Step Forward

I dodged by simply bending backward, narrowly missing the leg sweep that came my way, only to continue spinning, turning my falling back into a handstand and kicking up, slashing my right foot upwards in order to gain both some space and momentum.

An instant later, I was back on my feet, my palm smacking sideways the jab targeted at my face. I took a single step forward, the sweeping motion of my arm continuing as it briefly hid me from my opponent's eyes, while my free hand came up with a jab, that landed solidly on the liver of my opponent, who crashed to the ground, gasping in pain.

How did it go from 'Yo' to 'Let's fight each other? I asked myself, observing distractedly the kid wheezing on the ground.

"Sasuke-kun, you're truly... *gaah*" he exhaled forcefully, ".. strong." Rock Lee complimented me.

Never mind that, what pushed me towards this guy in particular? His personality is endearing, if only because of his circumstances, but if I don't curb his obsession with fighting, I'll end up pulling an Itachi.

Since the first blatant use of my bloodline, bootlickers, and general asswipes that catered to the whim of the Last Uchiha, yours truly, were doubled. The children at the Academy were still children, blundering through their emotions in somewhat reasonable, at least in their heads, attempt to either befriend or rise above me.

It didn't take long for the stares to grow from mildly irritating to downright hate-inducing.

"Are you alright?" I asked with concern to the downed kid in front of me, who made to rise to his feet, only to fall back on the ground, uncounscious. Fucking hell. I scratched my head, unsure about what to do. I more or less completed all my fights with my classmates by throwing them out of the 'ring', I only actually fought the, for now, superior teachers, but I had little choice with Lee.

I sighed exasperatedly. What the hell I'm supposed to do now? I didn't hit him so hard as to warrant a trip to the hospital, but what I had hoped would turn out as a somewhat friendly chat evolved in a spar, and Lee simply didn't stay down. I grabbed him by the shoulders and dragged him under the shade of a nearby tree, placing him on one side, before flopping on the ground myself, thinking about my current lease on life.

It was clear since my defeat at the hands of Mizuki that the Hokage, who undoubtedly kept me under surveillance, already knew about the awakening of my bloodline. Privacy wasn't something that I was going to enjoy anytime soon. Why did I know that he already knew? Because he hadn't sent one of his to set up another meeting, either with him or the blonde shrink whose duty was to patch together shinobi so that they could be thrown to the wolves outside of Konoha.

The Academy swiftly revealed that it was mostly useless to me. After a couple of weeks, during which I had been able to observe Iruka perform the necessary Katas, the shurikenjutsu, and all of the hand signs, I was basically set. My 'learning' happened by constant repetition of those movements, stretching, and thinking about innovative ways to apply what I knew.

So I simply opted to endlessly form hand-signs during each lesson, faster and faster, until my hands cramped, and then some more. The conditioning of my body was the part I liked less of my new lease on life, but one that I followed religiously, knowing that things like 'stunting my growth' were unlikely to happen. If Lee could spend his life lifting boulders without consciously manipulating chakra, I sure as hell could figure out a way to not die.

So it went down to stretches, to sprints, handstands, and whatever else struck my fancy. Anytime I wasn't stressing my body, and sometimes at the same time, I tried to get a hang of my chakra. I didn't know if it was the same for everybody, or if I was acutely aware of my own because I had never encountered something along those lines in my first life, but my progress was reasonably swift.

There were a thousand words to describe chakra, and each and all of them would have fallen short. How do you describe 'Blue' to the blind? Chakra was energy, yes, it felt warm in my gut when I started manipulating it, yes, it was almost as warm water running just beneath my skin, yes, I had an instinctive form of control to direct it in one or another part of my body, yes.

But all those words and particular descriptions of its use utterly failed when faced with the truth. It was life. My own, and more or less following my conscious mind: I could command it.

Nevertheless, all of that self-imposed training and genuine curiosity (come on, it's chakra!) left me with a looming need for companionship of any kind that I wasn't sure how to fill. I had been firstly raised in a civilian role in a society of more or less well-adjusted people. At least basing myself on Konoha' standards. Here, even if I were to buy myself a cat of all things in order to stave off the loneliness, I couldn't be sure that said cat wouldn't be swapped with an ANBU under a Henge.

Was I paranoid? Perhaps. Was I willing to risk it? No.

Mizuki was a slimy asshole, but from time to time he showed me a new hold, or subtly poked at my actual progress in any given field. On one hand, My metaknowledge told me that everything was reported to Orochimaru, on the other, I was really bored by the material that was endlessly being repeated, from how to skin a wild boar to the plants that were safe to eat in the wild.

I knew exactly jack shit about anyone else, or at least, I knew jack shit about their reasons for this or that particular course of action, so I remained on my toes. There was nothing more off-putting than trying to strike up a conversation with someone not knowing if he or she were actually who they looked like. And knowing that basically any more or less adult ninja could kill me by simply farting the wrong way in my direction was a big 'Don't' that solidly stopped me from even entertaining the idea of talking to someone.

Sure, the civilians that I had paid to work under my supervision were somewhat weirded out by my requests, but ultimately willing to receive what amounted to 'free money'. But that had been immediately after the Massacre, and I had somewhat exhausted any job that I could learn by simply observing. From time to time I stopped and used my Sharingan to look over someone without they taking notice, be they bricklayers or glassmakers. The first one had to work under the eye of everyone that walked by, the second actually showcased his skill in creating refined pieces that he then sold.

The glassmaker had the best kind of advertising in my opinion.

I had a large breadth of skills safety tucked away in my mind, needing only practice to be refined and made my own, but I lacked anything resembling a concrete reason for building myself a forge and start hammering away.

I had considered it, if nothing else it would kill time and keep me from going batshit crazy with boredom. But giving myself yet another reason to stay on my own wasn't going to do any favors to my mental health.

In the end, I ended up remaining behind after one school day, and approached Lee, who remained behind each day to make use of the schoolyard in order to train. Eventually, and actually faster than I would have liked, shit happened, and in a whirlwind of thankfully not yet green-spandex, I fought Lee.

Is this what passes for friendship in the Naruto-world? I asked myself, Punching each other and calling it a day?

"Ughn..." Lee slowly stirred himself, coming back to life apparently without permanent brain damage.

"You know, being friends doesn't have to include punching each other." I casually pointed out while I rose to my feet, extending a hand to help Lee get up.

"Oh, Sasuke-kun!" the fitness maniac retorted, already starting to get pumped up about absolutelu nothing, only for me to interrupt him.

"It's Sasuke." I spoke calmly, "no honorifics, they annoy me."

"But... it's disrespectful!"

"I call Iruka 'Iruka-sensei' because otherwise, the class would go ape-shit," I replied, "and I don't call the Hokage Sarutobi-Sandaime-Hokage-sama. We all know who he is, and when talking with him, you all know that he's the boss, there is really no need to twist your tongue to add honorifics. We have names, let's use them."

"But..."

"Unless the situation requires the chain of command to be spelled out." I amended, "So, let's start again: I'm Sasuke. Only Sasuke."

The dark-haired, bushy-browed, fitness-obsessed kid stared at my hand like he had never seen one before, only to slowly clasp it: "I'm R... Lee..." a faint smile wobbled on his face even as his brow remained furrowed, "Only Lee."

"Cool." I replied: "Let's go eat something."

"What..."

"You offered the spar, I offer dinner." I turned on a dime and started pulling the kid behind me towards the nearest restaurant.

The restaurant wasn't anything of particular note, but it was placed on a street perpendicular to one of those that led to and from the Market District, and had the bonus of being near enough to the Academy that stupid civilian parents celebrated their children succeed in learning how to become murder-hoboes as soon as they could. And it was just one of the countless side businesses that belonged to the Uchiha.

The restaurant had a section of the street closed off under a gazebo-like structure to shield the customers from the sun, and I dragged my brand new friend to one table, waving distractedly at the waiter that recognized me.

"Sasuke-k..." Lee closed his mouth with an audible clack of teeth at my harsh glare. "Sasuke..." he started anew, "I can't really..."

"Lee, this place is mine." I cut him off, and I briefly enjoyed the blank expression that he made when he elaborated my words: "Shut up and eat."

Like hell I was going to let the first not completely despicable 12 years old with whom I had interacted with refuse the generosity I could afford because of the massacre of Sasuke's family. I was still without a clue about how the hell I had ended up in Sasuke's head, but at least the small-scale genocide made me rich.

Almost demurely, Lee listened to me, and we ended up having a normal dinner. Somewhat.

"So..." I really was curious about it, it made somewhat sense in the manga, where the 'dedication over talent' thing was needed to sell more, but dedicating oneself to murder and violence only because people tell you that you can't sound extremely insane: "Why do you wish to become a shinobi?"

"Because I'll prove them that I can be one without using chakra!" he shouted proudly, earning more than a few annoyed glances from the other customers. One turned our way to reprimand Lee, but relented when he saw how I was looking at him.

Once I had stared the fucker into submission, I returned my attention to Lee: "Who says that you can't become a shinobi?"

"Well..." Lee seemed t stammer, more surprised by my lack of reaction than confused by my question, "just... the others."

"And are the others..." I refrained from assuming a sarcastic tone, "your friends?"

At the shake of his head, I squinted at the martial arts enthusiast: "Then why do their opinions matter to you? Who cares! You want to become a shinobi? Good for you, and to hell with their ideas!"

Thusly I had my first somewhat meaningful and willing conversation with another human being since I first awoke in the body of Sasuke Uchiha.

A week later, during which I repeated the routine of sparring with Lee only to offer a large dinner afterward, I received confirmation that privacy was something I wasn't going to receive anytime soon.

"You've demonstrated an understanding of the material that goes beyond your peers, so you can be moved up a year, if you wish." Iruka told me in the relative privacy of the closed classroom after a lesson.

I blinked in surprise at the blatant murdering of canon that was happening right in front of me, and tried to figure out what the hell was going on. I know enough shit to graduate,at least if someone actually showed me the Three jutsu of the Academy, and yet they want to bump me up only one year? What.. oh.

"I'd end up in Lee's class, wouldn't I?" I asked with raised eyebrows.

"Oh, you know him?" Iruka blandly replied, offering a smile that perfectly sold his unawareness of the situation.

If only I could actually trust my ability to distinguish truth from lie. I gifted Iruka my most deadpan gaze: "Yeah, it was a super secret." I sarcastically remarked, "But ok, I'd like to pass to the next year's course material, and having Lee to joke with in class makes it better still."

Iruka seemed torn between sheepish and annoyed by my comments, but nodded nevertheless: "Then from the next week, you'll join Lee in his class."