I do not own Naruto, If I did the characters would wear way more kick ass outfits
"Ahhh Kakashi's Brats" a voice hissed.
Naruto now tweleve rolled his eyes, they didn't mind when Ero-sennin used the name, but some how everyone else had picked it up. When their enemies used it, it was unbearable.
The Three of them stood, all in plain clothes of greys and blacks. Sasuke looked bored. Sakura growled, she was not a brat, and certainly not her father's, she was a proper young lady. Naruto just twirled a kunai around his finger, and glancing at his brother and sister shrugged.
"Go for it." He directed at Sakura
"Don't mind if I do." She hissed, and launched herself forward. The battle was over in seconds. Sakura landed pivoting on one foot, once more at her brothers' sides. The three of them stood shoulder to shoulder surveying the crowd spread out before them. They were quite an intimidating sight, short they might be. The absence of fear in their eyes, the way they were calm as if on an everyday errand such as buying milk.
"Why did Dad want us to enter these exam thingies exactly?" Naruto asked.
"To prove how strong our village will be once it's totally rebuilt." Sasuke answered, unsheathing his katana.
"Right" said Sakura, and then raising her voice to the rest of the crowd, "So can we get started?"
Although they were unaware Sakura had unwittingly sealed her own fate. The rumor of 'Kakashi's Brats' was already spreading. Although some didn't even know who Kakashi was, the name was stuck. Later in the biggest battle of their lives, long after their father was dead, and they had far surpassed him, the ten tailed golden dragon would pause in his fight as they appeared before him and hiss out in a puff of smoke that made the ground tremble, "Ahh, Kakashi's Brats." Before he attacked.
Naruto stood by himself in the final of the one on one competition.
"You again?" Naruto asked smiling quietly, at his opponent. He was an imp, rocking back and forth on his heels, short and lithe.
Across from him Gaara growled, "Mother wants your blood"
"Really you call yours mother? That's kinda sick you know?" and then Naruto was gone in a flash of yellow light. Gaara's eyes barely had time to widen, before he heard Naruto's voice in his ear.
"Thou I do call mine Fuzzball, that's just as weird." The sand reached up to grab him in its vice like grip but he was already gone.
"Oh that's good!" Naruto's cheerful voice chirped from the ceiling, "Your sand can't see me coming."
Above him Sakura gripped her bandaged hand in Sasuke's. When fighting together the three of them had no fear, but Naruto was still their little brother. Never mind that despite being the littlest, he had always surpassed them. They had to protect him, they had to! Sakura's heart clenched in fear, their little brother…
"What does he think he's doing" Sakura hissed.
"Stupid little idiot, he's trying to fix him. Stupid little soft hearted…" Sasuke's voice petered off, as he mumbled under his breath about how their little brother was too kind for his own good, they were ninja for Christ sake. All the while his eyes red, trying to keep track of the yellow flashes.
"Do you see them" said Naruto pointing up to his two ashen faced siblings, as he cut Gaara's arm. Gaara stared at in shock, as the sand began to swirl.
"What is this." Gaara almost sobbed, never having felt pain before the slightest bit of it was unbearable, then his face hardened, "YOU ARE DEAD! You cut me, Mother and I will KILL YOU!"
"You didn't answer my question, dumb ass!" Naruto laughed spinning over Gaara's head. "Do You See Them!" he yelled again pointing once again at the stands, at faces that were if possible now even more drained of color. "If you want to kill me and validate your existence with others pain, then kill them!" suddenly deadly serious.
Gaara obliged with a smile, as slowly the sand began to form into a huge arm that went lightening fast towards Sakura and Sasuke, and then just as fast it was stopped. Gaara let out a blood curdling scream, as red chakra held his sand arm in place rather casually.
"You see," commented Naruto casually, "I don't fight so others can feel my pain, to prove I'm the strongest. I fight to protect them. My strength comes from them. I love my brother and sister with all I have. They validate my existence." Slowly he began to push back the sand. "You are my brother Gaara, what lives in you lives in me, but look how strong I am from happiness. Look at your brother and sister. They could love you. They could, they want to. Give them something Gaara, don't just take." With each word Naruto spoke the sand slowly lowered. "See even 'mother'" Naruto spoke with disgust in his voice "recognizes fuzzbutt as a brother. It won't hurt one of its own. Gaara we are the same, but yet you are unhappy. Look what I have you can have too. Don't take, ask." The two boys stood in a sea of sand, Naruto smiling his same quiet smile. Then almost as an after thought, and so quietly that only the two of them could hear, Naruto leaned forward and clasping Gaara's shoulder whispered in his ear "When you have other people Gaara, you don't have to listen to the voices any more. You won't be alone."
Naruto heard Gaara's gasp, and then with a small pleasant laugh, raised his hand. "I forfeit"
"Good!" screamed a voice from the stands, "cause you are in so-" Sakura was cut off by Sasuke, "Oh he's not in trouble, for gambling our lives"
"I'm not?" said Naruto smiling nervously.
"No" said Sasuke with a smile to match Naruto's "Your Dead." Suddenly Naruto didn't like the smile anymore.
The three of them approached home several days later, each clothed in a green flak jacket. Naruto was cheerfully recounting the food he had eaten in Suna, in loving detail. Having once again escaped death at his brother's hands. Sasuke was quiet, hands in his pockets, absently nodding his head, as if indulging his younger brother. Sakura was starting to get annoyed, her fingers ever so slowly drifting towards her weapons pouch.
Suddenly the two boys were on top of Sakura. Naruto sitting on her legs, Sasuke on her back, twisting the hand that had been reaching for her kunai holder behind her back.
"Boys be nice to your sister" a voice called out from above.
"Dad!" three voices called out in unison, and just as suddenly as the boys had pinned her Sakura got the jump on them. Dumping them on the ground she sprang into her father's arms. Kakashi gave an exaggerated sigh, muffled by his mask.
"Just when it was starting to get quiet around here." The rest of his breath was nocked out of him as his two sons added to the hug. Getting his breath back Kakashi continued on a more serious note. "I am proud of you guys. Congratulations on being the first leaf chunnin in more than a generation. Speaking of which wait until you guys see the village."
They emerged over the next hill and Kakashi was rewarded with the three gasps of admiration. While they were gone the tent village housing the remainder of the clans had been replaced by low wooden houses, done in the traditional style. Kakashi sighed it was nothing like the crazy soaring buildings, that looked like the work of a deranged two year old, covering the whole valley as it had been when he was twelve, but it was still something. A permanent place, no longer was the village hidden in the leaves a group of travelling families who met every few months but an actual place with the backing of the fire country leader. And now they had three official chunnin to prove it.
The three siblings looked around in awe as they wandered through 'the village' astound that they had a home. They had lived their whole lives in a small cabin hidden away in the hills, and suddenly they had a town. Soon their awe disappeared as they spotted friends, and dispersed to find those they hadn't seen in months.
Midnight found Sakura sitting on the Hokage monument; legs crossed under, head in hand. Her eyes watched the campfires like little fireflies so far bellow her, her brilliant mind whirling a million miles a minute. Kakashi watched the worry on her face with worry of his own.
"What are you doing Kura-Hime? Your brothers are asleep." Kakashi asked quietly, revealing himself, and using a name only he was allowed to use, and only in very dire circumstances.
"Just thinking Tou-san" Sakura answered just as quietly as Kakashi sat down beside what was for all intents and purposes his awkward middle child. So deep in her thoughts she didn't even protest being called princess.
Kakashi didn't say anything just waited. Gazing up at the huge star filled night above.
"I'm worried Tou-san. About-" she motioned with her hand bellow. "Are you sure exposing us, your trump card, at the exams so early, or even the new village's existence at all was smart? What about the rogue Uchiha? How do we know he won't come back to finish the job? What about the other-" Kakashi abruptly cut through her increasingly frantic speech with a raised fist. Her teeth clanked together noticeably, as she responded automatically to the military symbol.
"Hime calm down. Some of these things are undoubtedly a problem, but you blithering isn't going to help. You are smart hime, very smart." Kakashi said, pausing to ruffle her long hair. A year ago she had refused to cut it, and began to wrinkle her nose at boyish antic she had previously joined in with glee. Kakashi was both overjoyed she had realized she was a girl, and panicked because he had no idea what to do with one.
"In the days that come, I as the next Hokage am going to need that brain of yours, but right now I need you calm and rationale, and ready to help with the here and now. I do want you to think of these things, they are important, but write them all down, look at them logically, don't let them overwhelm you. Understand Sakura?"
Sakura slowly nodded and looked back down at the small glowing village below. "Tou-san, Do you think they would have been proud of us?" her voice barely audible.
"Oh Sakura, I know they would have been."