First arc: VII

"So!" Kakashi said, sitting cross legged on the floor. "Lesson time. Sit yourselves down, my darling munchkins, old Sensei's got a jutsu for you."

As a unit, we froze, staring at him suspiciously. He looked like Kakashi, and he'd even shown up the usual three hours late to the bridge that morning, but he hadn't dodged all responsibility and dumped us on a d-rank while he sat up a tree reading porn. It didn't add up.

He patted the wooden boards of the bridge invitingly. We traded unsure glances; Sakura flared her chakra in a subtle kai and Naruto sniffed the air. Me, I poked gingerly at the pocket I knew he kept Icha Icha in with my kawarimi-sense, and waited for him to shield it protectively from my reach.

"No genjutsu," Sakura confirmed in a low voice.

"Smells like dog," Naruto said.

I nodded to add my agreement and we cautiously sat down. Sakura, as ever, took point. "What kind of jutsu, sensei?"

"So suspicious," he complained. "And here I was going to let you choose! But choose wisely, murderlings: you get one jutsu, and only one jutsu." The sky behind him darkened ominously, clouds rumbling in overhead as his voice got impossibly deeper. I shivered in response, and Sakura performed another surreptitious kai to try to dispel them.

It didn't work, of course, but it was still comforting to realise that they weren't real.

He clapped his hands suddenly, dispelling the clouds and making all of us jump. "And that's it! Just tell me what you want and if you're convincing, your beloved sensei will provide!"

There was a long and heavy pause. None of us said anything. I half expected Naruto to ask for a really cool jutsu, but he was following mine and Sakura's lead and waiting for the trap.

"Maa." Kakashi slumped, shoulders drooping comically low. "So uncute. But if you don't want the jutsu…"

"We want it," Sakura said, leaning forward. "We're just… trying to look underneath the underneath, Sensei. Like you taught us." She batted her eyes at him and smiled winningly, and I barely resisted snorting. But still, she had a good point. Even when he'd taught Team Seven things in canon, he hadn't let them choose, so what would Kakashi 'those who abandon their team are less than trash' Hatake be looking for us to pick? And what would he do if we asked for the wrong thing?

I didn't know the answer to that last one, but for the first: "We need a jutsu that benefits the team, not just us as individuals." I tried to think back over the d-ranks we'd done recently. Was there anywhere in particular our team work had failed that he was trying to put right? Naruto's clones sometimes got underfoot and I'd forgotten how the walkie talkie worked when we were finding Tora, but other than that I couldn't think of anything.

"So… where none of us can do something, one of us needs to learn to fill in the gap?" Naruto guessed. "Like how you need both shuriken and kunai, because they do different things?"

"And senbon," Sakura agreed, warming to the topic. "And if you only have one you can kind of cope, but it's better to learn how to use all three."

Excuse you, there's nothing shuriken can't do if you try hard enough. Pointy, can be stabbed, can be thrown, can be poison coated - what more do you need from life?

In typical Kakashi fashion, Kakashi hummed and pulled out his book. "Let me know when you've chosen one," he said, and flicked it open to a well worn crease in the middle.

"Ofsted would totally fail you," I muttered, glaring at the orange book. I had nothing against porn, and given how popular the books were I doubted that it was even particularly bad porn, but what if Sakura got curious enough to steal it? She was already a scary fangirl person. Giving her inspiration was just asking for trouble.

"What was that, bastard?" Naruto asked, and I refocussed on the conversation.

"I was just thinking we should… work out what each of us are good at, so we know what areas we're missing?"

"Yeah! I'm good at clones and henge. Sakura-chan, your turn!"

"Um, I'm good at. Um. Books and exams?"

How long does it take a twelve year old girl to stop being insecure about herself and start believing in her abilities. Hadn't we covered this? Didn't we keep covering this? This is why Kishimoto had a timeskip, so no one had to actually watch the painful process of Team Seven growing up.

"I'm good at throwing things and being bendy," I said. "Great. Glad that's all sorted."

"Ah, Sasuke-kun, you're also the best in the year at taijutsu," Sakura protested. "And you got Sensei with kawarimi in the bell test!"

"An' you're a sneaky bastard, bastard," Naruto added, nodding sagely. "And Sakura-chan, you're really strong and you're a good leader and good at strategy."

Well, if we were complimenting each other. "You have good chakra control," I said, tilting my head towards Sakura. "Naruto, your chakra control is abysmal, but you have loads of it. You also have a healing factor, at least for minor wounds." Major wounds as well, but there was no way I could know that, so I kept quiet about it.

Naruto preened under the praise, and though Sakura hid it better I could tell she was pleased as well. It was… sad. Did no one tell them they were good at things? Kakashi, look at your students. You're their teacher, why aren't you doing something about this?

Oh wait, he was. He was outsourcing it to me. Dickhead.

"And Naruto has those kunai he made when trapped sensei," Sakura said, warming to the topic. She tilted her head curiously. "What were they? We weren't taught that in the academy."

"The kunai? Oh! They were clones with henge on top, believe it!"

I frowned. I hadn't seen the trap - I'd been under a genjutsu at the time - and I knew Naruto had a reputation for henge and sexy no jutsu, but henge just didn't work like that. "It can't have been. They were solid. Henge is an illusion."

Naruto squinted at me. "What? No it's not. Henge is a transformation, see?" He held his hands in the familiar ram seal, and with a puff of smoke I was looking at a perfect copy of myself. "See, bastard?" the Naruto-me said, in, minus the inflection, my exact voice.

Actually, that set warning bells ringing. Henge can copy sounds as well as looks, but it should copy them. If Naruto'd never heard me speak in that specific tone then he shouldn't be able to mimic it - unless he… had… my vocal chords?

My mind boggled.

"That's not real," I said, scooting closer to poke him in the chest. He felt real. I grabbed the collar of his shirt, looking for the stitches I'd put in by hand when I cut out the front part and sewed down the raw edge. They were there, exactly as they should be, and when I pulled my own shirt forwards to compare them they were exactly the same.

"What the hell? How did you know how many stitches I had?"

"Huh? What do you mean how many stitches?" Naruto asked, pushing me into a better position so he could look. "Hey hey, how come you're so much better at sewing than me, bastard?"

"Natural talent," I said dryly, and moved on to tugging his hair. It felt like mine. It was mine. What the hell. A close enough mimic to fool someone during a cursory inspection was one thing, but he had the exact same uneven-ness from where I couldn't see round the back to trim it properly. Either he was a grade-A stalker and I hadn't noticed or he was somehow filling in details with his henge without having to consciously consider them. If he could henge my voice box and my clothes, then could he henge into someone stronger and get their strength?

Though, speaking of grade-A stalker, Sakura had been suspiciously quiet. I glanced over at her curiously. She was flushed bright red, staring at the two of us with wide, slightly glazed eyes.

"Oh fuck me, I forgot the pervert." I pushed Naruto away and tried desperately to ignore how my cheeks burned.

"Forgot the what?" Naruto asked, blinking, then whirled on Kakashi with a righteous fury that looked hilariously out of place on my face. "Sensei, stop perving on Sasuke! I didn't even use sexy no jutsu!"

I choked. Sakura choked. Kakashi turned a page and said, mild as butter, "Maa, did you say something Naruto?"

"Just change back," I said, dropping my head in my hands. Why me. Why? I was a good person. I had aspirations to advance the plot in a world saving direction at some point. I didn't deserve anything that happened to me. I lifted my head again to watch though as Naruto obligingly de-henged himself, and now that I knew what to look for I could genuinely see his weight shifting and the grass moving ever so slightly to accommodate his bigger feet.

That jutsu was insanely overpowered. At the risk of sounding repetitive, what. The hell.

"So wait, if you henge into a kunai do you actually turn into a kunai? Can you still see? Can you still think? How do you know when to change back?"

He scratched his cheek. "I don't know," he admitted. "I just… do? Like, not see see, but I can still… see? I've only turned my clones into kunai though. I don't know what would happen if I turned me into a kunai. Should I try it?"

Sakura was still drooling, so I stepped up as the voice of reason and shook my head. "Not unless we know it's going to work. Maybe your clones can work without a brain because they're an extension of you, but if you turn your original self into something inanimate you might not be able to turn back."

When I got my sharingan though, I was totally seeing if Naruto could copy it. Basic survival theory; the more potential targets, the better chance each individual one had of making it out alive. If Kakashi had already revealed his I'd get Naruto to test his possible bloodline-copying abilities on him now, but again, future knowledge and needing to justify it. Boring as it was, my life depended on it. Or at least my freedom.

"So," I said, putting aside all the glorious potential of Naruto's god-modded henge technique. "That's what we've got; what are we missing?"

Drool. Drool drool. That better not have been a fucking giggle, Sakura.

I waved a hand to catch her attention, fighting the urge to snap my fingers in front of her eyes. Hands were useful things, I didn't want to risk losing mine. She shook herself back to the present with a squeak.

"Um. Um? Yes! Those are. Skills. That we have."

Naruto and I exchanged glances. Mine conveyed this is why I'm going to abandon you both and run away to my brother, but I'm not sure Naruto quite got the message because he just made a vaguely apologetic grimace and shrugged.

The sound of Kakashi's book snapping shut broke the silence. "Time's up, my adorable squirrel nutkins! What did you choose, hm?"

Adorable squirrel nutkins, Naruto mouthed, looking vaguely bewildered by it. I sympathised. Elite jounin or not, Kakashi was weird.

No one answered him fast enough though, so in true teacher style he decided to pick on someone for an answer. "Sasuke! What does Sakura need?"

"She's suited for close combat," I said, slowly, trying to work out how to say Tsunade and medical chakra in a way that would make sense in context. "But being that close makes her take damage, so… something to…" Could I just say it? Take a risk? Would Kakashi be suspicious? Would he do anything if he was suspicious? Would my life be better if my sensei wasn't a ruthless killer who was loyal to a village I wanted to defect from? Life's great questions. "... Help her if she gets wounded?"

"Hm. And Naruto?"

Shit, I didn't expect to be put on the spot. I couldn't even remember Naruto's main fighting style - lots of clones, ever bigger and better rasengans, kyuubi? Therapy no jutsu? "Something to make his clones more effective," I went for. "Maybe a long distance attack jutsu, because they get dispelled easily in taijutsu."

"Ah. So you've put your teammates as the close range and long range fighters, but where are you, Sasuke?"

Did this man never stop. My mind raced; why wasn't he letting the others answer? Why only me? Did he do this in canon? I couldn't remember. I didn't know. I fought to keep my heartbeat steady, because he could probably hear that - hell, even without it he could probably tell, and that was a problem because what reason, what earthly reason could I have for being so twitchy under his attention unless I was guilty and trying to hide it? Did he know? Did the hokage tell him that Itachi was innocent, and therefore he'd guessed that I was planning to follow him? What was the right answer, what could he be looking for -

"Support," I said, hoping it didn't come out too panicked. Support was team-worthy. Support was what someone who was invested in a team would say. God, please let support be ok. He tilted his head in a go on gesture, so I hurried to justify it with my skill set. "I'm fast, and sneaky - I'm best suited to ambushes, or providing covering fire. I can complete mission objectives while Naruto and Sakura run distractions. I can - swap in, if someone's hurt, with kawarimi like I did with Sakura." Did I need to go on? This was so bad for my blood pressure.

"You don't mind letting your teammates take the spotlight?"

I shook my head. "I don't need to be the hero," I said warily.

"No," Kakashi agreed, looking at me in a way I honestly couldn't interpret. "You just want to be tall, ne Sasuke-kun?" Thankfully he moved on before I had to answer that, turning to Sakura and Naruto. I took a moment to breathe once his attention was off me.

It was, I reflected, possible that I was blowing things out of proportion. Maybe he was just being a good teacher (hah). Maybe the fact that I'd spent five years hiding not only adult-me's secrets but also Itachi's was making me paranoid. Maybe I should relax, act natural, and honestly try to be the twelve year old I was. Was pretending to be. Whichever. Whatever else Kakashi was in the series, he was still one of the good guys, and he still consistently put his team first - maybe I was included in that?

But geez, it was a lot to gamble with if I was wrong.

"If Sasuke-kun's running support," Sakura was saying when I tuned back in, "then he should be a medic or a genjutsu user, so he can provide backup if a fight goes wrong. Or some specialised teams have trackers or sensors as their support members, or if a ninja has a particular kekkei genkai or skill that's essential for a mission they can be given a support role so the mission isn't compromised if there's combat."

It was the classic answer, suited to the basic team dynamics we were taught at the academy. Naruto nodded along sagely, even though I was pretty sure he'd skipped those lessons and was just agreeing because it was Sakura saying it. If either of them had picked up on my reaction earlier, they weren't showing it - and I was cautiously hopeful that they weren't that good at hiding things, so. I was ok. I could deal. Life was good.

Ergh, optimism. I'd get hives if I continued like this.

"So what we need," Naruto summed up, ticking points off his fingers, "Is a way for Sakura-chan to fight people and not get hurt, a way for me to fight people and hurt them, and a way for Sasuke-bastard to rescue anyone who is hurt. And it has to be super cool because we're going to be famous. That's the jutsu we choose, sensei!"

Sakura and I sweat-dropped. Kakashi, on the other hand, tapped his book against his chin and made a show of thinking about it.

"Maybe I could teach you… hmm, no. What about… no, that won't work. Perhaps… best not. Ah!" He held up a finger, eye-smile firmly in place, and despite myself I leaned forwards with the other two. "Oh wait, not that one. Hmmm…"

"Sensei, c'mon! Stop teasing us and pick one!"

He held the suspense for a fraction longer, enough for Naruto to begin vibrating with impatience, then levelled his book at us decisively. "I have the perfect technique for you. Kakashi-sensei's super powerful, super secret technique: Konoha style ninja art: tree climbing no jutsu!"

"Are you kidding me," I blurted. Tree walking. Tree walking. All that fucking build up - tree walking? Did any of the past however many minutes of panic attack actually matter for anything if he was just going to teach us tree walking? He'd probably decided beforehand. It was probably in the Konoha sensei handbook, how to annoy your genin while making sure they mostly reach adulthood, dither about with meaningless questions then teach them motherfucking tree walking.

Don't get me wrong, I wanted to learn tree walking. It was useful. Life saving, even. But what was the fecking point of making us list our skills and come up with what we needed a jutsu to do if he was just going to teach us that one anyway?

"But sensei, we can already climb trees," Sakura said. It was the same tone of voice she might say, but sensei, we can already walk down the street, because we were Konoha nin and that's what we did.

"Oh?" Kakashi asked, and stood up in one smooth motion. "Well then, I suppose we'd best go and get our d-ranks for the day. If you already know the techniques then what's poor sensei meant to teach you?" And, in a move than even I will admit looked kind of cool, he walked directly at the fence on the edge of the bridge, then up the fence with his body parallel to the floor, over the top and down the other side, and smoothly over the water's surface to get to the bank. All without breaking stride or seeming to notice the change between vertical and horizontal.

As impressive as it was to see on a screen, it was actually way more impressive in real life.

"Off to the Hokage," he said cheerily. "Here I go, picking up a lovely mission for my lovely team. What a nice day to clean a sewer."

We glanced at each other, then scrambled to our feet as one and dived after him. "Sensei, wait!"

.

"Stupid piss-fucking bitch-ass tree," I growled, glaring at the splintered bark in front of me. I was going to set it on fire.

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura scolded from somewhere up in the canopy. I made a two fingered gesture at her which was entirely stolen from my old world but which I'm sure she grasped the meaning of well enough.

"Now now, Sasuke-kun," Kakashi tutted. "That's no way to talk to a lady, is it?"

"Stupid piss-fucking bitch-ass tree-san."

He sighed, shaking his head at me in mournful disappointment, as Naruto yelled a war cry in the background and started his millionth run-up of the day.

"Would you look at that, I think he's getting further than you."

I stabbed the kunai I was using to mark my progress viciously into the tree and whirled on him. "What is your problem?" I snapped. He blinked, eye wide and taken aback - or seemingly taken aback, who the fuck knew with Kakashi. "Why do you keep comparing me to Naruto? Why do you keep needling me about not being a team player, or not being good enough, or not living up to being the rookie of the year?"

"Saa," he said, and oh he was good, because he even sounded completely wrong footed. Someone get him an oscar, quick. "I was encouraging your friendly rivalry? To motivate you and help you succeed?"

"Well, don't," I said shortly. "I'm not rival material and I don't need to be better than him."

He was quiet for a blissful second and I turned back to the tree, trying to calm my temper enough to summon my chakra. Fire, I thought. Uchiha are fire. Fire was jumpy and inconsistent, but it could be just as powerful in a controlled smoulder as in a blaze of flames. When I thought I had it just right, I ran at the tree, using my momentum and the chakra on my feet to go up three four five steps -

The bark splintered. I slashed the kunai to mark my place and flipped off to land in a neat crouch. Six steps. Naruto was on at least nine, six was barely carrying me further than I'd get just on my speed.

"You don't think much of yourself, do you?" Kakashi asked before I could run again. I gave him an unimpressed look, but even my wariness couldn't see what the trap was in that. Didn't mean there wasn't one, just that it was too far underneath the underneath for me to find it. "Not a hero, not rival material, not tall. Not even fussed about rookie of the year status."

"We're not at the academy any more," I said. "No one cares about being rookie of the year." He hummed again, squinting at me, and I braced my shoulders to avoid hunching them and turned back to the tree. "Can I get back to failing this jutsu now, sensei?"

"I was going to call a break, actually. Can't have Sakura-chan getting bored up there at the top, can we?" He eye-smiled, and waved her down from her tree without waiting for my answer. "Sparring practice! You and Sasuke, first to bleed or yield swaps out with Naruto."

"Here?" Sakura asked, dropping down beside us and looking at the dense forest we were in. It was a far cry from our usual training field, and also offered her a distinct advantage given that she could use the trees but I couldn't yet. Not beyond, oh, three metres off the ground.

Sometimes I wondered what I'd done to make Kakashi hate me.

"Here!" he agreed cheerfully, and pulled out his book to leave us to it. I shot him an annoyed look and swapped my kunai out for a brace of shuriken. Attacking from the ground when your enemy could move in any direction was going to be hard - and it didn't matter that my taijutsu was better if I couldn't reach her to use it.

Unless...

"Hey, Naruto," I called. "Can I borrow some clones?"

"Well now that's just cheating," Kakashi said. He didn't sound like he was going to stop me, so I ignored him.

"And can you henge them? I need… ninja wire, more shuriken, and a smoke bomb."

"Sure? I don't think I can do the smoke bomb…"

"And more kunai and a really big net," Sakura added sweetly. "Thank you Naruto!"

I returned her sharp smile with one of my own and pushed my annoyance at Kakashi out of my mind. Knowing Naruto, the net would be made of rope instead of wire. Plus, trees were made of wood, and if they burnt there'd be nothing left for her to climb.

Grand fireball, baby. Time to let off some steam.

.

By the end of the day I'd beaten Sakura, lost to Naruto, teamed up with Naruto and somehow lost to Sakura, then emerged victorious but only just from the three way free for all that followed.

I'd also made it to twelve steps up the tree. These were Hashirama trees. Twelve steps was piddly.

It was the first day, I think, that we'd spent the whole time training and not taken a single d-rank, and there was something immensely satisfying about the bone-deep ache it left in my muscles. I didn't even care about the fact that I hadn't mastered tree walking, or that I was sweaty and disgusting and had leaves stuck in my hair.

"Naruto, sit down," I mumbled, flat on my back with an elbow thrown over my eyes. "You move too much. It's tiring."

He flopped next to me and poked me in the shoulder, ignoring my half-hearted attempts to bat him away. "Sakura-chan, I think you broke him."

Her reply was a garbled moan from her own sprawled heap of exhaustion. "I hurt," she complained. "Why do you have so much energy. Are you even human."

The way Naruto stiffened next to me would be imperceptible to anyone else, but given that I both knew about the kyuubi and also had his leg pressed half against my arm, it was impossible to miss. I flapped a hand in Sakura's direction and deflected for him, because I was magnanimous like that. "'S genetic," I said. "Uzumaki. They're all monsters."

He stilled, and I patted his knee. No worries, Naruto. I'm good at secrets. I got your back.

"Wait," Sakura said, levering herself up to her elbows. "I thought Naruto was the only one?"

"Nah. There was an Uzumaki on my mum's genin team." Were there more? I felt like there were more Uzumaki in the world. Maybe they happened after the time skip. "She ate ramen and was loud. Clearly related." I let my eyes close and my mind drift, too tired even to call up the immolation jutsu to ward off the chill that was sinking in now that we'd stopped moving. Lucky Naruto was sat so close - he was my own personal furnace, so the left side of me at least was comfortably toasty.

"Was?" Naruto asked, cutting into my drifting. I crinkled my nose in displeasure but he kept talking. "Is she still… is she still around?"

The odd tone finally prompted me to move my hand and open my eyes. He turned away, the raw hope shuttering off his face almost before I could see it, but my stomach plummeted.

Shit. He wasn't meant to know about Kushina yet, was he? Should I tell him? It seemed heartless not to, but it also really wasn't my place. "She died when the kyuubi attacked," I said awkwardly. "Sorry, Naruto."

"No! Um, no, you don't have to be sorry." He smiled down at me - squinty eyed, fake, wrong, and I felt like a total heel for bringing the subject up. "Bet your mum has some cool stories though, huh?"

"I, uh. She's dead too." I winced. Total heel. "But I think her old team photo is somewhere, if you want?"

This time the smile was smaller, sadder, but at least not so jarringly false as before. I almost expected him to try to refuse, but all he said was, "Thanks, Sasuke."

"Ah. You're welcome?"

Thankfully, his smile morphed back to his usual grin and he leaned back on his hands, breaking eye contact. I let my head drop back down in relief that the feelings were finished and subtly inched closer. Because warm.

"Hey, we should go to Ichiraku's!"

"I'm in," Sakura said almost immediately, lifting an arm like a flag. "I want pork. Two pork."

"I want a shower," I said. Sakura groaned and Naruto kicked me with his knee. More nudged, really, but I still elbowed him back. "Then miso ramen."

"You always have miso, Sasuke-kun."

"Well, when they start serving fish I'll have that, but until then leave me and my miso ramen alone."

"No," Naruto said. "You're stuck with us, bastard, we're not leaving you anywhere."

I squinted a glare at him, but I was too tired to put any venom behind it and he just grinned wider back at me. Honestly. The things I put up with for the sake of body heat.

.

Kakashi: Your advice sucks he doesn't want to be a rival now what the frick do I do
Gai: INTRODUCE HIM TO -
Kakashi: No