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Naruto: The Ninth Tail: Chapter 16

Reflection

Bang!

Sasuke backed away from the cloud of smoke, and waited.

Tch. A summoning scroll. But who?

He saw a shadow in the cloud, and it finally cleared enough to reveal…

"Geez, man. You are really predictable."

Naruto wiped off the dust from his sweater. Sasuke stared.

"You???"

The blond folded his arms over his chest.

"Hey, I've been training. I'm not a complete idiot, you know."

"Well, that's news to me."

A vein pulsed.

"Anyways, you should give up on finding the real scroll."

"Oh? And why is that?"

"It's 'cause you won't find it."

"Heh. There's no way you, of all people, could hide something like that from me."

"All right then. Let's make a bet." Naruto pointed to the east. "You have until sunrise to try and find it. If you find it, I'll give you all of the money here in my wallet." He took out his frog wallet, and it was completely filled. It looked like the money would bust out of the seams.

That's a lot of money, Thought Sasuke. He must be pretty confident.

"And what if I don't?"

"Then you owe me 1,000,000 yen."

"You're on."

Sasuke jumped back to the camp, Naruto hot on his heels. This should be real easy. Sasuke thought.

It wasn't.

Sasuke sat down on a rock. Damn it! Why can't I find that stupid scroll? The dobe hid it, so it should be a piece of cake. He looked up at the blond, to find him smiling widely. He looked to the east to find that the horizon was lighting up.

"Tch."

"Hehehe."

Sasuke got up, and started to walk off, but Naruto mumbled something that he couldn't quite make out, but still made him stop dead.

"Kazoku…"

"What?"

"Are you sure it's all right that you still take revenge on your brother?"

"You are really an idiot. He destroyed everything that was important to me!"

"What about us? Aren't we important?"

"You're a hindrance."

"You wanna bet?"

"You're on!"

Sasuke pulled out a kunai, and activated his Sharingan. Naruto also pulled out a kunai, and activated the Kyubi's chakra. Sasuke took an involuntary step back. Naruto noticed the slight movement, but didn't say anything.

"Let's get this going!" And they started fighting.

Instantly, Sasuke pulled off a Gokakyu to widen the space between the two. After Naruto had jumped away from the fireball, he found that Sasuke had disappeared.

"That's not gonna help! Tajuu Kage Bunshin no Jutsu!"

Naruto and clones quickly spread out, and searched for Sasuke. The Uchiha hid well, and watched as the Narutos spread out and disappeared from sight. After a moment, he sighed and relaxed. Suddenly, he felt something cold and flat touch his throat, and then dragged across.

"You died."

Sasuke instantly turned around to see a pair of blood red eyes staring straight at him.

"UAAAAHHH!"

Smack!

"Get a hold of yourself! It's just me."

As Sasuke looked carefully, the red eyes changed to blue, and he realized it was Naruto.

"We're done. Let's get back to camp."

Sasuke didn't say a thing. He just followed his former team mate and rubbed his now tender cheek. When they reached the camp, they just stood there, not looking at each other. Then Naruto broke the silence.

"How can you get stronger by following that guy?"

"I did."

"It didn't seem like it. It felt like you got weaker."

"Shut up."

"Are you scared of something?"

"What makes you think that?"

Naruto turned around to reveal the Kyubi's eyes. Sasuke flinched. And it wasn't just a little-eye-twitch flinch. It was a raise-your-hands-to-protect-your-head flinch. Naruto shook his head.

"I thought so. You didn't realize that Orochimaru was one of them? You didn't recognize the killing intent back then?"

Sasuke didn't say anything.

"Well, whatever. That's not important. There's this one question I haven't had the chance to ask yet."

There was a moment's pause.

"Is this what your deceased clan would want you to do?"

That wasn't a question Sasuke had expected. He ran his mouth before he even thought about it for a moment.

"How the hell am I supposed to know?"

"I know that you don't exactly know, but what do you think they would say?"

"…"

Naruto shook his head.

"If you think they would say that what you're doing is right, they must have been assholes."

"What?"

"What kind of a family would want their sons to kill each other? Aren't siblings supposed to help each other out?"

"You expect me to help my brother? After what he did?"

"Why fight for revenge? Why not fight to protect?"

"Protect what?"

"The rest of the Uchiha clan, of course."

"I don't see any 'rest of the Uchiha clan'."

"That's because he's standing right in front of me."

Naruto walked right up to Sasuke, and started poking him in the chest.

"Protect what is right here, and bring the Uchiha clan back to life. Don't let revenge destroy what is left."

"But how do I bring it back?"

Naruto winked.

"Well, that's for you to decide."

From behind Sasuke, Sakura got out of her tent. She looked groggy, and a few hairs stuck out here and there. The two boys turned around. Naruto waved and grinned.

"Ohio, Sakura-chan!"

'grunt' She looked up, and noticed that Sasuke was also there. She waited for a moment. Sasuke scratched his face and looked away.

"Morning, Sakura…"

She stared at him for a while, and then walked away. "I'm gonna go wash up over there." She pointed slowly, and carefully. It was evidently clear that she didn't want anyone with her. She let the message sink in a bit, then went on her way.

The two boys looked at each other. Then Naruto spoke up.

"Looks like it won't be that easy for you to get yourself on her good side."

A hammer of a fist smacked the blonde's head. Something broke. It wasn't the fist.

Hinata jumped out of the trees and saw Naruto at the campsite. When she got closer, the blond noticed her.

"Oh, Hinata. I'm sorry I had to leave at that moment. This guy here needed some attention. What was it you were going to say?"

So he didn't hear it… Hinata thought. "Ah… it's nothing."

"Well, if you say so." He put his hands in his pockets, and looked out at the rising sun.

Hinata noticed that he seemed more mature now. She wondered why. As she kept looking at him, it reminded her of another person, yet she couldn't put her finger on who it was.

"Hinata, is there something wrong?"

He had startled her. "Ah! No, no, there's nothing wrong…" She tried complimenting him. "You seem… a little different from before…"

Naruto laughed. "Well, I'm still me. It's not like I'm really somebody else."

She smiled. "You're right."

End of Chapter 16