Chapter 25: Nice Job Breaking It, Hero

"I heard Kakashi order me to stand down, but I killed Haku anyway."

Hiruzen's pen stopped moving. He glanced up and took one look at the speaker before sinking further into his chair, half resigned and half struck with morbid curiosity.

Sasuke was standing in front of his desk, a determined look in his eyes as he took another breath. "I sabotaged the mission—"

Hiruzen's face drooped, and he was suddenly very, very tired.

He should have expected this, really. Higurashi had warned him after, all—but it was quite another thing to witness it in person.

Not fifteen minutes had passed since Hiruzen had summoned Sasuke to the Hokage's chambers to discuss the current state of affairs. And what a mess it was. Where to even begin, when everything was said and done? There was Itachi, whose ongoing threat to spill village secrets if any harm were to befall Sasuke was never far from the minds of the council. And then there was Danzō...

"I lied about Kakashi and Sakura—"

Don't worry about Sasuke, Higurashi had said. Just leave him to me.

Yes, Higurashi's warnings had been accurate, and the power he wielded too great for Hiruzen to ever truly be at ease, but he was irreplaceable.

Higurashi had saved his life, after all.

Even so, the man had not been very forthcoming with specifics. When Higurashi said things like, "Don't worry about Sasuke," and "He needs to work through this stuff on his own," and Hiruzen's personal favorite, "It's really important that you just give the kid some space!" Hiruzen had expected some kind of delinquent behavior. Pranks, yes, but insubordination? Death threats? Desertion?

The hardest part of all of this was having to explain—or more aptly put, not explain—his decisions to hand-wave most of Sasuke's transgressions to Danzō. Itachi aside, heaven knows that Danzō habitually went behind everyone's back and did whatever he decided was best, regardless of what the rest of Konoha thought.

"I convinced Naruto to help me defect—"

And Danzō was most certainly out for Sasuke's blood. Not that he'd necessarily be successful... How many times had Danzō tried to arrange his untimely demise in the past? Hiruzen wasn't sure, but it was more times than should be allowed. Of course, a direct investigation would be a logical response to that kind of thing, but this was a shinobi village, after all. Keep your friends close and your enemies closer, as they say. So of course Danzō stuck around, with far too much political sway and reign over one of the more shady and far too powerful subdivisions of ANBU.

At any rate, Sasuke would not be the first misguided shinobi to get a free pass for no adequately explained reason. Or at least, for reasons that would never be shared.

What really mattered was who the village should be more concerned with: Itachi or Danzō?
Damn that child, for putting him in this position. If it weren't for Higurashi, Hiruzen would have dropped dead from the sheer stress of it all months ago.

Here comes the headache, Hiruzen thought. He raised a hand, ready to massage his temple...

"I put itching powder in the towels in the women's bathhouse—"

...before promptly putting his hand in front of him in a silencing gesture, effectively cutting Sasuke off.

"Enough," Hiruzen said. "I get it. Please don't list everything you've done since you've graduated—I suspect we'd be here all day."

Sasuke stared back at him, his face closed off.

So that's how it was going to be. "Is there a reason you've decided to tell me this? Now, of all times?"

"Yes..."

Hiruzen held his breath, waiting.

"I want you to give us another chance."

...and there it was. "Us?"

Sasuke flushed, clearly uncomfortable. "Team Seven."

"You want me to give Team Seven another chance," Hiruzen repeated slowly.

Sasuke said nothing, and Hiruzen raised an eyebrow. "After all the effort you put into getting off of Team Seven—after accusing your genin instructor of sexual abuse, after your attempted desertion, and let's not forget the treason,"—Sasuke flinched—"You're telling me that you would like to be put back on Team Seven."

"Yes," Sasuke stated, as if this was a perfectly reasonable request. "Kakashi, too, of course."

"Of course," Hiruzen nodded. "It wouldn't be quite as much of an ungodly disaster without the four of you together, after all."

Sasuke made some comment that was not directly related to Hiruzen's statement, followed by yet another comment about why reuniting Team Seven was in everyone's best interests even if it would take some time for things to get "back to normal" (Back to normal? What normal? This team had been a disaster from the moment it was formed)—but Hiruzen wasn't paying much attention.

The Hokage was long past trying to figure the youngest Uchiha out. He was not sure what Sasuke was, or ever had been, attempting to accomplish. Hiruzen had tried, at times, to goad Higurashi into divulging something—anything—of importance, but he had little success in the matter. In the end, Higurashi had not led him astray, so Hiruzen had resigned himself to giving up.

Hiruzen could have listed off the litany of reasons why Sasuke's request was completely ridiculous, and perhaps he would have, if Higurashi hadn't already told him exactly what Sasuke was going to ask.

"Alright. I accept your request."

Sasuke's jaw dropped, almost imperceptibly, and he blinked up at the older man. "What?"

Instead of directly responding, Hiruzen instead began list off the terms of his acceptance: Sasuke would be under heavy probation, with most of his civilian and shinobi rights being restricted. Team Seven would be reinstated, albeit another shinobi would supervise them during any out of town missions (this was mostly to make sure that nothing happened to Sasuke—after everything, Hiruzen couldn't be sure that Kakashi wouldn't slip up and let something unfortunate happen). And of course, the three genin would be banned from taking the chunin exams until the probationary period lifted.

Sasuke eyed the Hokage, his suspicion nearly tangible by the end of his speech. "You're actually agreeing?" Sasuke finally said. "What are you playing at?"

For the love of—"Look, do you or do you not want to rejoin Team Seven? I could have sworn you came into my office with the express purpose of trying to do this, and yet here you are reminding me why this is, in all likelihood, a terrible decision on my part."

Sasuke treated this question as he treated all questions and information that confused and/or irritated him—he ignored it. "And what about Kakashi? Do you think he'll be willing to rejoin Team Seven?"

"Kakashi will do as he's instructed, as he has always done. He is an exemplary shinobi. Now please, escort yourself out of my office before I come to my senses and change my mind."

Five seconds later, Sasuke was no where to be seen.

About a week later.

Sasuke woke up with a jolt, in his own bed, to the sound of the familiar beeping of his alarm clock. It was 6:30 AM, and Team Seven was scheduled to meet at 8 sharp for the first time in longer than Sasuke cared to think about.

This was exactly what Sasuke had been hoping for, which was why he was too paralyzed to get out of bed. It was time to enact step one of his newly developed "Thwart Higurashi" plan: returning the status quo.

However, coming up with a plan was one thing, and actually setting it into motion was another thing entirely. This would be the first time he'd come face to face with Kakashi since he was relieved as their jonin instructor. And Sakura hadn't been too happy with him the last time he saw her, either...

Something loud crashed outside of his bedroom, and Sasuke bolted upright, his paralysis momentarily forgotten. This was followed by the sound of someone cursing, and as soon as he heard the voice, Sasuke fell limply back down onto the bed.

..Why was Naruto always in his house, nowadays?

As it turned out, Naruto—bored of waiting around and really excited to be let out of the hospital—had decided that showing up and dragging Sasuke out of bed was the best way to let off steam.

Sasuke could have kicked him out, but Naruto was already sitting at his kitchen table, having helped himself to a bowl of cereal. It was just too much effort this early in the morning, so Sasuke just poured himself a bowl and took a seat next to Naruto.

"Do you think Kakashi-sensei's actually going to show up?" Naruto asked between mouthfuls.

"Yes."

"Do you think we're gonna get to go on a mission?"

"I doubt it."

"I don't wanna go if we're not gonna get to go on a mission," Naruto wrinkled his nose. "Let's go practice our jutsu in the Uchiha district instead."

Sasuke sighed. "Skipping our first team meeting is probably not the best idea, Naruto,"

"Why not?"

Sasuke looked at him then, his eyes briefly landing on the curse mark sitting innocently on Naruto's neck. "Because... because it just wouldn't, okay? Let's just go."

After his talk with Higurashi a week ago, Sasuke had immediately ran straight to Naruto's hospital room. Itachi hadn't shown up, and that was just as well—Sasuke wasn't ready to face him yet, and there were more important things to deal with.

It had taken some time (and lots and lots of patience) for Sasuke to explain everything to the boy. Like, exactly what had happened to Orochimaru ("He tried to eat that giant frog you summoned and ruptured from the inside out. He just... exploded, Naruto. It was gross."), why they weren't in (much) trouble ("We helped take down a wanted criminal,"), and most importantly, why it was not a good idea for them to desert and become "super badass mercenary shadow missing-nin." Sasuke struggled the most with this last one, but he eventually managed to convince Naruto that missing-nin, could not, in fact, become Hokage. Fortunately for him, this still happened to be one of Naruto's dreams.

Unfortunately, Sasuke failed spectacularly at convincing Naruto that Konoha (contrary to everything Sasuke had said prior to this point) was not all that bad. When Naruto asked what the Will of Fire was, Sasuke ended the conversation, because he couldn't exactly remember, either.

Later...

It had been three weeks since Team Seven's first meeting.

Three long, god-awful weeks. Everything was different, and nothing was different.

There had been no signs of Higurashi since their last meeting at the hospital. Itachi had not shown his face since either, and since Sasuke was still alive, he could only assume that Danzō was otherwise occupied, too.

Sasuke could almost imagine that the whole fiasco had been a dream, if not for cold look in Kakashi's eyes, the tightness in Sakura's jaw as she spoke, and the ten-foot gap that forever separated the two of them. He had not yet worked up the courage to apologize to Kakashi to his face, but Sasuke knew Kakashi was waiting for it. He'd get to it… eventually. He couldn't do it now, anyway: Kakashi had disappeared somewhere, leaving the three of them to spar until lunch.

This "fixing things" thing turned out to be a lot harder than he thought. Where was he even supposed to start? He'd never actually had to try to mend bonds before. Usually it was everyone else scrambling to do it for him. Back home, Sasuke reasoned, all he probably would have had to do was say, "Okay, I'll come home," or "Sorry for all those times I tried to kill you," and everything would have worked itself out.

But here?

Well, the status quo wasn't snapping back into place on its own like he had hoped, and convincing someone that teamwork is awesome when he wasn't totally sold on the idea himself was proving to be difficult.

Sasuke stood up from where he had been sitting on the floor and looked down at the Uchiha clan symbol he had spent the last twenty minutes outlining in the dirt. Grumbling, he ground his foot into it and turned his attention back onto Naruto and Sakura, who were still sparring.

They seemed to be doing alright: Naruto was being his usual, annoying self, and so was Sakura. Maybe they were on the right track already—

"Why are you even holding a kunai?"

Sasuke sighed, wishing he could shut Naruto's mouth through sheer willpower.

"Because we'e sparring, idiot," Sakura said, right before lunging at him.

"Well, yeah, but I've never actually seen you do anything with it. Except that one time you accidentally stabbed yourself when you weren't paying attention and went crying to Kakashi-sensei."

"You're an asshole, Naruto," Sakura sneered before whipping around to glare at Sasuke, who was currently snickering to himself—"And so are you!"

At that, Sasuke abruptly shut up, willing himself not to respond.
This was definitely not the status quo.

"Sorry," Sasuke mumbled.

When she heard him, Sakura froze, an odd expression plastered on her face. In fact, she almost looked like she was blushing... until Naruto punched her square in the jaw, knocking her flat on her butt.

"Ha, I win! That's 2 to 0!"

"What the hell is wrong with you?!" Sakura was no longer blushing. In fact, Sasuke was pretty sure he wasn't even on her radar at this point. "Who in their right mind sucker punches someone when they aren't even paying attention?"

"A real ninja never gets distracted in the heat of battle! Maybe you should just give up and retire now."

Sasuke flinched at the sound of Sakura's high pitched scream as she launched herself at Naruto.

Dear God, was this day over with yet?

Fortunately for Sasuke, Kakashi had appeared not long afterwards to pry Naruto and Sakura apart (at some point, it had crossed over from 'sparring' into 'death match' territory) and dismissed the three of them for the day.

Technically, it was lunch time, but Kakashi had obviously had enough of them for one afternoon. He couldn't really blame him.

"Sasuke?"

Sasuke stopped en route and turned to see Sakura staring up at him, looking a lot more like her old self than he was used to seeing. In fact, Sasuke was fairly sure that she hadn't willingly spoken to him (outside of yelling at him, that is) since the re-formation of Team Seven.

Was it because he had apologized to her earlier? Sakura still hadn't said anything—she was just staring at him, like she was waiting for him to say something first. Which was ridiculous, because she was the one who started talking to him.

"What do you want?"

Sakura flinched at his tone, and Sasuke immediately regretted his choice of words. Okay, maybe he sounded a little more irritated than he felt, and maybe his tone had been a little harsh, but she was staring at him like he was the one who started talking to her first, and what the hell did she want, anyway?

Sasuke crossed his arms and stared at her, glaring, because she still hadn't said anything and was still staring at him. He'd just have to wait for her to make the next move—

...aaaand she was walking away.

God damnit. He had one job—one job!—and that was to not be an asshole.
...And how did people restart conversations, anyway?

"Sakura, wait."

Now it was Sakura's turn to look back at him expectantly.

..Except by this point, he didn't actually have anything to say to her, and was flustered enough that he didn't even remember what the conversation was supposed to be about. Wait, had they even had a conversation yet...?

"Sakura!" A female voice called out, and a few seconds later, a mass of red was swarming towards them, before latching itself onto Sakura's arm.

Sasuke immediately tensed, his glare returning almost instantly: behind rectangular frames, two red eyes raised up in response, and the owner was grinning right back at him.

"Saaakuraaaa," Karin whined, turning her attention back towards the other girl. "Is training finally done for the day?"

Sakura looked relieved to see her, which only pissed Sasuke off more. He still had trouble wrapping his head around the fact that they had somehow both a.) met and b.) become friends without him knowing. Three weeks was apparently more than enough time for the universe to continue to screw him over.

"Aa, thankfully. I've had about enough of them for one day."

"You poor thing. I don't blame you," Karin whipped her head towards Sasuke again, raising her nose at him in distaste."I still can't even believe they let him back on your team. You Konoha ninjas are so forgiving. I would have had him strung up by his—"

"Good thing nobody asked you," Sasuke interrupted.

Karin bristled, and almost looked like she was going to say something before ultimately deciding Sasuke wasn't worth responding to. Instead, she just smirked at him before turning her attention back towards Sakura.

Mother fucking Karin.

"You should come hang out with me and Anko-sensei more often. She's just the coolest—I can't believe the Hokage let me work with her. I mean, if they let me in... I bet you could definitely convince the Hokage to let you switch over."

Sasuke still couldn't believe they let her into the village, either. Didn't they have standards? And why did Karin have to pick Sakura of all people to latch onto? It was almost like she did it just to spite him...

"No," Sakura sighed. "A team's a team... even if I don't like it. I can't just ditch them."

"Well, you don't have to spend anymore time with them than necessary, at least. C'mon, let's go get something to eat. My treat!" Karin declared, tugging Sakura down the road by the arm. Sakura took one last look at Sasuke before allowing herself to be shuttled off.

This was most certainly not apart of the plan, Sasuke decided. He had to go find Naruto.

Finding Naruto was easier than expected: it was lunchtime, and the jinchuriki was currently wandering back and forth between several cheap takeout restaurants. It was a wasted gesture, because not once had Sasuke seen him stop anywhere other than Ichiraku's.

On his way there, Sasuke had realized that he was going to have to be much more proactive if things were ever going to get back to normal. Naruto was going to need a lot more encouragement if Team Seven's relationships were ever going to be mended.

Sasuke was still in the process of figuring out what "mended relationships" looked like, though; for now, Sasuke decided that Sakura needed to like him again, and that Naruto needed to like Sakura. Both of those were... not looking so good, but he felt better seeing them as "works in progress."

"Naruto," Sasuke said, after grabbing the blonde by the back of his shirt, "I think you should ask Sakura out on a date."

"Huh? Why?"

Sasuke paused, unsure of what to say. "Well.. because. Because you like her."

"Um... Wait, do you need me to distract her? Do you have something planned?" Naruto, whispered, his voice taking on a conspiratorial tone. He looked around the street, quickly spotting Sakura and Karin at a nearby vendor.

"No, just..." Sasuke ran a hand through his hair—"I just think that it would be a good idea... for you to ask.. Sakura out.. on a date," He said this very slowly, as if that would help get through Naruto's thick skull.

The blonde's brow was furrowed, the wheels turning in his head. Apparently something must have clicked, because his face split into a huge grin. "Oooohhhhh. I see."

"You do?"

"Yup!" Naruto's grin somehow got wider. He wiggled his eyebrows once, before bolting off towards Sakura, shouting, "SAKURA! Sakura-chan! Hey Sakura, do you wanna go out on a date with me?", all the while pushing unsuspecting villagers out of his way in his efforts to reach her as quickly as possible.

Sasuke followed after him, and was greeted with a beautiful sight: Naruto was unrelentingly, and repeatedly, asking Sakura out, while she repeatedly told him no and to go bug someone else. It was almost like he had been thrown back in time all over again.

Sure, he was sending Sasuke really odd winks every once in awhile, but Naruto was weird like that.

Sasuke sagged in relief. See? Everything was going to be just fine.

A:/N: Epilogue upcoming, so I've removed the bulk of the old author's note for now.