Chapter 8: Hardball

Parings: Naru/Sasu...duh.

Rating: K-T (first) M-NC-17 (later)

Disclaimer: I do not own the sheer genius "Naruto"; Shippuden of other. The honours go to Masashi Kishimoto and his genius brain that created this masterpiece.

Summary: Remember the summer camp you went to; that quaint place out in the woods, by a lake, sitting around a campfire telling ghost stories and eating s'mores? Well this summer school, sure as hell, isn't that. Three months, Sasuke, teenage delinquents, illegal alcohol, prescription drugs, annoying shrinks, escape plans, a Shitzu from hell, and new relationships; welcome to camp. NaruSasuNaru.

A/N: Clarification, the Michael Jackson song is really named 'SmoothCriminal' but most people know is as 'Annie'.

A/N2: Okay...It's no secret I love Kisa/Ita...so I'm not leaving them out of this either; come on...gotta give an awesome brother some love. XD

A/N3:No Sapphyah30: it's not possible to update twice a day... I'd have half cyborg to do that, but thank you for you review.

"You know me," Sasuke glared, "Admit it."

Kakashi sighed internally, "Good morning to you too, Sasuke."

Tuesday morning eight am; he opened his office door and figuratively slammed into the one person he would want at least another week before confronting. Sasuke Uchiha.

"I am not playing that game with you." Sasuke growled eyes narrowing to lethal, "Answer me."

"Yes." Kakashi said evenly, focusing more on the heat radiating from the cup in his hand, "I do know you...your father w-"

"My father was a bastard," Sasuke cut in, "He tried every twisted theory he had on us for his students benefit... your benefit."

Kakashi stopped. "What...you mean he..."

Sasuke snorted, "Were his shooting range ...yes... I fondly remember the inkblots tests, free association, the Freudian relaxation techniques, the random word association tests, the initial reaction tests, the subliminal assessments..."

"He wouldn't do that." Kakashi blurted, "That's not even legal... It's against the Hippocratic oath."

A crooked smile crossed Sasuke's face, "...then I guess you don't want to know about the shock therapy, then?"

The mug of coffee Kakashi had shattered on the floor, "You're lying."

"I could show you the scars if you're interested..." he returned pleasantly, "I think they've finally healed over now."

Kakashi slapped himself mentally for subduing to the obvious crap Sasuke was spewing out. "What do you want Sasuke?"

"Why didn't you just tell me?" he accused, "I would have found out anyway."

The silver haired man sighed mopping up the spilt coffee with a wad of tissues, "How did you find o-" Kakashi stopped and shook his head at the completely inane question he was going to ask, "you know what, don't answer that...I didn't want to rake up any memories you might have had an-""

"Bullshit." Sasuke said evenly, "You didn't want to tell me because I would have just shut down and be unresponsive."

"Yes," Kakashi admitted, "I didn't want to make you anymore reluctant to talk to somebody, so I had Iruka do your sessions and stayed out of your way as much as possible."

Sasuke grunted, "Fat lot of good that did you, didn't it."

Kakashi sighed, "What do you want from me Sasuke?"

"Don't avoid me," he replied evenly, "I don't like to be ignored...it makes me... edgy."

A small smile crossed Kakashi's face, "You, your father and Itachi ..." he sighed. Ethereal eyes pierced black ones. "Sasuke...may I ask...what did you do after your parents died."

Obsidian eyes stated straight into Kakashi's after scanning the room. "Strictly off the record?"

Total paranoia.

"Completely."

"The Hyuuga clan took us in for a probation period until Itachi was eighteen and went to work...it wasn't like he really needed it...the trust fund kicked in less than two years after they died..." he answered leaning on the wall and crossing his arms, "...apparently my father had his will made up even before we were born that his Hyuuga associates would take custody of us in any emergency."

Kakashi spun around, "But there is-"

"A Hyuuga in here... I know...an old... friend of mine." Sasuke said, "You could have turned me into stone when I saw the perfect Neji Hyuuga in a juvenile holding centre...serves the bastard right."

The last part was murmured in a low voice. Kakashi pretended like he hadn't heard it or the slight pause before 'friend'. He glanced up; Sasuke's eyes were tracing his bookshelf and after a second the Uchiha smirked.

"...that's a very...interesting... reading choice ... I don't believe that book is recommended psychotherapy material."

Damn it. He shouldn't have left that particular segment of Icha Icha Paradise on the shelf.

"Sasuke..." he paused, how was he going to word this, "...if there is anything you want to talk to me about my office is open."

Black bangs swished with the force Sasuke's turning head, "Let me get this straight...if I need anything I can come to you?"

"Yes."

Sasuke took a minute to think, "Okay then; the main problem I'm having..."

Kakashi tensed, "...is...I'm freaking bored...the classes are unchallenging; I have so much free time I would watch paint dry."

That was totally left field. Kakashi was expecting something normal like a request for some quiet conversation or something...but then again...this was an Uchiha; unfathomable.

"Why don't you murder the library?" Kakashi suggested, "There are many books in there that might pique your fantasy... I happen to know of a stimulating collection of thermonuclear physics that might interest you."

Sasuke snorted at the goad. "You really think you're funny don't you; but no, I'd rather read Ripley's Believe it or Not."

"Still," Kakashi said rummaging in his drawer for a library pass and quickly signing it. "Have at it."

Sasuke took the slip of paper. "Again, don't disappear on me."

"I'll try not to." He answered evenly.

"And Hatake..." he shot over his shoulder, "...you get more flies with honey...try that with him, why don't you?"

Silver head whipped around, "W... what are you talking about?" He couldn't have noticed that, could he?

Sasuke snorted and walked out.

(*)(*)(*)

The garden wasn't empty when he went to it; in fact there were five people scattered around the ploughed plot...four girls and one additional guy.

"Ahh. Uchiha Sasuke..."an old woman hummed, "...welcome...I'm Chiyo-san...your overseer."

"Hello," he returned quietly.

"Today we will be planting an herbaceous plant 'lycopersicon esculentum'; commonly known as the-"

"Tomato." A smooth cultured female voice said behind him. Sasuke turned to find the platinum haired, purple be-glittered model walking up to them; Ino.

"...a herbaceous plant of the botanical family Solanaceae...they may be red, green or yellow."

The old woman's eyes lit up, "That's perfectly right."

Ino stepped parallel to Sasuke a pleased smirk on her face, hip cocked out the right with a delicate hand akimbo on it. "I always am."

"Yamanaka Ino," Chiyo said pleasantly, "... can you tell me the major nutrients in tomatoes?"

"Sure," she said, examining her perfectly buffed nails, "Vitamin C, potassium, the vitamin B complexes, and Iron."

"Also perfect." Chiyo said turning to one of the wheel burrows that was beside her filled with hand forks and spades and small potted out seedlings of tomatoes.

"Today we will be transplanting these; the best of the batches are designated for the kitchen's use. They are hybrid plants manufactured to resist certain types of fungus and destruction." She said her tone motherly, "Each row is the property of each one of you, and you may begin."

Sasuke took up a small orange fork and moved to the one right next to the fence that led to the stretch of bare land and waited.

"You're Sasuke, right?"

Women; so predictable. He didn't even shift, "Yes, and you're Ino...Sakura's best friend... the flower shop girl...the model."

The silvery-blond bang that curtained half of her face fluttered and Sasuke was treated to a set of green eyes; not the glittering brilliant quality of Gaara but still green...and mischievous.

"Ah... forehead girl." Ino said, "Yes, we are friends."

"...forehead girl?" he asked darkly.

Ino snorted, "You haven't seen that gigantic billboard brow of hers? I'm just glad she took my advice and cut bangs to cover that eyesore."

Under ten seconds Sasuke sized Ino up as a stuck up, self-satisfied, pompous Madonna. Still she did have a right to be one; her body looked like it could have graced G.Q. magazine.

"You're not falling for her, are you?" Ino asked.

"What business is it of yours if I am?" he recounted evenly.

An irritated look crossed Ino's face, "You have to have better taste than that."

Sasuke turned to face her, eyebrow almost at his hair line, "And you are?"

"Duuhh," she said flipping her hair, "Obviously."

Christ...stuck up much. He leaned in to her ear and whispered, "Stop fooling yourself... you're not that attractive." and sauntered off leaving her standing still and mouth open stunned. Sasuke suspected it was the first time somebody had rejected her and he revelled in the aftermath of doing so.

"Chiyo-san," he asked taking up five seedlings of the plant, "May you tell me why that piece of land looks barren?" he said indicating the stretch of desert beyond the fence.

"Oh." She said, "it is barren...we call that No-man's-land... some time ago, and this is mainly legend, they said a sand spirit lived there and poisoned the soil. Not a thing can grow on it."

"Hn." He said, kneeling down to the ploughed land. Sand spirit... yeah right. The most likely explanation is that the water table under the ground, over time, had leached away every viable nutrient in the soil and leaving sodium compounds to make it barren.

Legends... a fool's paradise.

'It's going to rain.' Sasuke noted dismally looking through the window to the greyish cloud cover dotting the sky above. 'I hope Itachi can make it.'

This time the visiting room had an additional three people; Shikamaru, that TenTen chick and the Renjii guy. Sasuke squinted. Renjii was the quietest person in the camp; you would have missed him completely if you didn't watch for him. He was an oddity.

He slumped against the desk, pale lids falling over dulling eyes. The door opened and a man, obviously related to Renjii, stepped into the room; he was tall, broad shouldered, adequately muscled; slightly mocha skinned and had a thick mane of finely twisted dread locks falling around his shoulders. He glanced up to his face and frowned; the man's eyes were...blue.

Bizarre.

He was just closing the door when Itachi stumbled in and the bag he was carrying met the floor.

"I'm so sorry." The dread locked man said dipping down to retrieve the bag, his deep baritone carrying even over to where Sasuke was sitting.

He watched as a flustered Itachi glanced up and...wait... What. The. Freakin'. Hell?

Was that a...blush...on Itachi's cheeks?

No seriously; they had chatted for less than ten seconds and Itachi's pale cheeks were...red; and not embarrassed red...aroused red.

Sasuke paused and blinked; hallucination right? What the fuck just happened. No...not freaking possible. A black hole had just opened up, swallowed him and dumped him into a parallel universe where everything was opposite, right.

Right?

He blinked again. No...same sight. There was a red hue on his big brothers cheeks. Damn...who knew... Itachi had a thing for tall, exotic men with piercing, ice-cold blue eyes...go figure.

"My brother," Renjii's quiet voice said beside him, "...he has that effect on people."

Sasuke dimly heard him while the majority of his brain was busy conjuring up a million ways to make his brother squirm.

Itachi sat down, clearly flustered. "Sasuke?"

"What's his name Aniki?" he couldn't help (and didn't want to) take off the smirk that splitting his face in half, "'fess up Itachi...what's his name?"

"Mizu Kisame." Itachi said trying (and failing) to not smile.

"Water shark," Sasuke snorted, "...seems appropriate...anyway, did you find out about Neji or didn't you?"

"I did," Itachi said sighing, "It's not pretty."

"Look at me Aniki," Sasuke growled, "Do I look like I give damn if it's pretty?"

"Sasuke," Itachi said his strict voice chipping in, "Just because Neji cheated on you with... what's-her-name-"

"Karin." Sasuke snarled. "Little hooker cunt bitch."

Itachi railroaded on, "...doesn't mean you can punish him for what he was pressured to do. Sasuke revenge is not a pre-"

"Are you going to tell me or not?" Sasuke but in, "I do have things to do, Aniki."

Red eyes closed for a second, "He was caught hacking into Hyuuga & Hyuuga."

"His family's law firm?" Sasuke's brows narrowed, "Why?"

"I don't really know," Itachi replied, "the defence lawyer said something about getting information on his uncle for blackmail."

"Huh," Sasuke's mind was spinning. Why was Neji trying to blackmail his uncle? "...really."

Itachi's hand covered Sasuke's for a moment, "Are you going t-"

"Forgive him?" Sasuke snipped dragging his hand from under Itachi's and pushing away from the table. "Hell no." he snorted, "For once I'm going to take dear old daddy's advice, do unto others as they do to you."

Itachi sighed and handed Sasuke the backpack, "Anything else?"

"N-" he started to say but stopped, "yes...there is...Nii-san can you get me some info on this person, Orochimaru Sannin."

Black brows furrowed, "Why?"

Sasuke had never had a problem lying to Itachi but this time he felt a twinge of... something...in his stomach. "Just for an essay...the internet here is restricted."

"Fine."

Sasuke pushed up from the desk and a strange emotion cut through him...he wanted to... hug Itachi.

Hell no.

Instead he squashed those feeling to dust and stuck his hands into his pockets and murmured a 'goodbye' and a 'safe travel' and left.

"What?" Sasuke asked incredulously. "She's a what?"

Sakura shrugged and sipped her coffee, "That's what I overheard Iruka saying; TenTen Higushi is a weapons dealer...apparently she is from a clan of blacksmiths, and after her father died she took over the business, making and selling exotic weapons like...a Chakram (1) was it ."

"A Chakram is an ancient Indian weapon...it's circular...and what about that acrobat thing?" he asked.

"Oh yeah..." Sakura said, "She is one...at least that's her cover for distributing the weapons."

"Weapons dealer... huh." He murmured. A second passed and he looked her in the eye, "I met Ino yesterday."

It wasn't that visible but Sakura tensed, "Oh...what did you think of her?"

"Madonna." he replied instantly, "Way too posh...she's a snob."

A mixture or emotions flittered across Sakura's face; exultant mixed with small levels of sadness and...protection? , "...She always was."

The dust was aggravating his sinuses but he still dug though the pile of papers.

He had handed the library keeper the note from Kakashi and with a shrug he was given free range to do whatever he wanted.

He immediately headed for the restricted section and started to hunt for the camp's blueprints. Half an hour later he still had nothing. He was looking for a needle in a figgin' haystack.

Softly knocking his head back on the wall he ran over everything about the camp and his mind shifted to the power posts. The manufacture name on them was 'Raijin'. If the man was in the basement as Orochimaru said, they would have made some kind of adjustment to the power circuit.

Hauling himself up from the pile of dusty books and papers he made his way to the electronic section and typed in 'Raijin electronics'.

The page loaded and he scanned it.

Turns out 'Raijin' was the engineering company the man was talking about. It manufactured everything from power post to micro-L.E.D. lights. In the pages 'search' field he typed in 'Maito Gai Rehabilitation Institution' and the results popped up with a 3D simulation of the posts placements. The power posts were carefully manufactured of pure steel and scattered all around the circumference of the camp with tensile strength to resist the periodical hurricanes that sometimes battered the nation.

Each room, dorm and place was listed on the circuit that had lines and power outlets to everywhere, except a section of the basement under Admin.

Bingo. He was expecting that.

What he didn't expect was to see a high def. picture of Renjii's brother pop up on screen; Mizu Kisame Ph.D. twenty nine years old...engineer, owner of Raijin Electronics.

Sasuke whistled lowly with respect. Twenty nine with a Ph.D., that couldn't have been easy.

In another page he went to the construction department of the county and typed the name in also hoping they had a copy of the blueprints on file. They did have a copy but it turned out the blueprints were confidential and only the owner or the construction crew had authority to see them.

Whatever. He still had what he needed.

Deleting the recent search history he pushed away from the console, made his way back to the room and grabbed a book of local legends he wasn't intending on reading but whatever.

The book was stamped and tucking it under his arms made his way back to the room. On the way to Sparta he crossed a recessed nook and snorted; the unmistakable sounds of sex were emitting from the space.

He wrinkled his nose. Sex...really.

Some people.

The stench seeping up from the basement was deplorable. Though the passages were concrete and spotlessly clean; but the disgusting rotting odour saturating the air almost made Sasuke hurl. Burying his nose in the crook of his arm he squinted and descended the steel stairwell. The walls of the foundation sported slight cracks as if the mortar was deteriorating.

Why in god's name would they prison somebody down here?

"Sensory deprivation...torture." His mind supplied; and honestly is wasn't a hard thing to do; shut off human contact for a time period, surround them by a monotone environment and voila...total shutdown. The person either developed schizophrenia or tried to commit suicide. After nine months in here the man was either crazy or brain dead.

Every three feet he knocked on the stone, seeking a hollow out sound to indicate a room where the man could be.

Twenty feet in he found the knock reverberated hollow. He knocked harder.

"Pein," he hissed.

Nothing.

"Pein." He tried again.

This time a shuffle.

"Pein?"

"...yes?" the voice was cautious.

Gold.

"Who's there?" the disembodied voice asked, "Who are you?"

Odd. The man sounded veritably sane and he had a foreign accent.

"You don't need to know who I am...just what I'm going to do for you." He paused scanning the wall that separated them, "I'm going to help you escape."

A paused and another shuffle, "That's impossible... I've been trying to escape for months...it can't be done."

Sasuke smirked, "Leave that to me."

Another pause, "He sent you...didn't he...Orochimaru."

"Yes." Sasuke replied hesitantly, "He did."

"I suppose he told you what I am, didn't he?"

Crossroads. Did he really want to know?

"Yes..." Sasuke said slowly, "He said that you were selling state secrets to the Yakuza."

The laughter that Sasuke heard through the wall made him quirk and eyebrow. What the hell was so funny?

"That snake bastard... I figured he would make some story up."

"You mean you weren't selling secrets?" Sasuke replied curiously.

"No..." Pein answered, "I'm a C.I.A agent... I was selling him out."

****Psychiatric session Room56***

"Neji Hyuuga."

"Hatake-sensei." Neji returned slowly, "Did I do something wrong?"

"No," the silver haired man said, "I'm just informing you of you placement score...you scored 160."

A smug look crossed Neji's face, "I suspected that."

Kakashi had to stomp down on the urge to roll his eyes. Narcissistic complex didn't even describe Neji's attitude.

"That's good and all," he started, "But I'm here to find out about you and Uchiha Sasuke."

The Hyuuga's spine went ramrod straight, his grey eyes narrowing, "Sasuke huh," he leaned in smiling maliciously, "I'll tell you about Uchiha Sasuke... he's a..."

(*)(*)(*)

"Damn," Naruto said kicking off his shoes and flopping on the bed.

Sasuke barely looked over the book he had nestled on his chest as camouflage to disguise his unfocused eyes. "What are you grousing about?" he asked, "No let me guess...there's no more bacon in the kitchen?"

"No, douche bag," the blond returned, "...just a meeting with Kakashi-sensei tomorrow."

"Why?" Sasuke asked adroitly turning the page.

The blond snorted; "Something about determining my learning method because my I.Q score was abnormal."

Sasuke didn't even try to muffle his snickers, "What dobe...did you score an 85 on it?"

A basketball slammed inches beside his face, "No bastard...I got a 175...something about me being a genius."

Sasuke went faintish cold after hearing the figure; deathly cold. Ice was traveling up and down his skin. THAT JUST WASN'T POSSIBLE!

"W...what?" he stuttered.

Does anybody see the problem here? Sasuke doesn't like to be ignored and paradoxically he doesn't want to be noticed...#shakes head...he should be the one bipolar and not Gaara.

A Chakram is a circle weapon...people please tell some of you have seen Xena: Warrior Princess. That circle thing she uses is a Chakram.

It is just me or does anyone else love to see Sasuke shocked to the core... I'm sadistic, aren't I?

Peace out

Love ya'll

****B.P*****

And one more thing

REVIEW DAMNIT!