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A/N

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Chapter 14

Why?

It was the greatest question anyone had ever asked since the beginning of time. Most people upon hearing that word would associate it with something else entirely. The sky is blue because of the light reflecting off the ozone layer. Fire burns because it is hot. Good is the action of something you do that you enjoy. These were the usual answers to the great question. But sometimes there was more to the one word question than its three letters could create. It was the curse that all living things went through. Sometimes that greatest answer to it was the simplest reply.

Because.

Naruto was not this kind of person, and thankfully, neither was Ozpin. Naruto had little tact for this sort of thing and for good reason. Aside from the more obvious reason of not being taught to answer such a question in this fashion, he also had little patient for it. Ozpin believed in detail. He was a man that wanted people to understand something, even if he had to give them nibbles of the truth and the answer he was trying to make them learn. But sometimes the hand of fate needed to a shove as well, and Ozpin was not one to move that hand without good reason.

This was why his request was met with an odd stare from the blond and a furrowed brow from Glynda. "You want me to do what?"

Ozpin stapled his fingers together. There was more to this request than what he was willing to share. Naruto was an outside. Their petty problems shouldn't mean anything to him. With Sasuke out of the office, Naruto would slowly return to a more normal nature that Ozpin was lead to believe about the boy. Naruto didn't have to show off to Sasuke if he wasn't around. He could revert back the kind and carrying person that would charge headfirst into a problem to fix it without asking for anything in return. That was his nature. That was what Ozpin liked about him.

"I want you to start trying to spend more time with the other students and keep a close eye on them." Ozpin made sure to keep his voice low. Not in warning, but in fear to his request being denied. A good reason was all well and good, but if Naruto wasn't going to press for more information, he wasn't going to give it. There were details on his students he wanted kept under lock and key. Not for their safety, but for the safety of the world if the worst came rearing its ugly head.

"Why me?"

Why indeed, Glynda thought. She pushed her glasses up. Already she had thought up a number of reasons, all of them pertaining to Naruto's unique ability to self-replicate and gain their memories. What better way was there than to send out a hundred people and kill them at the end of the day to learn about the world around him? But there was more than just the ability and she knew it. It was also about his lack of a background in the world, his whisker marks, and now his red eye. If he covered the other eye up, he could easily pass as a Faunus without problem. All the information they could gain on the White Fang was at their fingertips and Ozpin wanted him to monitor their students. They had cameras and they used them daily. Their security force worked around the clock to make sure that each student was well behaved and not crippling another.

But there was more than just those reasons that came to mind. Glynda knew the one and true reason he wanted him to do this.

"Consider this a chance to prove to the students that you care about them." Ozpin stood up and walked around the table. Naruto watched him with a keen eye. "I've watched you since you woke up. Some students fear you. Others look to you with hatred. Only a few call you friend. You are powerful, and you are right to be feared for that power. I do this not because of Sasuke's talk about your past, but because I don't like seeing spirited individuals like yourself suffering the way you do. If you ever decide to join Beacon, I assure you that you would be made a leader. Not because of your skill on the battlefield, but because of your true leadership ability. I saw it the day you woke up. You ran ahead of everyone to fight an enemy you knew nothing about. You used your power to make sure that no one else fought. And while your weapon is proof of a kinder nature, it is also proof of something more." Ozpin gave him a smile. "You are a gentle person that when angered is a terrible storm. You're innocents is not ignorance. You're calm hides a storm."

"So you want me to watch them to try and make friends?" Naruto almost laughed at him. Almost. "That's really stupid."

Ozpin smiled. Well, Naruto most certainly wasn't dumb. With a sly grin he moved to the desk and sat down. "How much do you know about the White Fang?"

The question sparked an interest in Naruto. Glynda looked cautiously towards Ozpin as he waited for Naruto's answer. "They're a group that once tried to use peaceful protest for equality. Sadly that never went as planned and some time ago they started becoming violent. They were setting fires to shops that refused to service them and robbing supplies from companies that used Faunus as a workforce."

"Would you consider their actions justified? Cops let them Faunus die when Grimm show up. When a robbery happens, a Faunus is the first one to be accused. I know that not everyone is so cruel, but the world at large still sees them as animals… even slaves. And when you throw in the White Fang it only makes matters worse for those that are trying to do right by the world and live happily." Ozpin leaned back in his chair. Gone was the youthful face of a man with pride and joy for a school created for would-be heroes. His face was that of an old man, wise, battle hardened, and eyes so telling that the stories were old and forgotten. Naruto saw him no more as Ozpin, but rather as the Sandaime Hokage. "I want to make the world a better place, but with the White Fang doing these things, there has been some concern throughout the world that they're gearing up for something big. Recently they have been making it worse for all Faunus."

"Somehow I doubt that's really what you're after. So why do you want me to start monitoring the students?"

"A few days before you awoke there was a robbery attempt at the docks. This robbery was led by a known criminal, Roman Torchwick, and several members of the White Fang. Normally, this wouldn't happen. Eye witnesses testified to Roman treating them like animals. The White Fang would never take orders from someone like him, a human. There is also testimony of them working together on something big. Recently there have been a number of dust robberies that have put dust prices through the roof. Vale is low on this precious resource. The robbery in question was thwarted by one Blake Belladonna and Sun Wukong. Blake, as you know, is part of team RWBY. Sun Wukong is part of another team coming to Beacon for the Vytal Festival." Ozpin paused to take a sip from his coffee. There was more he wanted to add, but Naruto seemed onboard already for this. "This is why I want you to monitor them."

"You want me to monitor team RWBY?" Ozpin's lips cracked into an almost knowing smile. Naruto sighed and rubbed his nose in thought. "Why should I only monitor them?"

"The night at the docks proved that they want to change the world and believe they are ready to take on the task. I simply want to make sure that they don't get in too deep with the world they're going up against."

"I'll look after them," Naruto told him with a wave of his hand. "But if they go out and cause problems, I'm not taking responsibility for it." Naruto walked to the elevator before Ozpin could say anything else.

Today was going to be a fun day.

(-)

Sasuke fought back a yawn and failed. The library was never a place he liked to be. You didn't learn much of anything from it. They had the occasional book he fancied every now and then, but as of lately he wished he had more of their books from their village here. He had a clone out in the woods training and trying to grasp something he was sure was impossible. Any new information he could get was welcomed.

How was it that no one in their village had thought of this? Had they tried and simple failed?

The idea of hurling chakra out and letting it sustain itself was something that was worth looking in to for a number of reasons, but mostly so that both could acquire new skills. Sasuke wasn't blind to the world at large. The White Fang was a powerful and corrupt organization that needed to be put down. Sasuke didn't so much as want to end them as he wanted to first try and understand them. The books that Naruto had once been reading were insightful. It made Sasuke's skin crawl at how drastically they had taken things. Would things have been different if it was the other way around?

Aside from the White Fang and Grimm, Sasuke knew that deep down something else was out there. There always was something else out there. No matter how you looked at it in life, there was always a bigger fish. No matter how big you thought you were there was always someone else out there to pull your strings and make you dance to their whims. It was the truest form of life. The subtle hints and points and winks were all part of this. Love was one such factor in all of this. Out of love, hatred was born. If you learned to love you must also learn to hate. Sasuke already knew how to hate and he knew it well. But love was the ultimate mystery to him.

That was why he was reading a more… romantic book. It was one of Persia's books she brought with her.

The book was also about lesbians. Sasuke wondered if that had anything to do with her dark past or just some foolish experimenting as a teenager. Since all of team RWBY was female, did they have lesbian sex when they became sexual stressed? It wasn't like they could just hide those kinds of toys without the other person finding it. Blake already was called out on being a pervert when her Ninja's of Love book was found. Sasuke had immediately thought of Kakashi and could almost see her as him when he found out she read that stuff. Thank god Naruto did know just yet or he'd be calling her a pervert as well.

"You activated my trap card! Giant Nevermore!"

Sasuke groaned as he was yanked from his book to stare over at the loud girl. Libraries were a place of knowledge and silence. This was lost on Yang and Ruby as they played their board game with great enthusiasm while Weiss remained confused on the very nature of said game and Blake had no interest. The only team to truly use the library for what it was was the members of team JNPR. Ren was reading a book. Nora was asleep and mumbling about pancakes. Jaune was reading a comic book. Pyrrha was reading something else but upon seeing Jaune reading a comic book, quickly took it with a small cough and replaced it with a combat book. She then proceeded to happily read the comic.

Sasuke glanced over his shoulder to where his team was doing their own thing as well. Emert was drawing, but he kept looking at the four girls playing their board game. Jasper was playing with a yo-yo while looking at a photo he kept with him. Persia was reading another one of her romance novels, as she had already finished her school work for the week. When Monday hit she would undoubtedly have all her homework done in an hour. She was a lot like Sakura in that area, but she was useful and strong. Sasuke didn't want to hate on Sakura, but she never did anything short of that one time in the Chuunin exam where she kept them all alive through the night. And even then she had to have other people show up to help.

Sasuke wondered just how things got like this with him at times. Here he was reading a romance book in a library while the three teams sat around doing what they did best and he didn't care. His old self would have gotten annoyed the very moment team RWBY showed up with their board game and left. Maybe that was a sign he was changing?

"Sup losers!"

Sasuke looked up from his book, as did a few others. Sun was standing behind Blake with another person that was taller than him. He had blue hair and wore goggles. Sasuke thought of Naruto when they were younger for a moment. He suppressed a shudder.

"Hey Sun," Ruby greeted.

"Ruby, Yang, Blake… Ice Queen…" Sun pointed to each girl as he spoke.

"Why does everyone keep calling me that?" Weiss asked.

Sun ignored her and turned to his friend. "I never got a chance to formerly introduce you to my old friend."

"Uh…" he looked around, mostly at the board game the four girls were playing, "aren't libraries for reading?"

"Thank you!" Ren shouted, raising his hands in the air to his fellow man.

"Pancakes!" Nora snapped awake, snorting as she did. Everyone gave her a sharp glance before looking back at the two males.

"Shut up! Don't be a nerd."

Sasuke started ignoring them after that. He was more focused on his book at this point. Truthfully he didn't care about either boy. He already got the basic idea on what was happening here. Sun wanted to be with Blake and Weiss was now interested in the new guy. Really, Sasuke couldn't care less about two new guys showing up at the academy for the fight that he wasn't participating in.

His team already agreed to stay out of the matches. Jasper didn't care enough to do it. Emert had no desire to do any fighting in the thing. Persia was the only one that was actively trying to get them to do it. All three males knew why she wanted to do it. Her family was supposed to be here and she was going to show her father up in the tournament. Valid reason for her to participate, but not the others. They weren't motivated and it was too time consuming for them to join either.

Jasper explained how the tournament worked. There was a normal team match first. Then the winners would elect two representatives to fight for them in the next rounds. Following that, there would be a one on one match to decide who the victor was. Those that backed out could fight in another bracket as well. But that was where the problem was. Neither male was interested in fighting in the doubles round. That would leave Persia all by herself to fight off two other people for the match. They didn't want to put her through this, but really, they didn't have the desire to fight in the thing and with it being a three to one vote, she was sort of out of luck.

Persia had already pleaded her case to Sasuke multiple times, but he was putting his foot down. If the others didn't want to do it, he wasn't going to make them. She was heartbroken for sure, but really, she understood why they didn't want to do it. They weren't motivated to prove that they were the best team at Beacon for their age. Sasuke already got enough experience in working with teams to know that they all thought like that. Team RWBY thought they were amazing because they were a team of girls that blew up nightclubs and stopped would be criminals. Team JNPR thought they were amazing because they had Pyrrha, a girl with inhuman strength, a wannabe ninja, and Jaune.

Sasuke knew his team was good, but he also knew that there were teams better than them. When he was part of Team 7 he thought they were the best because they survived the invasion of Suna and Oto. They fought Gaara and lived. Sasuke and Naruto both fought Zabuza and lived! What other team their age had done that sort of thing when they were fresh boots on the ground? No one! Sure the other students that they graduated with all survived, but what did they do during that whole shit storm? Hinata was out cold. Lee was paralyzed. Neji knocked clean on his ass from fighting Naruto. Ino passed out. Chouji did nothing. Kiba did nothing. The only other person to do anything was Shikamaru, and he just bought them time with his stupid shadow move.

So really, all in all, Sasuke knew that deep down his team was good, but if he wasn't going to say they were the best. He had enough grace now to not do that.

Sasuke glanced up from the book to see that he was all alone in the library. He sighed and shut the book. He was almost done with it.

He saw himself out and walked through the cool night air. He saw Naruto laying in the grass and staring at the stars. Sasuke considered leaving him there by himself for a moment. He wrestled with the thought for a long time before he marched over to him and looked down at him. The idiot didn't even turn over to look at him. He just kept staring straight ahead like he was spacing out. Sasuke tapped him with his foot. Naruto jerked to attention and stared at him for a bit.

"You looked like you were thinking hard. Figure I'd save you before you did something stupid." Sasuke told him. Naruto chuckled and propped himself up on his elbows. He returned to look at the night sky. Sasuke glanced up as well. The stars twinkled like living things. He wondered if Sakura was doing this right now.

"You ever wonder why we decided to become ninja?"

Sasuke arched a brow. He had a valid reason. He wanted to prove to his father he was great, just like his brother. After the massacre he did it to get revenge. There had been no other reason but that one. The death of his brother was all he could think about and that made him stronger. It gave him the strength to endure that hardship.

Naruto fell back onto the grass and looked up at the stars. "I never really stopped and thought about it. Why did I join? What motive did I have for joining other than to gain the respect and admiration of the village? I could have left and done anything. But something made me want to be a ninja."

"Maybe we were brainwashed into believing that if we could mold chakra we had to become a ninja," Sasuke supplied. Naruto was willing to accept that. "But the flipside to that is that everyone could mold chakra. You just had to be trained on how to do it. Sakura could do it and she didn't come from a clan. Of course, neither did you and you could do it as well." Naruto nodded reluctantly. "Why are you thinking about that now? Did Ozpin say something?"

"…No…" Sasuke sat down in the grass. "I just started thinking on it."

"You don't start thinking on anything without having someone say something else. So what happened?" Naruto's silence was an all to telling answer. The former Uchiha looked around and sighed. "Ozpin asked you to do something. So what does he want you to do?"

"He told me not tell you." Sasuke snorted. That was a bold face lie. Even Ozpin did tell him that, Naruto wasn't exactly very subtle when it came to keeping secrets unless they were something as large as the Kyuubi. "I've been thinking about the village." Sasuke shut his eye with a tired sigh. This was an ongoing thing. Naruto would think about it and then from there he'd get angry and talk about going back. "Do you think they brainwashed us into believing we had to become ninja?"

Sasuke was taken back by the question. He had never assumed such with their village. Like the other children of their class they believed in the glory and fame of what it meant to be a ninja and not what it truly meant. Sasuke was taught that during his fight with Haku and their time in the Forest of Death. How many children died in that place? How many more would follow? Without seeing the true picture and history of their village he knew enough to know that it had a dark side to it. It was political in nature. Every person that sat on the council had a motive other than the security of their village. It was the same in this world. You couldn't trust politicians with a government, just the same as how you can't trust generals to lead armies.

So maybe there was a driving force in their village that left subtle hints in their minds for them to join the cause and fight for their nation and village. If there was a driving force behind that, Sasuke couldn't see it. He didn't want to see it. He wanted to believe that his will was free of guiding hands.

"Well," he began slowly as he looked over at his friend, "say there is some brainwashing involved. Does that apply here as well?" Naruto shrugged. This wasn't the village. He was free to do what he wanted. "If there is any brainwashing in that village it would have been done through the water." He chuckled when he saw Naruto's lips twitch into a grin. "What about you? You think you were brainwashed into loving Sakura?" Naruto's face fell. That struck a nerve. Sasuke scratched at his scalp, annoyed that he said that. There was no point in backing out now. "What did you love about Sakura? What made her special?"

"She was pretty and smart!" Naruto made that sound as though it were obvious.

"And?" When Naruto have anything else to add, Sasuke shook his head. "You liked her because she was a pretty and smart. She was smarter than you, so you adored her for that. Her looks were also something you enjoyed because she was unique among the class. But aside from that; what else did you like about her?" Naruto opened his mouth and shut it. Sasuke nodded as though he had gotten through to him. "Here's the thing about love. It sucks. You find the person you want and you go for them based on looks. That's what you do. Everybody has their style with people, but that's not me."

"So you're saying I like Sakura-chan because i only find two things about her that I like?" Naruto snorted and sat up, furious to be put on the spot like that. "Sakura was kind."

"She beat you up."

"She was insightful."

"That's the same as being smart."

"And she was pretty."

"You said that already." Naruto fumed. Sasuke looked up at the stars and cracked a grin. "True love is weird. I'm not an expert and I will never claim to be. I see myself dying alone and without a family. But if I had to go for a girl," he paused and thought of all the girls he knew Naruto knew, "I'd go for Weiss." Naruto blinked. That was rather odd for Sasuke to say such a thing. "She's smart, beautiful, talented, alluring, desires to be the best, suffers under the gaze of her father for her skills, and believes that all people are beneath her."

"Sounds like you like her."

Sasuke shrugged. "I can say the same for every girl that you've met. I'm using her as an example. Take Ruby for instants. She's smart, skilled, fast, not one for looking pretty, desires to be the best because she wants to be the hero, and she's hyperactive. She's pretty much a female version of you when you stop and think about it." Naruto couldn't see their similarities. "All I'm saying is that you had a simple crush when we were little and in the village. If we're truly stuck here, you should get used to being here then."

"But we're not stuck here. I'm going to find a way home."

"And then become Hokage and be with Sakura?" Naruto bristled. Sasuke got up. Naruto followed. "Don't get hung up on one girl because you liked her. People change… I'm sure you can find someone here to spend your days drooling over." Naruto rolled his eyes and started walking for his dorm room. Sasuke snickered and departed. Tomorrow was a new day.

A/N

I pretty much decided to cut this one here because nothing I wrote made the transition to the next part really work for me. I tried for days before giving up and saying, "Screw it!" So the next chapter will start where this one was supposed to go to because nothing I did I liked.

Sorry.