Sasuke's No Good Very Bad Teammates
Summary: Naruto and Sakura have gone insane.
Or: Just after becoming Team 7 Naruto and Sakura go through a massive shift in personality, leaving Sasuke out of the loop and wondering what in the name of sanity could have happened to them. His only consolation is that Kakashi is just as weirded out as he is.
Chapter 10
Leaving behind their home village was – who would have thought – a bit more complicated than it had sounded when Naruto had first brought it up. Although for entirely different reasons than Sasuke would have expected.
"I forgot something!" Naruto announced and interrupted their planning session. Luckily, not even Sakura and Naruto were reckless enough to run away on a whim, and they'd spent most of the day preparing for their minor act of treason. "We have to stay until after the last task of the Chūnin Exam."
Sasuke cocked an eyebrow at him. "Why?"
Naruto hesitated and Sasuke narrowed his eyes in warning. While his teammates had started to involve him more and more, sometimes they still slipped up and stumbled upon topics they – for some reason – still would not share with Sasuke.
Eventually, Naruto caved. "There's this boy one year above us. Hyūga Neji. There's something I have to take care of before we leave."
"Why the exam?" Sakura asked. "You're not participating."
"... Shit. You're right."
"What would participating have changed?" Sasuke asked.
"I would've beaten him up."
"It's how he makes friends," Sakura said with a teasing smile.
Sasuke arched an unimpressed eyebrow. "... By beating them up."
"Remember Gaara? From the sand siblings?" Naruto asked.
"Yeah?"
Naruto gave him a self-satisfied smile, nodding in a way that said 'There you have it.' Sasuke leaned back, deciding to let it go. Naruto made friends by beating them up. Sure, why not.
"So?" Sakura asked, stretching her arms. They hadn't moved in hours, too engrossed in their planning. "What are you gonna do?"
Naruto shrugged. "I'll improvise."
Improvising, as it turned out, meant breaking into the Hyūga compound in broad daylight and interrupting Neji during his training. The older boy was engrossed beating up a training dummy, a look of utter concentration on his face.
However, it was not distraction enough for them to surprise him. "How did you get in, and what do you want?" he asked, not even sparing them a glance. Sasuke's lips thinned. He seemed incredibly arrogant. What did Naruto want with him?
Naruto stepped forward and Sasuke felt Sakura's hand on his arm, holding him back. "Leave it to Naruto," she whispered. "He knows what he's doing."
"You're preparing for the Chūnin Exams, right?" Naruto stepped closer to Neji with a sunny smile. "Care for a sparring partner?"
Neji huffed out a breath, eying Naruto dismissively. "Your team wasn't even recommended for the Chūnin Exams. Don't be absurd."
Sasuke felt heat rising up in his body and took a step forwards. He wasn't even sure who exactly he planned to defend: himself, Naruto or his team in general. Sakura laid a calming hand on his shoulder. "Ignore him. Just let Naruto do his thing."
Sasuke squirmed, but obeyed. He didn't like the feeling of leaving everything to his teammates.
It didn't take Naruto long until he had persuaded Neji to a spar – although it was obvious that Neji didn't expect a challenge. "Byakugan," he called out, and Sasuke watched with interest as veins thickened around his eyes.
He had heard about the Hyūga's technique before: a Bloodline Limit rumored to even surpass the Sharingan in its prowess. Sasuke very much doubted that, but for there to be rumors in the first place, the Byakugan had to be somewhat useful.
Neji lunged forwards, his hands glowing and eyes narrowed in concentration. Considering that he didn't take Naruto seriously, he was probably planning to finish the fight with a single blow.
Sasuke lost sight of Naruto, and he reappeared behind Neji, getting in a few jabs before Neji managed to block. Sasuke frowned and leaned closer to Sakura. "Those punches were nothing. Did he even use chakra?"
"Didn't look like it," Sakura said cheerfully.
Neji frowned, pausing. He started a new attack, aiming for Naruto's chest only to change direction and target his limbs instead. Again, Naruto dodged his attacks, using the small window of opportunity by hitting Neji harmlessly.
Sasuke was starting to see what he was doing. Naruto wasn't trying to hurt Neji or even to win the fight. He was dodging and getting in hits to prove to Neji that he could.
Neji had noticed too, and his mouth twisted into a snarl. His movement grew sharper, his attacks more ruthless and soon his hands were glowing streaks, moving too quickly to follow. Even so, Naruto continued to dodge and continued to fight back. Not fighting Neji seriously just made the confrontation more insulting.
Only a few minutes into the spar, Neji cried out in frustration. He was gasping for breath while Naruto looked as calm as when they had started. Neji hadn't managed to get in a single hit. "Why are you here?!" he yelled.
"To prove something to you," Naruto said, following Neji's example and relaxing out of his fighting stance. "I'm not going to pretend like I have no unfair advantages as a shinobi." He snorted. "In fact, I'd probably never have graduated if it wasn't for my mom's huge chakra reserves. But what I used right now? That was just taijutsu. Just what your teammate, Lee, uses too."
Neji grit his teeth, still panting from their spar. Naruto wasn't finished.
"That means I beat you only with what I learned through hard work."
"What do you want?! What do you hope to achieve by coming here?!"
"I wanted to show you that you shouldn't look down on others, no matter their background or their privilege. And yeah," Naruto continued before Neji could interrupt him, "I know that's rich, telling that to a member of the Hyūga's side branch."
That made Neji pause. "You know of our clan system."
"I do. And it's wrong. But looking down on others the way you do right now… That's not going to change anything." He smiled, letting optimism light up his expression. "But it will. Change, I mean."
Neji snarled. "You have no idea what you're talking about."
Naruto's smile dampened, but he clung to it. "I think I do. You'll soon find out, but we three? We're not really fond of Konoha the way it is now. We'll make sure that things change, even if it may take us a while."
Neji scowled at them. "You're insane. You're talking about dismantling a system as old as the shinobi world."
"Sounds like a challenge," Sakura chimed in, smirking. She had apparently recognized that Naruto was finished. They didn't stay for longer after that, leaving behind a bitterly scowling Neji. Sasuke didn't see how they had changed anything about his behavior.
"What exactly were you trying to do?"
"I got him thinking." Naruto flashed him a smile. "That's enough for now."
It was only later that Sasuke realized that he hadn't protested about Naruto including him in his little speech. He supposed that meant he was fighting to dismantle the current shinobi hierarchy now.
He also supposed that he ought to be more bothered by that than he was.
They ended up bickering over whether or not to tell Kakashi about their little field trip.
Naruto, for once, was adamantly against leaving without notifying him first. "We can't just not tell him. He'll be worried sick!"
Sasuke shrugged. "He'll get over it."
"He doesn't deserve that!"
"... You're right." Sakura paused. "But he'll try to stop us if we tell him," she pointed out.
Naruto broke out into a grin. "I have an idea."
"You what."
"Sorry, Sensei. But we made our decision."
"But– You can't– You're genin!" Kakashi stared at them with growing horror, his visible eye pleading with one of them to get to their senses. He was disappointed.
"Genin who held off two S-ranked missing nin," Sakura pointed out. Sasuke's eye twitched at the reminder.
"But–" Kakashi was struggling to find the right words. "What are you going to tell the Hokage?"
"Riiiiight… About that." Naruto let his voice trail off, ending in a sheepish grin. All that followed was horrified silence.
"You're not going to tell him," Kakashi said.
Nobody answered.
"You want me to tell him. To cover for you."
Silence. Kakashi rubbed at his eyes, muttered what sounded like "How did I deserve this." Sasuke couldn't help but to feel a tiny spark of satisfaction about seeing him so agitated. It was petty, but he had refused to tell Sasuke the truth about his teammates once he'd found out. He struggled to find it within himself to feel bad for Kakashi.
Naruto on the other hand winced. "I'm sorry, Kakashi-sensei. Really. But there's so much beyond Konoha."
"We'll come back," Sakura promised. "We just have to take care of some things."
Kakashi looked at them pained. "What if I stop you? I could tell the Hokage right now. Even if you make it out, you'll have ANBU on your tails."
Sasuke and his teammates shared a glance. They looked back at Kakashi.
He closed his eye as if in deep pain. "What did you do?"
Naruto and Sakura took a leap and threw themselves at Kakashi in a hug. Sasuke felt a hand at his collar, and before he realized what was happening he was dragged into it, too.
"Thank you for everything," Naruto said. "Take care, we'll see you soon!"
Kakashi didn't return the hug, but he didn't shy away from it, either. Although that may have been out of shock, resignation or plain defeat. "What did you do?!"
The three clones disintegrated and halfway across the country, Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke paused as their clones' memories merged with their own. They shared a glance before they kept on going.
Sasuke breathed in the cold air, wind ruffling through his hair as they leaped through the trees, one of his teammates at each of his sides. A smile tugged at his lips, hidden from their sight. The air smelled like freedom.
A/N: Ahh. Do you feel that? That's me, finishing up the first part of this story and finally getting Team 7 out of the village. :P We'll see plenty of characters and plot points reappear later on, but the chunin exam was the last plot point that followed canon closely. Well, ish. Not really, actually. The point is, everything is far less restricted now and we're starting a whole new part of the story!
Beta'd by the wonderful Igornerd, PyrothTenka, To Mockingbird and phirephox666!
Please take the time to leave a review!
~Gwen