a medic-nin, should be responsible for worrying about idiot fourteen-year-olds with faulty guards and switched them back again.
He walked away when he caught himself wondering if he should pack the old scroll that described all the Uchiha fire jutsus, just to be safe.
Four days before departure, the senseis announced that Anko would be coming with them, Hanabi was still fighting in a way that would get her killed within five minutes of encountering a real opponent, and Udon had actually managed to become less accurate when throwing kunai. Sasuke was pretty sure he was developing a migraine. Or a tic, it was hard to say.
Three days before Sasuke left, Naruto was due to return from his mission. He failed to do so, though overall that was pretty normal for the type of mission he was on. Sasuke mentally shrugged and shoved that train of thought behind the much more pressing concern of how he was going to get through five days of his jounin representative's constant company without resorting to homicide.
Two days before leaving for the exam, Sakura didn't show up with breakfast. Sasuke gave up waiting for her fifteen minutes prior to when he was due on the training field, annoyed but figuring she'd been called in to work on some serious injury or other and hadn't had time to send a note. It had happened a few times during the months he'd been under house arrest, and she always turned up for dinner.
She didn't turn up for dinner, either.
ooo
Sakura eventually did show up, three hours, nineteen minutes and nine seconds after she usually did at seven-thirty. Sasuke knew this because he spent most of the time sitting at his kitchen table, glaring at the clock and letting the fuse on his temper burn lower and lower with each passing minute. Not that he'd ever admit this to anyone.
He sensed her chakra even before she crossed over the proximity alarm, and slid the door open as she was raising her fist to knock. There was a moment when the light from his hallway threw her into sharp relief and he paused, taking in the bags under her eyes, her clenched jaw, her tense stance. It only lasted a moment, though.
He considered saying something about how he'd started letting her bring him meals at her own insistence, but in the end just turned away from her and walked back into the kitchen to warm up the now ice-cold tea on the burner. Sakura followed a moment later, and the silence stretched out between them to fill even the corners of the room with an awkward tension.
It was broken a few minutes later when his stomach rumbled loudly. He ignored it. Behind him, Sakura sighed. "I'm sorry," she mumbled. "I should have sent a note to let you know you'd need to pick something up to eat."
"Hn," Sasuke responded, turning off the burner on the now-whistling kettle and took out two mugs for the tea. He waited for her to say something more, but she didn't, and the silence stretched out between them again. Sasuke ignored that, too, and brought the tea to the table. Sakura accepted her mug with a smile.
"Thank you," she said. Sasuke took a sip from his own mug instead of responding. It wasn't as though he wouldn't do the same for any guest in his home. Besides, she looked like she could use the caffeine. Her eyes lingered on him for a minute, and her mouth opened, as though she would continue speaking, but instead she just took a sip of her own.
Then she set the mug down with a huff. "You aren't going to make this easy for me, are you?" she asked, annoyance and amusement warring with the weariness in her voice. Sasuke set his own mug down, raising an eyebrow as he did so. He hadn't been aware of the fact that he was being difficult. Sakura hardly needed his permission to talk, after all.
"Make what easy?" he asked, figuring he might as well give her the prod she needed to say whatever she wanted to say.
Sakura opened her mouth again, then closed it, hesitating. Finally she huffed again. "I don't know why this is so difficult. I do it more often than I'd like, really. All right, I'll be blunt about it." She looked him squarely in the eye. "Naruto's back. He's in the hospital, in intensive care. That's why I couldn't make it until just now."
The world froze, rewound a bit, and then started replaying more slowly. Sasuke blinked. Well. He hadn't been expecting that.
"It was supposed to be an easy mission," Sasuke pointed out, frowning as he set his own mug down and turned his full attention to the woman in front of him.
Sakura sighed, and leaned forward in her chair in a way that reminded Sasuke of the Hokage as she briefed someone on a situation. "It was supposed to be," she responded. "We don't know what happened. Well, obviously, since he was nearly unconscious when he got in last night." She reached up and rubbed her temples, as though warding off a headache, then laced both hands together and met his eyes again. "It looks like he used rasen-shuriken."
He used what? Sasuke thought, inwardly frowning. "I've never heard of that," he said aloud, letting his face smooth into indifference rather than confusion.
Sakura looked equal parts exasperated at Naruto and tired. "Well, I suppose it's good to know he listens to some of what I tell him," she muttered. "Rasen-shuriken is a technique he created when he was fifteen. It's the completed form of the rasengan, adding the element wind to the pre-existing chakra element. It works by attacking all the cells with which it comes in contact with microscopic wind blades, thus killing them." Sasuke raised an eyebrow, actually a little impressed. Not that Naruto needed to know, of course, but still.
Sakura did not seem to be similarly impressed. She scowled as she continued. "The problem is that it is still held in Naruto's hand, so every time he uses it he kills all the cells from fingertip to elbow in that arm." She used her left hand to gesture on her right, showing Sasuke the full extent of the damage. "Last time he used it, the chain reaction it created meant he couldn't move from a hospital bed for a month."
"…Che. Moron," Sasuke said, turning away from her. What kind of idiot has a jutsu in his arsenal that severely injures him every time he uses it, when he knows that he has a terminal condition that worsens with injury?
"Mm," Sakura agreed, taking a sip of tea. "I told him to stop using it. He has, for the most part. He usually has a really good reason for pulling it out of his metaphorical bag of tricks." Her lips thinned. "I'm kind of looking forward to the explanation, to be honest."
Sasuke couldn't help smirking a little at that, even as he kept his head turned away from her so she wouldn't see him do it. Knowing Naruto, it'd at least be a story worth hearing.
ooo
Sasuke eyed his opponents across the field, his weight balanced on the front of his feet and arms relaxed at his sides, giving away nothing about his next moves. Twenty-three paces at his 10 o'clock, Hanabi stood in a Gentle Fist fighting stance, hair pulled back into a messy pony-tail, strands sticking to her face from sweat. Seventeen paces to her right, Udon was breathing heavily where he crouched (a tactical mistake, it was easier to throw him off-balance), a kunai held too tightly in each hand and a large bruise beginning to discolor on his right cheek. He absently reached up to wipe under his nose, and Sasuke let a small part of his mind list all the ways that left him open, and how one would take advantage of them.
"Okay," Anko called from her seemingly very comfortable position under the maple, nine paces to Sasuke's immediate left. "Again. Three-way spar to pin or first blood. On my mark…" The two younger genin tensed, and Sasuke resisted the very real urge to call out exactly what direction they were likely to jump. "Three, two, one…" Anko popped a dango into her mouth and chewed happily.
"Sensei!" Hanabi snapped, obviously exasperated. Anko smirked around the dango stick, and took her time taking the damn thing out of her mouth. She twirled it in her fingers, watching as it spun a little jerkily.
"Mark," she called without warning.
Udon was actually the first to move this time. He threw both kunai, one at either opponent, and then leapt backwards in an attempt to put some more distance between them. It wouldn't have worked if Sasuke had been paying more attention to him, but the throw wasn't bad. Hanabi dodged it with ease, of course, but it served to throw off her stride during an otherwise reckless frontal attack on Sasuke. Sasuke, on the other hand, didn't bother to dodge. He snatched the weapon out of the air and tossed it in the direction of Hanabi's weak point in her defense. Hanabi dodged again, but barely.
Hyuuga were graceful, on a whole, and Hanabi was no exception. She'd moved out of the line of the kunai as though it were part of a well-choreographed dance, and was again trying to close the distance between herself and her chosen target seconds later. Apparently, she still hadn't taken what Sasuke considered a rather blatant hint that she was leaving herself vulnerable.
He waited until she was within arm-length before planting his foot directly in her side. He added a little chakra to the hit, too. He figured if being flung halfway across a training field didn't make the hint sink in, nothing would.
Hanabi hit the ground on her back and rolled, using her momentum to get to her feet again just in time for Sasuke to reach her landing place. He used his sword sheath to hook her legs before she managed to get into a good stance, sending her backwards towards the ground again. He'd found that the best way to counter-act Hanabi's ability to cut off chakra pathways was to keep her hands busy lessening the impact of a fall, though it didn't hurt that knocking her down was also rather satisfying.
She twisted so that most of her weight was balanced on her arms in a partial hand-stand, and then levered herself up into a double kick towards Sasuke's stomach. He side-stepped, and twisted to block the first hand-strike of the match with the still-sheathed sword. He caught the other arm around her wrist as she went for his shoulder and pinched a nerve cluster until she winced, then kicked her again directly in the stomach, effectively winding her. Then, he dropped her face-first onto the ground and placed the now unsheathed blade at the back of her throat.
"Does this count as a pin, or should I draw blood?" he called to Anko. The jounin looked up from her lunch as though she hadn't been keeping a close eye on the match. "You're done for now, Hanabi." The younger kunoichi humphed, but stayed down.
"I was going to throw a shuriken at his eyes," she informed her sensei, as though this would somehow counteract the fact that she was on her stomach with naked steel at her neck. Sasuke snorted and raised his sword so that she could get up…
… and sidestepped as the kunai Udon had been holding for the past five minutes finally flew past his ear. He turned and faced his second opponent.
True to form, Udon had stayed away from the fighting as much as possible. He'd backed up as Hanabi's impromptu trip across the training field had drawn the action a little closer, and was now in what would normally be a strategically sound position in the branches above Anko's head. Too bad he'd just given away the exact position, Sasuke thought to himself, inwardly smirking. He tilted the sword just enough to send a glare directly at the other genin's eyes, in such a way that his glasses would be more hindrance than help. Then he moved.
A quick dash up the trunk, a swing onto the branch behind Udon and a swift cut through the wood later, and Udon was in a heap on the ground with a tree branch pinning him there. The whole process took about four seconds.
"Match goes to Uchiha," Anko declared with roll of her eyes. "I'm sure nobody saw that coming…"
Sasuke snorted contemptuously, then jumped down. That had been extraordinarily simple. He landed easily a foot from where Udon was struggling his way out from under the branch. Anko eyed him uninterestedly. "There a reason you're beating the shit out of them today, or are your feathers all a-fluff for no reason?" she asked Sasuke. He shot her a glare that could freeze boiling lava, which earned him an obnoxious smirk and little else. "Fine, don't tell me." She gestured Hanabi over and waited for Udon to finish dusting himself off before continuing. "Lunch break," she declared. "You kiddies get twenty minutes."
"Finally," Hanabi snapped, pushing sweaty, dirty hair out of her eyes irritably and turning her back on the party as she headed to her pack. Udon plopped down where he stood and stretched out, groaning like he'd just been used as a punching bag. The fact that this wasn't too far from the mark was inconsequential. Sasuke turned to get his pack, too, but Anko's voice stopped him.
"Hold it, Uchiha. I want a word with you." He turned back and raised an eyebrow. "Yeah," she said, as though he'd asked a question. "You." She stood up and stretched, then started walking off towards the edge of the training ground. "Walk with me." Wondering irritably if she was going to push the 'more grumpy than usual' question, Sasuke followed.
The truth was, he was feeling out-of-sorts, though he really couldn't pin down why. He'd had trouble getting to sleep the night before once Sakura left, but it wasn't lack of sleep that had him on edge now. He felt uncomfortable in his skin, and there was something nagging at the back of his mind that he couldn't quite pin down. It made everything seem even more annoying than it usually was, and as a result he may have been a little harder on his temporary teammates than was strictly necessary. He didn't see what the big deal about that was, truthfully. They were ninja. They should be able to take a few hits.
Anko strolled along, not looking at him, hands in the pockets of her coat. She was whistling something Sasuke didn't recognize, though that may have had something to do with the fact that the whistling was disgustingly off-key. Sasuke, who was making a conscious effort to not show how annoyed he was getting with every passing moment, matched her step for step and didn't attempt to shut her up. He felt she should be grateful for his restraint. After all, it was hardly polite to ignore the person whose time you were taking up for some presumed desperate need to converse. He wondered if he was supposed to make the first overture at…
He dropped, letting the snakes fly right through the area where his head used to be, sharingan spinning in his eyes. He drew his sword and arced it directly at Anko's legs in a counter attack that would cut them clean through at the knee. Anko jumped before the hit landed, did a neat summersault in the air, and landed behind him out of immediate striking range. Sasuke rose and whirled to face her as she landed, sword at the ready. Anko had drawn kunai while still in the air, three for each hand. The younger ninja wasn't surprised to see that she was grinning. "So," she said casually, as though she wasn't poised to take Sasuke's head off. "You're good enough to counter a jounin with no warning and no killing intent." She relaxed and let her arms drop, sheathing the kunai again in a show of truce and leaving Sasuke blinking a little as he realized that there really was no killing intent coming from his opponent. "That's good. It's the type of skill that takes years of back-breaking work to cultivate." She gestured over her shoulder at where the other two genin were just now realizing something was going on between Sasuke and Anko. "They aren't that good," she said unnecessarily.
"Che," Sasuke responded, standing up and sheathing his sword, but keeping sharingan activated.
Anko raised an eyebrow. "But then again, they don't have to be that good, Uchiha. They're genin. Genin who are ready to be chuunin, but genin either way. Hanabi's about the level you were at when you entered your first chuunin exam." She stretched. "You were lauded as a genius, if I remember correctly."
"What's your point?" Sasuke asked bluntly.
Anko gave him a look. "My point is that you should lay off them. They're not terrible. They just don't meet your ridiculously high standards, because they don't have the training and experience you had." Sasuke raised an eyebrow. Anko raised one back. "Hanabi's my student, or I wouldn't be saying anything at all. Just… they're only kids. Don't expect miracles."
"Can I go now?" Sasuke asked, letting some of his annoyance bleed into his voice. It earned him a grin from Anko that could have cut glass.
"Hold your horses. You don't have anywhere to be," she said. "Just one more thing. You," she pointed at Sasuke, "are the senior member of this team. During the exam, you will be the one with the experience, and the responsibility to get all three of you out of there alive. I," here she gestured to herself, "am going strictly as your jounin representative. That means I make sure you get there on time, and then sign you in at that door. I'm not going as a sensei." She paused, the grin still in place. "Do ya know what that means, Uchiha?" Sasuke didn't lower himself to answer, not that she expected him to. "It means that if you want them to fix something, you'll have to teach them yourself. I'm not gonna do it for you." Sasuke clenched his fists, even as he kept any reaction to the words out of his face and shoulders. Anko's eyes flicked to his hands, one of which was still bandaged pretty tightly to support the healing fracture, and her grin widened. She turned and started walking away.
"You now have ten minutes to eat," she called over her shoulder. Sasuke pulled out a kunai, but managed to stop himself before he threw it. From the fucking cackle Anko gave, she noticed anyway.
ooo
Discarded notes from the waste-basket of Uchiha Sasuke:
Naruto,
This is for whenever you wake up from your coma.
--
Naruto,
Words cannot express how fucking stupid you are.
--
Idiot,
What kind of loser uses a jutsu that kills all the cells in his arm?
--
Naruto,
When you get this, I'll probably still be in Grass, since the Council decided I could go to the chuunin exam. You wouldn't know this, because you went into a coma before I could tell you.
--
Moron,
You better fucking appreciate what I'm going through to make sure you have a team for the jounin exam. Do you have any idea how fucking weak genin are?
One comment about me being a genin and I'll track you down and kill you myself.
--
Asshole,
When I get back from Grass, you better have a really good reason why you used a jutsu that you know escalates your condition. I'm aware that you're mentally challenged, but I didn't
--
Naruto,
I couldn't come to visit you in the hospital. Not that it would have mattered because you were in a coma. Anyway, I needed to go to the chuunin exam. For you, by the way. You better be grateful.
--
Naruto,
Why am I even trying to write you a note, anyway? I don't have to explain myself to you. I'm not your keeper. If you want to kill yourself before becoming Hokage, go right ahead. It's not like I (remaining words blacked out)
--
Naruto,
You better fucking be awake when I get back, or you can fucking take the jounin exam on your own. I have no intention of wasting my time on reckless idiots.
--
Dead last,
Can't you even deliver a message correctly? Are you a special brand of idiot here-to-fore undiscovered or something?
--
…I DON'T FUCKING KNOW WHAT TO WRITE
ooo
A note found on the side-table of Uzumaki Naruto's hospital bed:
Moron.
ooo
A message sent to Uchiha Sasuke by carrier bird from Konohagakure, received just before the third round of the chuunin exam:
Bastard.
ooo
AN: –boggles– Oh my god, it's done! I'm so sorry it took so long to finish, people! I'm smack dab in the middle of a semester of college right now, so time is scarce. –sheepish– Thanks for sticking with me!
Dragon77: Gah! Sorry it took so long, sweets! Hopefully it was worth the wait?
Ness: –glomp– You read it! Yay!
Boshoku: It is indeed… I'm glad you liked, love! Hopefully, you'll this chapter was worth the wait!
Dragon695: I agree with you. If a main character is going to die in the body of a story, there should be a warning. As of now, however, this is not a death fic, which is why it isn't labeled as one. Also, I refer to Best Days as a long-term illness fic mainly because, in this universe, Naruto has actually had the condition since the day he was born. It just wasn't discovered until he was fifteen. Perhaps a better description would be 'terminal illness'? As for kyuubi, you're absolutely right. It would be a good idea to, at the very least, tell him to bloody stop healing the boy so quickly. Unfortunately, while looking through canon, I didn't see any indication of Naruto mentioning that he holds conversations with Kyuubi, so none of the people who could have this idea know it's even possible. Well, except for Naruto, but he can really only enter that cavern when he's unconscious, and he's only unconscious when the damage has pretty much been done, so it hasn't occurred to him to try.
Right! I think that's everyone. Hope you all enjoy! I'll try to have the next chapter out much sooner than this one. Look at my bio for weekly updates on whether or not something's up!