Aftermath 1: Making Waves
Capabilities of the Sharingan:
-The Sharingan first activates when the user experiences a powerful burst of emotion. (You don't have to kill your friends for this one, much as you'd love an excuse)
-The Sharingan requires a not-insignificant constant chakra cost to have activated.
-It allows the user to see chakra at a basic level, such as discerning an individual's remaining chakra reserves or the type of nature transformation in use. (Like you can't tell what that fireball's made of lmao.)
-It offers the user significantly improved visual acuity in their field of view, allowing them to perceive miniscule details about what they see.
-This grants a significantly improved reaction time and ability to track movements and projectiles within line of sight, and many describe a slowed down perception of time. At the third stage of Sharingan development, this seems to outsiders like precognition.
-Making eye contact with the Sharingan makes it significantly easier to cast all genjutsu upon the target, and certain genjutsu are unique to Sharingan use.
-The user can perfectly remember and reproduce anything observed by the Sharingan. This allows them to copy handwriting and mannerisms, and perhaps more importantly any jutsu they witness. (Note: Effectiveness is limited if the user has not mastered the nature transformation of the jutsu they copy. Techniques that require a different bloodline limit cannot be copied (unless you start stealing their DNA like a dick. Danzo.))
-The Sharingan has three stages of development, shown by 1 through 3 tomoe (See diagram) present in the eye. Development occurs through more powerful emotions or through continued practice, and represents an increase in the dojutsu's power.
-Izanami and Izanagi can be used by the base Sharingan. (What the hell are they?) (Neji how the fuck did you even get in here.)
-One of the tablets beneath the Uchiha compound, notes scribbled by Itachi.
Slowly, the third Hokage put down one of the most ridiculous mission reports he'd ever read.
"This...this is what happened?" He clarified, hoping they would say was a joke.
"It's true, sir." Kakashi looked embarrassed.
"And why" Hiruzen continued "did you continue with the mission after an S-rank missing-nin arrived?"
"A-Rank, come on-"
"Kakashi." The Hokage's voice was dangerous.
The jonin sighed, and began listing. "We were closer to wave than leaf, Zabuzza had expressed a desire to attack us for attacking us' sake, all three genin were invested in completing the mission, and...I thought they could handle it."
Hiruzen stared him down. "I see. Do you believe you made the right choice?"
"I do." Kakashi replied, evenly.
Hiruzen let him sweat for another moment. "Well then, who am I to argue with results." He smiled at the three genin. "Congratulations on your first successful C-rank mission. Or, given what I have just read, A-rank. I will ensure you are suitably compensated."
"A-rank pay?" Naruto's jaw dropped. "Hell yeah!"
"A few issues to clear up before I let you go." Hiruzen leaned back in his chair. "Kakashi, what happened to Zabuzza's sword? As I'm sure you know it has historical value to hidden mist, and can likely be ransomed back for a significant amount."
Kakashi coughed. "Funny story, that. Turns out the Uchiha have invoked some old clan bylaw that gives a ninja the right to a disarmed opponents weapon. Who knew?"
"Really?" The third rolled his eyes. "How?"
"Well, Sasuke was technically the one who disarmed Zabuzza." Kakashi shrugged. "He put it in a storage scroll, dropped it off with Itachi, and now the Uchiha clan is ignoring all related communiques."
"Mine." Sasuke explained.
"Indeed." The third acknowledged. "It's not like we could have used that...moving on." He turned to the sixth visible person in the room. "Haku, was it?"
"Yes sir." Said the boy, stood perfectly to attention slightly off from the room's other occupants.
"Your situation is certainly unusual, but I'm sure we will be able to accommodate it." Hiruzen told him. "I warn you that you will be taken to T&I to ensure your honesty, but if you cooperate you will not be unduly harmed."
"Whatever is necessary, Hokage-sama." Haku was unfazed. "If I may ask, what is to happen to me afterwards?"
"Unless I am mistaken, that will be up to you." Hiruzen answered.
Haku and looked across to Naruto, who gave him an encouraging smile. Hiruzen blinked and hid the warm glow he felt.
"And now, the final matter." He drew their attention back to himself. "Has Naruto explained what happened to him on the bridge?"
Naruto cringed, as attention fell on him.
"They've been carefully avoiding bringing it up." Kakashi said, dryly.
"Naruto? Do you want them to know?" The third asked, kindly.
Naruto nodded.
"Very well. I think a direct showing from the kyuubi is sufficient for the law. I should know, I passed it."
Naruto breathed out, as his teammates looked at him. "Right, then, guess I'll just..." He cleared his throat. "Guys...I'm the nine tails fox."
"Cool."
"Okay."
"Now I know how bad that sounds but I promise I...wait what?"
"Naruto," Sasuke gave him a flat look. "you're about as likely to destroy the leaf village as Itachi is to betray the Uchiha clan." (The third Hokage coughed on his pipe.) "I've seen it affect you once and it's helped. Don't let it ruin any missions and we'll be fine."
"You're my teammate, Naruto." Hinata added. "I trust you."
Naruto looked at them both in awe.
"Excellent." The Hokage beamed. "None of you are allowed to tell anyone who doesn't know (on pain of death) except for Naruto himself. That goes for you too, Haku. Now, unless there's anything else, I believe you all have some much needed rest to get to."
The three children filed out, bickering amongst each other. An ANBU appeared next to Haku and tapped him on the shoulder. They both left as well. With a twitch of his finger, the Hokage dismissed the other guard from his office. He and Kakashi both sagged. "Excellent work, making them think it was their idea to continue." Hiruzen began. "Did you have to genjutsu them?"
Kakashi chuckled. "Hell no. They thought they had to convince me." He looked up. "I don't like doing this."
"Me neither." The third agreed. "But it has to be done. I'll admit, when I learned about Gatou I was expecting more opponents like the demon brothers."
"Oh, only hiding a B mission as a C?" Kakashi asked, sarcastically. "How generous of you."
"We can't afford generosity, I'm afraid." Said the third. "Psychologically, how have they been affected?"
"By civilian standards, they all still need therapy." Kakashi acknowledged. "But spending time as a team seems to be beneficial for all three." He leaned back. "Sir...they almost died."
"Such is the life."
"Was it enough?"
Hiruzen shook his head sadly. "They're ninja. Nothing's ever enough."
Sasuke walked into his house, closing the door behind him. Itachi was there waiting, and smiled. "Hey little brother."
"Hey Itachi." Sasuke dumped his bag of supplies on the counter and flopped onto the sofa. "Fuuuuck I missed this. Where's my sword?"
"I hung Kubikiribocho up in your room."
"You did what?"
"That's it's name. That's what the sword's called."
Sasuke shrugged, still lying down. "That's dumb. Imma call it 'big bloody cleaver' because it, like, absorbs blood, I think? God, Naruto must be rubbing off on me."
"We could get that engraved on it, actually. That would thoroughly embarrass hidden mist." Itachi moved over to perch on the edge of the sofa. "Now talk to me. You ran up to me, put the sword in my hands, said 'mine' then ran off to the Hokage's office. What happened on your mission? C ranks don't usually involve running into the seven shinobi swordsmen of the mist."
"Six swordsmen, now." Sasuke replied, proudly. "And the Hokage bumped it up to A rank. Had you done any A ranks this early?"
"So soon after graduating, no." Itachi admitted. "But by the time I was your age...yes. Sorry."
"Don't worry about it." Sasuke waved. "Oh, and more importantly..." he looked up and met Itachi's eyes. He activated his Sharingan.
Itachi's own eyes widened. "Fuck." He remarked.
"Yeah." Replied Sasuke, grinning.
"Congratulations you." Itachi seemed genuinely impressed. "How did you get that active?"
"Naruto died." Sasuke remarked, and Itachi stiffened. "Or at least, I thought he did. Took a senbon to the face."
"I see." Itachi replied. He focused on Sasuke's red iris'. "You've got the single tomoe of a newly awakened Sharingan. With practice, or more traumatic events, you'll get two, then three of those. If...If any strange pattern seems to appear, you let me know."
Sasuke frowned, as his brain remembered something. "Like what appeared in yours?"
Itachi gave him a piercing look. "What did you see?"
"It was the evening after, well, after Shisui." Sasuke admitted, suddenly feeling very vulnerable laying on the sofa. "You were arguing with the Uchiha police and I saw your eye go all..."
Itachi frowned. He looked around, making sure they were alone in the room, then looked back to Sasuke. His eyes shifted into their Sharingan form, then shifted again, black pupil going red and tomoe becoming curved black spikes. Even for someone used to red eyes, it was unsettling.
"What is that?" Sasuke recoiled slightly from it.
"You've had nothing like this?" Itachi confirmed.
Sasuke nodded.
His big brother sighed and his eyes went back to normal. "It's possible you weren't close enough to Naruto, or only perceiving death doesn't count, or it can't develop when your Sharingan hasn't fully matured yet..." he mused.
"What is it?" Sasuke was genuinely worried.
Itachi shook his head. "More trouble than it's worth. If you do see it, you tell me. Before you bring it up to father or the rest of the clan. Understand?"
"No, but...okay." Sasuke relented. "I trust you."
Itachi smiled. "I don't deserve that, but thank you. By the way, how did Naruto survive a senbon to the head?"
"He borrowed power from the nine tails." Sasuke said, offhand. Itachi blinked.
"Yeah. You guys can stop keeping that awkwardly secret now. I've just realised how many times you all deliberately didn't mention it at dinner."
"Full of surprises this evening, aren't you?" Itachi rolled his eyes. "Anyway, you should be going to bed. Tomorrow, how about I teach you more about how to use that eye of yours?"
"Kakashi'll be training me all day." Sasuke warned.
Itachi chuckled. "Oh I'm sure I can convince him to spare you for a few hours." He had a dark look on his face.
"You scare me sometimes, bro."
"As it should be, Sasuke. As it should be."
A few minutes earlier
Hinata gave Sasuke a respectful nod as she and Naruto saw him off into his compound, hiding the brewing anger that he still had a clan to return to. Hide it, hide it, don't let Naruto see it.
She still had the blond convinced her home was near his, so she was able to walk alongside him as they crossed the village to his apartment. Night had fallen, and the streets were quiet, the air filled with Naruto's thoughtless chatter about anything and everything. It was nice, but Hinata knew she couldn't just let 'nice' stand. She wasn't allowed to be happy. Things went wrong when she was happy.
"So, you're a Jinkuurikki." She spoke up eventually, when there was a lull in Naruto's talking. "That certainly explains a lot."
"Sure does." Naruto replied. "It's nice to know there's a reason for everyone treating me like dirt. I mean I just thought-" he trailed off, face creasing in discomfort.
"You thought you deserved it." Hinata finished for him.
"I mean-"
"Naruto." She interrupted him. She couldn't remember the last time she'd had the confidence to interrupt someone. "When you were on the bridge, you substituted with Sasuke to get him out of the ice prison."
"Yeah." He scratched the back of his neck. "That was pretty dumb of me. Can you believe I forgot I wasn't a shadow clone?"
"No." Hinata responded. "No I don't."
"What do you-"
"Naruto." She turned to face him, backing him towards a wall. "No-one who valued their own life would make that mistake. Especially not a ninja, especially not one as good with shadow clones as you."
Naruto grinned weakly. "Yeah, well, guess I'm just that dumb."
"Stop saying that!" She shouted. Her hands were clenched at her sides. "You keep saying that some day you're going to become Hokage and I believe you, I do, but when it comes to right now? You don't value your own life at all, do you?"
"I..." Naruto's facade crumbled. "Oh come on, what's there to value?"
"Naruto!"
"I'm an orphan!" He shouted back. "And you know what that's like! But I don't have a clan to avenge, a special superpower. I don't even have a purpose, so I had to just pick one and roll with it! All my life everyone's told me I'm worse than scum! I have one thing going for me, and that's that I have a demon sealed inside me that might, at any moment, kill everyone I know! So yes, of course I'll give myself up for my friends!"
There was a crack.
Naruto winced, and put a palm to the red handprint on his face.
Hinata looked in shock at her own hand (which had gone a little red itself) before glaring back up at her teammate. "Don't. You. Dare. Imply that you don't deserve to live. You are brave, and kind, and strong, and amazing!"
"I'm not-" he stared at the floor.
"You are!" She moved closer. "Look at me. Look at me!"
He met her eyes.
"Naruto, I've seen you around a lot." She admitted. "Remember that one time you saved me from those bullies?"
Naruto shrugged. "Ages ago, yeah."
"I watched you, after that day." She told him. "Not in a weird way!" (It totally had been) "but I watched you going about your daily life. Everyone was always just so horrible to you, but you bore all of it with this big grin on your face. I remember admiring you so much. And then," she choked up a bit, but persevered. "And then I lost my family too. And I finally understood what you were going through, at least some of it. And I admired you even more. Because I didn't understand. I didn't know how, despite everything, you could bring yourself to smile." She backed off a step. "So if you're going to tell me that was all a lie that's fine. It's fine. Does that mean every time you smiled around us it was fake too?"
"No!" He sounded indignant.
Her heart fluttered a little. "Then don't act like every time you've made us smile we were faking it as well. We don't want you to die for us." She poked a finger into his chest. "Dying is easy, Naruto, living is harder, and you've never backed down from a challenge before."
He looked at her, and she nearly squealed. He was actually looking at her properly.
"I've made you smile?" He asked.
"You've come close." She admitted. She attempted one then, but couldn't manage it. "Don't stop trying now."
The fire went out of her sails. She shifted her posture, crossing her arms in front of her and looking down as she wondered what in God's name she'd just been doing.
Naruto clapped his hands together, and the grin was back. "Well then, challenge accepted! I will make you smile!"
"Now you sound like Gai." She pointed out.
He struck a pose. "Yosh! The fires of my youth will burn brightly enough to bring joy to all who see them! If I fail, I will run to Suna and back on my hands!"
Her lips just might have twitched. "Come on, Naruto. Lets get back home. We have training again tomorrow morning, remember?"
"Oh damn, you're right. What's Gai gonna do when he learns we fought Zabuzza? Running laps blindfolded, probably. Hey, would that work on you?"
"Not if I had my Byakugan active, no, but..."
In a much less one sided conversation, the two continued on home.
Angst! Character development! Sharingan! Best boy Haku, and poor comedy! For a chapter where nothing happens, this one really has it all, folks. Yes, grandpappy Hokage is a bit more manipulative in this (Or maybe I'm just explaining something that doesn't make much sense otherwise) And it brings a nice end to the land of waves arc, which I've finished up hella fast because now we get the good stuff. Next chapter is a timeskip and a training montage because believe me, with what I have planned? Team seven is gonna need it...
