It had been a few days since the fight between Zabuza and Kakashi's team. Haku had gone out to fetch medicinal herbs because Master Zabuza was well enough that he didn't need to be constantly looked after or guarded from the idiots in Gato's employ who kept trying to start something because Zabuza had been virtually incapacitated. Bragging rights for being the one to "bring the Demon of the Mist down" were worth quite a bit, regardless of the fact that the job had pretty much been done by Hatake Kakashi. It was while he was out, dressed in rather feminine clothing so he looked less suspicious, that he spotted the blond boy that Master Zabuza had claimed as family laying completely unguarded in a clearing.
The boy was sprawled out, fast asleep with a kunai in his hand. Much in the same way Master Zabuza slept when he wasn't ill. Unlike Master Zabuza however - as he learned when he shook the boy awake - the boy wasn't semi-aware of his surroundings and able to wake up prepared to fight at the smallest sign of danger. Instead, the boy had rubbed his eyes after yawning a couple of times and stretching rather than moving into a defensive stance like he should've.
Shortly after waking up, the boy proved himself to be none too bright when he cheerfully and rather trustingly followed him, blushing and calling him "Nee-chan" the entire time. It was slightly disturbing, but he knew he deserved it considering what he was wearing, and it was far milder than what other people had said and tried to do to him in the past. Despite several lewd comments and insinuations, Master Zabuza had never "tried his charms" or showed any interest in doing so. The only comments Master Zabuza had made about his apparent beauty were that he could probably get away with wearing women's clothing for a couple more years before absolutely nobody would mistake him for a girl.
He studied the boy whose name was Uzumaki Naruto as he helped him gather the medicinal herbs he was collecting for Master Zabuza. On the surface, Master Zabuza and the boy looked almost nothing alike, but further study revealed a certain resemblance that could easily go unnoticed.
There were faint traces of red in the boy's bright blond hair just as there were faint traces of red in Master Zabuza's almost black hair when the sun hit it just right. There was some similarity in the shape of their noses, and the way their mouths curled up at the beginning of a smile. The shape of their hands were also similar, and both of their ring fingers were just a tiny bit longer than their index fingers. He didn't know whether or not Naruto's and Master Zabuza's eyebrows were similarly shaped, as Master Zabuza's had been burned off during an accident involving a faulty tag that had blown up in his face and never properly grew back. There was also a faint similarity in movement between the boy and Master Zabuza that training couldn't account for, especially considering that Kiri and Konoha had different fighting styles.
When he asked Naruto why he was out in the woods alone, the boy had replied that he was training to become stronger. He himself was somewhat familiar with all night training sessions, and watching such training sessions on occasion, so he didn't find the boy's assertion to be the least bit strange.
When he had asked the boy if he had someone precious to protect, the look in the boy's eyes told him that he was probably just as familiar with pain and loneliness as he was in the few moments before the boy recalled his precious people who he would undoubtedly give everything for, just as he himself would give everything for Master Zabuza. After seeing that haunted look, it was now clear to him why Naruto had sworn to avenge the death of a man who he had only known for a few minutes.
He had felt a pang of jealousy that hadn't entirely gone away when Zabuza - or his water clone rather - had hugged Naruto days earlier, but he had understood. Master Zabuza had found him on that bridge several years ago shortly after the last of his younger cousins on his mother's side of the family had died on a suicide mission. Master Zabuza had gone a long time without his family, and meeting a relative of his beloved mother was undoubtedly a very special moment despite the circumstances under which it had happened. He could only pray that there would be a moment when Master Zabuza would hug him like that.
When he finished gathering the last of the herbs and got up to leave, he informed Naruto that he was a boy. The crushed look on his face when his newly forming crush was destroyed was sort of adorable.
He wasn't sure whether or not he should be flattered that the boy had found him more attractive than some girl named Sakura who was apparently very pretty however.
It was after the girly looking boy who was way prettier than Sakura had left that the thing that had been bothering him the entire time he helped him gather plants finally hit him. Haku smelled just like that Hunter-nin that had carried his cousin off. He was tempted to go after him, but decided to leave it. Kakashi had said that his cousin wasn't dead, and that meant that the Hunter-nin had actually saved his cousin's life. The fact that he thought that he might have smelled his cousin on the girly boy seemed to confirm this. Deciding to put that behind him, he now had another problem that was bothering him. Did his being attracted to a boy however briefly mean he was gay, or did his not knowing it was a boy negate the issue entirely?
Sasuke arrived moments after Haku left.
"Did you see the person in pink that just left?" he asked, still preoccupied with his musings and deciding to seek an outside opinion.
"Yeah, she just passed me." Sasuke replied.
"Tell me, prettier than Sakura or not." he asked.
"Prettier than Sakura and Ino put together." Sasuke replied rather reluctantly, apparently not wanting to admit that he found either Sakura or Ino attractive in any way.
"It's not fair!" he wailed, lamenting the fact that the world should put things in his path as a boy that was prettier than Sakura in his path now that he'd had it confirmed that the boy had indeed been physically attractive, and it wasn't just him who had thought so.
"What's not fair?" Sasuke asked.
"That was a boy." he replied.
"Damn" Sasuke said, succinctly summing up what Naruto was feeling.
Edited 2-27-17