Okay, so it was longer than a month. I lied. Big Deal. I have very good reasons though. I said in May that it would take a month. HOwever June is exam time, and like hell I am failing school to post fanfic chapters/ write. Then after/during June, I got a Wii and Twilight Princess, for those who don't really know me personally, I am a complete Zelda game fanatic/freak. If it took some people 72 hours to beat Twilight Princess it took me 18 okay? And you can ask OrangeKittyAlchemist-Sony about what I did in WindWaker for her in 20 minutes. Now, who in their right mind, after receiving a new game would sit in front of a computer when they can swing a wiimote around and kill monsters and Ganondorf? Thirdly, I'm taking theory over the summer, and I have two summer jobs. One in which I don't get home until, at the best 7. I go to sleep at 9. SO HA!
Naruto was so easy to manipulate…thought the Older Sasuke, as he prepared to kick the ball. Just mention the word Hokage or suggest teaching him a jutsu, and he was all ears…It was that sort of thing about him that made him such a likable person. Except when he went overboard with the 'dattebayo's and other such stupid exclamations…
I swear…the only reason we're getting caught is because he can't keep a poker face…
What's poker?
Don't you start… growled the Older Sasuke, as he took a run at the ball.
Sasuke had always been at the top, and if there was one thing he couldn't stand, it was to lose.
Genjutsu huh? Naruto's stupid, he wouldn't notice one even if it was right in front of him…
But that's cheating!!
It's not cheating, it's exploiting your opponent's weakness. All ninjas know this…
That's not fair!!
It's fair until the other side notices…
8.8.8
Naruto squinted at Sasuke as his friend approached the ball in a running kick. He was forming hand seals…A ninjutsu? Probably a fire-element jutsu, like always. All Naruto had to do was dodge the main blast and get close to where it got thin, near Sasuke's mouth…
"Katon! Housenka no Jutsu!!" shouted Sasuke, blowing and kicking the ball at the same time. Just as Naruto was beginning to dodge, a familiar female voice rang out across the field.
"Sasuke! You're the coolest!!!"
Naruto whirled around surprised to see Sakura staring at Sasuke adoringly from the sidelines.
"S-Sakura-chan??!?!"
Why was she here???
"Shuriken Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!!!"
8.8.8
Sasuke was cheating…that was so definitely genjutsu…thought Gaara, his eyes narrowing at Naruto staring at a tree at the sidelines. Well it was to be expected…they were after all, shinobi…
"SHURIKEN KAGE BUNSHIN NO JUTSU!!!"
What do you mean Shuriken??? Those were soccer balls!!!
Gaara knew just by watching as the fire from the Housenka enveloped the soccer balls, that there was no way he could block all twenty-five flaming soccer balls.
"Ah…" he said softly, disappointed. If this was how the game was going to go with flaming soccer balls he and Naruto were going to lose…
I hate losing…IT SUCKS DAMMIT!!! I WON'T LET YOU GET AWAY WITH THIS YO!!!
8.8.8
Sasuke had expected some sand to try and stop the soccer balls from getting in. Just…not this much…
A wall twenty feet high had suddenly erected itself in front and around the goal, preventing the ball and its bunshins from getting in. Though Sasuke's kick and fire had been powerful enough to slam straight through a tree, they barely made a mark on the sand.
Okay…I so did not see that coming… said the Older Sasuke, looking at the wall impressed.
Who knew the Shukaku was such a sore-loser…
Shuka-who???
Shukaku…the Ichibi…giant, scary, sky-scraper tall sand tanuki…
I like tanukis…they're cute
Not the one Gaara's tied to… the Older Sasuke shuddered at the memory of it.
Man that had been freaky, when Gaara had only partially transformed…Half of his face had been enveloped with sand to form part of a tanuki's head…the other half twisted into a bestial grimace with a huge murderous intent. Remembering that blood-lust, it was amazing how he could have stood up to it…much less Naruto…
The big giant tanuki had been much better to look at, but the destructive power of the damn thing had been insane!! No wonder why the Akatsuki only took people S-Jounin and higher…and sent them in groups of two. To fight on the same level of those giant animals, you had to reach them first…getting close was not an option really…
Well anyway…where did all that sand come from anyway? Looking around, Sasuke found his source…
That sand box was looking pretty empty… He was pretty sure it hadn't been fifty feet deep though… That wall was quite thick…
"WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" exclaimed Naruto amazed.
"Gaara you are AWESOME dattebayo!!! It's like…an ABSOLUTE DEFENSE!!!" he gushed, running over towards his team mate as the wall slowly dissipated into the air.
"Teach me how to do that! Please, please, please, please, please, please, please dattebayo!!!!!!"
Gaara looked mildly surprised, which for normal people, would mean falling over from shock.
"I…I can't teach you this…" he said softly, looking at the ground.
"Oh come on!! I'll teach you Kage Bunshin!! It's a forbidden technique, but I think all the senseis know it…" continued Naruto.
"No!!" said Gaara loudly looking up, and then quickly returned his gaze towards the ground.
"The only reason…the only reason I can do this is because I'm a monster and a murderer…" he said.
Sasuke looked at Gaara sadly. He was just a kid…and ever since his birth, hated and feared by everyone…even by his own father and family…A little kid who had never before in his life been told 'I love you' or 'You're the most important person in the world to me'. Just like Naruto… Except…Naruto kind of had it easy in comparison to Gaara. The red-haired Sand shinobi had had to put up with assassination attempts almost 24/7 after he turned six-years old and had been deemed dangerous to the village.
He'd heard that the jutsu to seal the Shukaku within an unborn child required a human sacrifice…most often the mother. It also seemed that Gaara's mother had hated him too…but the poor kid had lived the first 6 years of his life believing that his mother had loved him, and that it was her love for him that made the sand protect him. Unfortunately, the same person who told him this then promptly destroyed the childish belief by telling him the truth…all in one night. Geez…it would have been a lot easier if that stupid Yashamaru person had just kept all of that to himself and just let Gaara hate his father for the order to kill him…Well anyway, it wasn't as if Gaara carried out his mother's hateful wish…the boy grew up to be Kazekage, the person who loved everyone in the village and was willing to lay their life down hundreds of times over to protect it.
Take that…whatever your name was…Gaara's mother…!!! Thought Sasuke triumphantly, as he began to smile.
8.8.8
Naruto didn't get what Gaara meant by that…How could a kid his age be a monster and a murderer??? He didn't get it dattebayo!!!! He should probably get Sasuke to explain it to him…Yet…somehow, somehow Naruto knew what Gaara meant by monster. Gaara had the look of someone who had never known what it was to have a friend, much less been cared about by anyone. Just seeing the way his father had treated him, Naruto wasn't really surprised, but Naruto felt a connection to the Sand ninja.
"Well…If you're a monster, then I'm a monster too!!!" declared Naruto loudly.
"Eh??"
"EHHHHHHHHH?!??!?!?!!" exclaimed Sasuke.
8.8.8
He's not supposed to know that!!!!! said the Young Sasuke horrified.
Did Iruka-sensei tell him already? Did something happen while I wasn't looking?!?!? Sasuke's younger consciousness was beginning to panic.
Relax…Deep down inside, Naruto has always known about the Kyuubi…well maybe not his conscious mind, who knows what goes on in there… but he's always known he was different…All his life, he's been looked at with disgust and disdain, he's never really known why, but somehow he does know…Usually whenever he gets angry and Kyuubi chakra starts leaking out…typically characterized with whoever his opponent is getting the crap beaten out of them…
Don't swear!!! And what does conscious and disdain mean???
Crap isn't a swear word. It's just another word for feces.
What's feces?!?!?
Don't ask.
But…
I said: DON'T ASK.
"Look Gaara, we're just kids! How can we be monsters dattebayo?!??!" exclaimed Naruto angrily.
Well actually…I've known a couple of monstrous little kids myself…remarked the Older Sasuke, looking pointedly at his younger self.
HEY!! That's not nice!!
Don't worry, you're not the worst little brat I've ever met…assured the Older Sasuke. The younger Sasuke began to smile proudly at first, before he realized that it was still, in a way, an insult.
Look there's nothing wrong with being a brat, just make sure you shape up once you're older.
Nope, that wasn't going to do it…anyway, they had a soccer game to win…as soon as this conversation was done…boy these always took forever…
8.8.8
"Even if you say you were born a monster, does it really matter dattebayo???" asked Naruto angrily.
"It doesn't matter what you are, it's what you do that matters Gaara!! Everyone used to hate me before, but did I let it bother me?? NO!" proclaimed Naruto
Yes you did… thought Sasuke irritably. Naruto was just puffing himself up since Gaara had little to no self-esteem…But it would do the kid some good to see how a Jinchuuriki could turn out to be, though he didn't know that Naruto was…and neither did Naruto for that matter…
8.8.8
Hyuuga Neji watched as his failure of a classmate walked as 'sneakily' as he could towards the Academy Grounds. Not again…would that stupid 'dropout' be trying to catch him off guard again?!?!
"Come out of there…" he said finally, fed up of being followed. "Knowing you, you'll just hurt yourself…" he told his classmate irritably.
"I WOULD NOT!!!" exclaimed the bob-haired boy, bursting out of the bushes angrily. In a short instant, the black-haired boy realized that he had just gave in to his enemy's taunts and had revealed his position. He was about to jump back into the bushes, as if it would somehow better everything. Well, just as he was about to jump back into the bushes, a flaming projectile came flying from the direction of the Academy field, to crash into the brush, setting the plants aflame.
"WAAAAAAH!!!" exclaimed Rock Lee, as he lost balance and fell backwards. Neji stared at the flames for a long moment, and then looked towards the direction of the schoolyard. What on earth was going on over there??
8.8.8
"That so counted!!" roared Sasuke across the field.
"It did not!!!!" Naruto yelled right back.
Of course it counted. It had gotten through Gaara's ultimate defense!! Sure he had used a kage bunshin to tunnel a hole up into the net, a trick, learned from Naruto's fight with Hyuuga Neji during the Chunin Exams. Sure Sasuke hadn't actually seen the fight, but after that incident, Naruto just wouldn't drop it…
Sasuke had also bettered the move by using Goukakyuu to propel the ball forward. So the ball had gone rocketing up through the ground to blast off to who knows where, the ball went into the net, and that's what mattered.
"That was cheating!!" exclaimed Naruto.
Gaara just stood there watching impassively. He was probably confused with all this arguing. He thought there weren't any rules to scoring in this game…Well, it was better that way. What he didn't know, wouldn't get Sasuke in trouble…he hoped. Gaara was always one to catch on quick to things…
"Fine then!" he shouted towards Naruto, "We'll have a penalty kick!!" he roared down the field.
THAT should make him feel better…said the Older Sasuke smugly.
But what if he scores??
Does it really matter? This is just a stupid game of soccer, if he scores, he scores, end of story.
NO IT'S NOT!!!! Squealed the younger Sasuke, stamping his foot. The Older Sasuke stared in a kind of shock. He was preeettty sure he had never made noises like that before…
WINNING IS ALL THAT MATTERS!!!!
Uhh…no it doesn't. Except in life or death situations, and even then, it doesn't have to matter.
WHATEVER!! I'M gonna win this game!! Declared the younger Sasuke.
Yeah, without my help, right?
YEAH! Said the child resolutely.
The older Sasuke had to keep a smirk off of his face, when about ten seconds later his younger self came back looking slightly miffed.
What do I do here…?
8.8.8
Neji stared in amazement as the soccer game unfolded…it seemed to be played almost entirely by the same person…There had to be at least 10 of the same blonde kid, running around, tackling one another. There were two other people, who weren't blonde. One was a red-head wearing weird sandy beige clothing, the other was a dark-haired boy wearing a black shirt and white shorts. Neji recognized him as Uchiha Sasuke, the supposed prodigy who had adamantly refused to skip grades in the Academy. That meant, that the blonde boy was Uzumaki Naruto, Konoha' number one loser…next to Bushy Brows behind him…
The score was probably still zero-zero, judging by the red-head's goalie technique. Huge walls of sand erupted from thin air to completely block the front of the net. Honestly… that was an impenetrable defense…
"Amazing…" said Bushy Brows next to him.
Neji glanced sidelong at him before returning his gaze towards the soccer game. Truly it was. There was no other word to describe at least 3 tonnes of sand moving as quick as the wind…
What was that kid, to be able to do that? He couldn't possibly be human…or if he was, then he was just a freak…Then again, in a ninja village, everyone could be seen as a freak, including himself. He had a Kekkei Genkai, the Byakugan, that Uchiha kid had the Sharingan, and whoever that red-head was obviously had some sort of special ability to be able to control sand…making them all freaks. That meant that the only normal people, were the losers…like Bushy Brows, and that blonde kid. If those people were normal, then something was horribly, horribly wrong with the world…
8.8.8
"Hey!!" shouted Naruto at the two kids standing near the edge of the forest. Both of them turned towards him surprised. Naruto felt slightly indignant. It wasn't like he was invisible or anything, so why did they look so surprised to hear him shout?
"It's not that they didn't know you were there," said Sasuke coming over, "More like they're surprised that you knew they were there."
Naruto squinted and nodded, as if he had known that all along. Sasuke was a crazy mind-reader…How did he know what he was thinking?
"That's Hyuuga Neji and Rock Lee…" said Sasuke, indicating each with a small head-jerk. "They're both a year older than we are…I hear that Neji is supposed to be a genius of some sort…"
Naruto nodded again, merely accepting this new knowledge. He didn't know how Sasuke knew all this, but Naruto learned not to bother asking.
"Hyuuga…huh?" said Gaara softly, as if assessing the name. "they're supposed to be the strongest in Konoha…"
Naruto could have sworn a flash of something went through Sasuke's eyes at that…almost as if they had turned red, just for a split second.
"Hmph…" said Sasuke with contempt, but had no further comment on the matter.
"We'll see about that…" he muttered under his breath, before calling out to the older kids.
"HEY!! Do you want to play too?" he asked.
The one called Lee, with his abnormally bushy eyebrows nodded, and began to run over…not before tripping over his own to feet on the way…
"I don't want him on my team…" whispered Naruto towards Sasuke.
"Fine. Be that way…" growled Sasuke back just as softly.
8.8.8
By the time Lee made it all the way over, he had completely ruined his brand new set of pants, with a huge grass stain, and he had all sorts of things stuck in his hair…Yep, his mom was going to kill him…The blonde kid was looking at him as if he was an alien, the red-head didn't seem to notice him, and the dark-haired kid looked as if he was trying not to laugh…
His greatest rival, Hyuuga Neji was already there, and looking at him with the same white-eyed expression of disgust.
"Okay then," said the dark-haired kid, "My name is Uchiha Sasuke, that's Uzumaki Naruto, and this is Gaara."
"Don't you have a last name?" asked Lee, looking towards the indicated red-head.
"…Sabaku no Gaara…" answered the boy after a silence. When he said that…it sounded positively eerie.
"T-That's not really a name…"
"…My father says that only weaklings who rely on family history have last names…"
At that both the Hyuuga and the Uchiha turned to glare at him.
The red-head boy shrank slightly beneath those glares.
"That's what my father said…that's why none of us in the desert have last names…" he said, as if it was an explanation.
"Hey! Don't pick on Gaara!! He just doesn't know much about Konoha!!" said Naruto angrily at the other two boys.
"He's only been here for just a little bit, and he comes from another country! On top of all that, Gaara's never seen a tree!!!!"
8.8.8
Sasuke had to suppress a chuckle at that statement. Gaara had probably seen plenty of trees…cacti more likely, but still, just coming to Konoha the boy had most likely seen more than enough trees. Glancing towards Gaara he expected to detect at least some sort of indignation from the other boy, but instead he got a completely blank expression. Even at six years old, he still wore that same expression of 'I'm incapable of using my facial muscles, so please, don't ask me to smile.'
If Sasuke didn't have his entire database of memories of the sand ninja, he would think that Gaara was a shy, timid, possibly feeble little boy…but then memories of the boy half-turning into a gigantic tanuki with a manic expression on his face and saliva dripping from his fangs completely eliminated that impression.
STOP THINKING OF THOSE THINGS!! YOU'LL GIVE ME NIGHTMARES!!!!! Protested the Younger Sasuke indignantly.
You're a ninja, ninja's don't have nightmares. Psychological pain is nothing.
Sasuke grinned, and just for fun, decided to reminisce over what Itachi had done. After time, sometimes the memories lost their pain.
AAAAAAAAGGGH!!! STOP IT!!!!!
The older Sasuke sniggered. Who needed Mangekyou Sharingan when memories of it worked just as well?
YOU'RE A MEANIE HEAD!!!
Thank you. I try hard to be a jerk, all just to outdo Neji.
So this Neji guy is also a meanie head?
Yes he is…all the Hyuuga's except for Hinata are a bunch of stuck up, self-centred, pompous…wind bags! And don't forget that some of them, very few of them are powerful…
Sasuke knew he was kind of biased towards the Hyuuga's mainly due to some of his memories. The Uchiha's were the strongest in Konoha…until Itachi killed them all…And everyone claimed that the Uchiha's were just a spin-off of the Hyuuga's since Sharingan was supposedly similar to the Byakugan…The Uchiha's were allegedly descendants of some random ninja of no significance, who was apparently a failure in everything, including the Byakugan…Well, that's how the Hyuuga's put it.
Sure, the Byakugan could see tenketsu, and jyuuken was a pretty neat way of fighting, but being able to see through and copy a person's moves was hardly related to that, and was much more useful…
Though he would love nothing more than to challenge Neji to a death match, Sharingan versus Byakugan, instead he smiled politely and spoke.
"Okay let's make teams…Lee can be on my team, with the Kage Bunshin Narutos, and Neji can go with Naruto and Gaara…"
"Why are you two team captains? We're older than you are!" said Neji. Sasuke had to suppress a snigger at the pomposity of Neji's statement.
"We're in charge, because we started the game dattebayo! And because I say so! So HA!!!" shouted Naruto.
Sasuke glanced sidelong at his friend. Geez…there was no need to shout! And anyway, it was Sasuke who had made that decision…
"It doesn't matter…" said Gaara suddenly, surprising everyone, "Can we all just get along and play now?" he asked.
"Sure…"
Yep. This is what you get after two months of waiting...a semi-cliffhanger. Well, now that we got high-speed internet for three months, maybe you'll get mor updates...unless i'm off gaming/working/downloading/reading...well later!