AN: Re-upload. Fixed

Chapter 2

The atmosphere on the training field shifted instantly. The two comrades locked their gaze, and the temperature rose around them. Some of the students expressed their surprise when they could actually feel the pressure radiating from the other side of the field. Sakura and Iruka looked on in awe. No matter how many times she saw them clash, it never ceased to amaze her. In terms of sheer raw power, there was no matching those two, and she leaned further against the tree and braced herself for what was to come.

Around the field, pebbles and small rocks began to shake and over in the air. The water in the pond changed from calm to violent and the leaves in the trees began to thrash wildly. Neither man appeared to even notice as they continued to lock on to their opponent. Then, as quickly as it had started, the commotion on the field stopped. The rocks settled down and there was a brief moment of total stillness before Sasuke Uchiha made his move.

His hands were too fast for the untrained eye to see, but Sakura was able to catch him make a few hand seals at inhumane speed. 'Here we go' she thought to herself.

"Inferno Style: Great fireball Justu" sasuke shouted and he breathed out a giant ball for red fire that was quickly coated in lines of black flames and sent it hurling towards Naruto. The grass it left in its wake was burned to a cinder and it came inches away from hitting its target. At the last minute, Naruto shot his hand out, and bright yellow tailed beast chakra coated it, taking the form of a large claw like hand. The fireball slammed into the chakra palm and hissed at it tried to continue on further to no avail. Naruto closed his palm and as if it were nothing extinguished the entire justu. "Is that all you've got?" He shouted out before realizing his opponent was no longer in front of him. He looked around him quickly before looking above, where he found sasuke in the air with black lighting emitting from his hand. "Onyx Chidori Senbon" he yelled as hundreds of tiny, razor sharp lighting needles shot out toward the ground. Naruto didn't have time to react at dozens of senbon pierced his arms and upper body. Sasuke landed behind him and slashed with his sword, aiming for the blondes back. The blade connected, but as soon as it had the Naruto before him disappeared into a puff of smoke. Across the field, Sakura let out a sigh of relief as she watched the injured Naruto disappear.

Sasuke looked around trying to locate his opponent. 'Not around, not above, then he must be...' but before he could finish his thought the ground beneath him erupted as the real Naruto slammed his fist into Sasukes chin, knocking him back and up with a powerful uppercut. The crowd of students went wild as Naruto's blow connected. Most of them hollered or cheered his name, but a few winced or cheered on Sasuke. Sakura was glad that the two figures were just as polarizing to the new generation as they had been in the old. Meanwhile, Sasuke had regained his footing. He wiped a small trail of blood off his lip before extending his left arm out in front of him. His rinnegan eye glowed as he released his Almighty Push Technique. Naruto recognized the stance and formed a very familiar hand seal. A dozen clones identical to their creator appeared in a cone formation behind Naruto. As Sasukes attach pushed him back, his clones pushed him forward. The force intensified and clones began to disappear as they couldn't take the pressure. Just before the last two clones gave out the force stopped and a cloud of dust was left in the several yards Naruto had been pushed back. The children cheered and even Iruka let out a quick shout before realizing he was supposed to be unbiased in this fight. Sakura shot Iruka a knowing look, and was proud she had managed to keep a straight face. 'That" she thought 'was impressive.'

Naruto's two remaining clones disappeared. 'Sasuke's window is four seconds before he can use his rinnegan again, one second faster than Pein's attacks' he thought. He was still impressed his rival had managed to surpass the leader of Akatsuki's speed with just one eye. He smiled to himself. 'I've been looking for an opportunity to try this out.' With his left hand, he started to form a ball of chakra that condensed and began spinning at extreme speeds. "Rasengan!" One of the children shouted out as a few more cheered on their favorite ninja. He coated his other hand with his tailed beast chakra mode, and reached into his weapon pouch. In the blink of an eye he threw a chakra coated kunai at sasuke. To any other ninja the speed of the attack would have proved too much, but Sasuke simply tilted his head as the weapon went flying past.

'One more second' Sasuke thought as he lifted his arm to ready another gravity attack. However, his eyes widened when his friend disappeared into a flash of orange and yellow before him. Sakura stood up from her leaning position, wide eyed. "Is that..." But before she could finish her thought she saw Naruto reappear behind Sasuke just in time to catch the kunai in his free hand. In one movement he caught the weapon and twisted his body. His attack slammed into Sasuke's back. Or it would have, if the Uchiha had not covered himself in a ribcage made out of chakra at the last minute. Still, with the lack of time Sasuke was unable to fully power up his susano'o, and the rasengan proved enough to break through the chakra bone and send sasuke flying forward a few feet. The crowd cheered and Naruto stood with his arm outstretched, a smirk look glued to his face.

"I cant believe he can use that Justu now" Iruka thought out loud before turning to Sakura "did you know he could do that?" Sakura shook her head. It bummed her out a bit that her closest comrade had a technique up his sleeve that she didn't know about. She quickly shook if off however, thats just the way Naruto was. He was overzealous and unpredictable, and no one could hope to keep up with him at all times. Still, watching the technique in action she couldn't help but see the resemblance between him and his father, the Fourth Hokage. 'I wonder what his dad was like' she wondered thinking back to when she had briefly met him during the war. She was broken out of her thoughts at she heard Iruka yell "Thats enough you two!" Before disappearing to the other side of the field. Sasuke looked disappointed he wouldn't have a chance to retaliate, but understood this was just a match to excite the students and let out a sigh before meeting his brother in the middle of the field with Iruka. The two looked at each other, and raised there hand with two fingers extended. Sakura swore she could cry seeing that. She began to walk towards her team to check the damage.

Naruto was the first to notice her and quickly ran up to greet her. He stopped when he stood in front of her, and looked down at her with a glint in his eye. "How's that Sakura-Chan? Sasuke can't even keep up anymore!" He beamed from ear to ear before wincing in pain when Sakura punched him the the arm. "Be humble!" She chastised him. "Don't get a big head just because you got a hit in, you know if you kept going the fight wouldn't have been over." Naruto frowned and she let him sit in his misery for a second before adding "Still, I had no idea you could do that, and that was pretty cool to watch." She giggled as she watched his expression change back to that of a seven year old boy in a matter of milliseconds. "How long have you been able to do that for?" Naruto and Sakura turned to see their third teammate walk over and join them, rubbing the part of his back that Naruto had hit. "About a week now, its far from mastered and I can only do it with one kunai in a short distance, but it still comes in handy." Naruto replied. Sakura forced herself not to show any sign of disappointment. 'Only a week, that explains why I didn't know about it.

"Go talk to your fans, they're waiting" Sasuke said as he pointed to a group of children that Iruka was desperately trying to keep under control. Naruto let out a relaxed sigh. He still wasn't used to the younger generation idolizing him this much, but he didn't mind it. It actually filled him with a great sense of pride. "I just have a few bruises on my arm. Sakura-Chan, you can heal Sasuke first I'll be right back." He said before turning to go inspire the youth of Konoha. Sakura watch as he began giving an impassioned speech to the students after he high fived a few of them. She then concentrated chakra into her hands as they began to glow a soft green and slowly the glow became more powerful. She signaled to sasuke to turn around and he nodded and lifted up the back of his shirt. Sakura put her hands on the dark bruise that was forming where Naruto had landed his attack. Sasuke took a deep breath as the pain began to fade away. "So, how has it been since you got back? I've only seen you a few times." Sakura said, trying to break the awkward silence as her hands rested on his back. Sasuke waited a moment, making her question if he was even going to respond, before he spoke. "It's been okay. Not everyone has been as forgiving as you and Naruto have, but that's to be expected. I have to earn my place here now." He paused and looked over to Naruto who was blocking punches as a few small shinobi in training attempted to land a hit. "But, its peaceful." He finished. Sakura removed her hand and Sasuke readjusted his shirt. "Well, I am glad your back. We all are. And those who aren't will come around eventually." She stated matter of factually. "Plus having that idiot around all the time must help a bit." She nodded at their blonde teammate. Sasuke looked back at her confused. "Actually, I haven't seen much of him since I returned. We have sparred one time before this and he helped me move some stuff into where I am staying, but other than that I assumed he was with you." He noticed as Sakura as eyes darkened a bit and she looked at the ground. "Oh" was all she could say. The dark haired shinobi sighed and looked back over to his best friend and only remaining family. 'Idiot. What the hell are you doing' he thought to himself. He also thought about whether to say something to comfort Sakura, but realized anything he could mention would probably only make things work. Comforting people was not one of his strengths. He sighed as stood up. "I have to meet with Kakashi, he wants to talk about possibly sending me on missions. I'll see you around. Thanks for that" he gestured to his injury and before sakura could respond he disappeared in a blur. Sakura watched the place where he had been standing less than a second ago, and chuckled. 'For Sasuke, that was actually pretty talkative. I think being home will be good for him.' She thought before wincing at the other thing he had said. 'But if Naruto isn't with him, why is he ignoring me?' As if on cue, the blonde in question appeared before her and smiled.

"Sorry for the wait Sakura-chan, those kids as energetic as me." He rubbed the back of his head and looked over one last time as Iruka waved, thanking both of them again before leading his class out of the training field. Naruto focused back to her "where is the other one? Don't tell me he left?" Sakura responded "Yea. Said he had to meet up with Kakashi. Something about him getting registered to go on missions again. Now hold still let me see your arm. He didn't move. "Sakura you really don't have t..." She interrupted him by pulling him forward by the arm in question, so forcefully he stumbled a step before regaining his footing. "What am I going to do with you, idiot?" She said before rolling up his sleeve. Her eyes shot open when she saw burn marks on his arm. Nothing crazy, but more than she was expecting. "I guess you aren't as invincible as you think." She said before starting to work on his arm. He chucked and let her heal him. "I guess not."

They sat in comfortable silence as Sakura finished healing his wound. When she was done, she took out a bandage from her weapon pouch and wrapped the burn. "That should do it, just put some ointment on it tonight. I'm sure I have left some at your place." She smiled at him and he smiled right back. She thought for a minute before asking, "I'm pretty hungry, wanna grab lunch? My treat." She watched the blonde got excited before his face broke into a frown. "Aww man, I want to Sakura-chan but I forgot Konahamaru has something to show me. He said it was urgent." He rubbed the back of his head again. Sakura looked away for a second to regain her composure. "It's fine. Maybe tomorrow, I feel like I haven't seen you at all since Sasuke got back." At the mention of his name, Naruto got noticeably uncomfortable. "Yea, sure thing Sakura-chan. Ill see you tomorrow. Thanks for fixing me up." He gave her one last grin before disappearing into the trees leading back to the village.

Sakura just stood there, now completely alone in the training grounds, confused and hurt. She had not only found out her best friend had been ignoring her, but he had done it again and blown her off. She wanted to punch him, but also wanted to just scream. What was even more confusing was the reaction he was getting out of her. "Pull yourself together, he doesn't owe you anything." She said out loud. As she began her walk back to the village, only one thought filled her mind.

'Naruto, what is going on with you?'