Sasuke glared at the noisy blond, trying to figure how he and the boy from just a few days ago were the same. The one he knew from his apartment was much more like Sasuke than he was right at the moment. They didnt even look the same. He scoffed and settled on watching the teachers, Mizuki and Iruka. They were both competent teachers, but Sasuke had already learned everything they were trying to teach him.
"Naruto! Sit down and shut up!" Mizuki seemed pretty angry with Naruto recently, although he seemed angry with Naruto all the time. Maybe Naruto had pranked him? "They think that I'm the Kyuubi reborn or some crap." Sasuke scowled at the furious teacher and turned to see what the boy was doing. It looked like he was taking notes, and from what he could see on the paper, he was.
"What have i said about passing letters in class? This is the last time! Go out in the hall!" Mizuki barked, glaring at the upset child. Sasuke watched closely and saw that Naruto was actually confused.
"But Mizuki-sen-"
"No buts! Go out in the hall. I can't just let these things slide anymore. You have to grow up at some point." Mizuki sighed, and Sasuke could easily tell that he was faking being disappointed. He kept smiling everytime he thought no one was looking.
"I have to use the restroom." Sasuke quickly stood up and went towards the door before being blocked by Iruka.
"What are you doing? The bell is going to ring in just a minute." Sasuke scowled at the man. It seemed that he either didn't see it or didn't care as much as Sasuke thought he did.
"Its an emergency." He pushed his way past the scarred man and into the hallway, and turned to the left, where people were supposed to wait out their punishment.
He was surprised to see that the boy was so upset.
"Damn it. I wasn't even doing anything this time!" Naruto muttered under his breath, glaring at the ground as he scrubbed the tears from his face.
"Naruto..?" Naruto froze when he heard the hesitant voice and turned to glare at the boy.
"What are you doing here?" He snapped, glaring at him. Sasuke frowned and stared at him.
"So Mizuki is one of the ones who don't like you. Did you do anything to him?" Naruto shook his head and picked himself up.
"The lunch bell is about to ring, so I'm gonna go get something to eat. You want anything?" Sasuke shook his head.
"I'm coming with you. It's boring when you know everything they're trying to teach you." Naruto gave Sasuke a bitter smile and turned, walking out the door. Sasuke felt thrown off by the smile the boy gave him.
"What was that look about?"
"Well, it can be pretty boring when you can barely read and write, too." Sasuke stared at him for a second before following the boy out. They walked for a while before arriving at a small hole-in-the-wall walk-in restaurant that served mostly ramen. Sasuke could basically see the boy changing personalities.
"They're pretty nice people. As long as you eat and pay your bill, they don't care who you are," Naruto explained as he sat down on a stool and greeting the family that worked there.
"I want a Naruto special, Teuchi!" Naruto shouted, grinning and slapping his hands onto the bar. The man grinned right back and walked into the kitchen area, scooping noodles and broth into a bowl.
"Coming right up!" He set a large bowl in from of Naruto and looked over at the raven haired boy beside him.
"What can I get you?" Sasuke stared in distain at the sloppy way Naruto tore through the ramen and opened his mouth to answer, but Naruto cut him off.
"He'll take a plain ramen with plenty of tomatoes! Don't cook them, though! My friend here don't eat them when they're wierd like that!" Naruto grinned at Teuchi, who nodded and quickly whipped up a small bowl of ramen for him.
"Naruto's my only customer who isn't an Akimichi that eats more than one large bowl," Teuchi mock whispered, chuckling at the boy's outrage.
Naruto rapidly ate bowl after bowl, amazing and disgusting Sasuke at the same time. How could someone eat so much? They quickly finished and left, Naruto coming into the classroom right after Sasuke.
For the rest of the day Sasuke only saw Naruto resting at his desk. While the teachers were talking Sasuke began thinking. Surely someone had taught him to read and write, right? But then he remembered that the boy was hated within the village. The only way he could have learned how was by watching other people do it. If he taught the blond, be would owe him something. Maybe it would be a good idea to help the blond. He was tricking everyone around him with how he acted, so maybe his skill level was a lie, too.
Having decided on having the boy owe him one, Sasuke settled in his desk and waited for class to end.
Naruto sighed at the worksheet on his desk. It had been one of the more complicated things to learn and he still didn't have a solid grasp of what the little lines on the paper said. Iruka had allowed him to stay in class after school was let out so that he could focus on his work. Sasuke had quickly left, to train, he assumed, and Naruto was stuck here glaring at words he didnt understand.
"Dobe." Biting back an insult, he looked up at the raven and growled.
"Why the fuck are you here, bastard?" Sasuke scoffed and slid a desk closer, and pulled out several books.
"I'm here to help you. You'll owe me one after this." Naruto blinked before standing quickly.
"What do you want from me?" He hissed, shoulders hunched as he glared harshly aat the boy. Sasuke scowled and motioned for him to sit down.
"No. I ain't owing nobody nothin'!" His answer, he could tell, was pretty much a snarl instead of a reply. He didn't appreciate what he had to deal with before when it came to owing anyone anything.
Sasuke stared at the angry boy, confused, until he pulled to the front of his mind memory of body language and psychology. He didnt understand most of the psychology book except for the part where people sometimes acted angry when scared, and he suddenly realized that Naruto was terrified.
"I want you to train with me. That's all." Naruto calmed down enough that he didn't look like he was going to pummel the boy and was only eyeing him suspiciously.
"Train in what?" Sasuke snorted and rolled his eyes.
"Academy stuff. If youre going to go around calling me a friend to whoever asks, I'm not going to have you be a weak pest. You'll be the second top in class and no one will be able to beat you. If I need to, you'll be placed on my team to make sure that you won't fall behind. I won't have anyone who claims to be friends with me be weak." He scowled and turned back to the work, irritated that his cheecks were flushed. He began rearranging papers until he finally heard the blond settle down beside him.
"Sorry. Everytime I owed anyone anything, I ended up getting hurt and I ain't doing that again. So, what am I learning?" Sasuke smirked and slapped a paper down beside Naruto.
"You're learning how to read and write." Naruto paused before nodding and they set to work, Sasuke correcting Naruto's mistakes.
It was a long afternoon and many fights happened while Sasuke taught him, and soon it was dark and both boys were tired.
"Let's go to my house. It's closer and less dangerous."
"I don't wanna go," Naruto moaned, facedown in the papers that covered his desk.
"Hn." He yanked Naruto up by the arm and dragged him out of the classroom, having gathered everything needed.
"Oi, I said I don't want to!" Naruto was protesting rather weakly, too tired to truly fight the raven boy at the moment. In a daze, he followed the boy to the compound and into the house, not realizing where he was.
"I'm gonna go to sleep now," He mumbled going directlt for a couch.
"Hn." Sasuke didn't care much where the boy slept at the moment, being rather tired, himself. In fact, the couch looked pretty comfortable at the moment. He stumbled over, falling on the couch beside Naruto, both asleep where they fell.
The next morning Naruto woke up, tension flowing into his body as he realized that he wasn't home, and the tension left as quickly as it came when he realized where he was.
He was in Sasuke's house.
And Sasuke was helping him learn school stuff properly. He could feel his face glowing, and with Sasuke next to him on the couch, his face just might catch fire.
He carefully moved off the couch, making sure the other didn't wake up, and walked to the bathroom, quickly using it and contemplating leaving the house without telling Sasuke.
It would be a dick move to do that to someone who's helping, though, so he didn't.
Instead, he snuck into the kitchen to see what the boy might have to make. Eyeing all the tomatoes, Naruto decided that a tomato soup would be good, especially considering how cold it was this morning. Seeing that he also had bread and plenty of cheese, he decided to make some grilled cheese to go with the tomato soup.
Sasuke woke up to the smell of tomatoes and cheese and felt very confused. What was Naruto doing?
Deciding to discover what the blond had gotten his hands into, the half asleep Sasuke stumbled into the kitchen, wincing at the sunlight shining through the window.
"Oh, Sasuke!" Naruto exclaimed, turning around and looking at him nervously, "I just figured that since you were, ya know, helping me out and stuff that I would make some food for ya. Its tomato soup with grilled cheese, and trust me, it tastes great! I did everything by hand..." He continued talking, further irritating the half asleep raven. He held his hand up, glaring at the talkative boy, and walked over to the hot cup of tea sitting on the table, and took a long sip.
"Okay, that woke me up some. So you've made breakfast?" At Naruto's nod, he nodded. "Okay, so let's have it." And Naruto hurried into action.
Soon, the bowls and plates were sitting in front of Sasuke. He picked up the spoon that suddenly appeared and ate some of the soup. He looked over to Naruto, who was busying himself by cleaning some of the things he had used.
"What's the recipe?" Naruto grinned and pulled out a folded piece of paper. Sasuke grabbed the paper and looked at it.
"I figured you might want the recipe so I wrote it down!" He kept talking loudly, and it was quickly getting on Sasuke's nerves.
"Okay, why are you acting like that? It's wierd." Naruto winced and seemed to calm down. He shrugged.
"I dunno. It's wierd having people help me with stuff and I dunno how to react." Sasuke snorted.
"Act normal, dobe." Naruto glared at him and plopped himself down in the seat across from Sasuke, quickly slurping the soup down before taking it to the sink, washing the bowl and leaving it to dry. Walking over to where Sasuke was waiting for him to finish, Naruto shrugged his shoulders.
"I can't go back to where I was for a while so I guess we can do that training thing you were talking about." Sasuke nodded and they sat back down at the table.
"I want to know your true skills." Naruto snorted. His true skills involved trapping and out thinking his opponents. Sasuke's skills was much more up front than Naruto's skills.
"Since trapping isn't something taught in the academy, I don't have to worry about being taught wrong or tossed out of class. They only go over the basics of it and let us do whatever we want with it, so that's one of my better skills. The other is simply figuring out my opponent through manipulation and making them believe I'm simply a pathetic person who will never amount to much, but most people figure that anyway so I don't have to worry about that. Out thinking isn't really what most people think of and usually just try to overpower their opponent." Sasuke stared at him, thinking over what he said.
It was true that they didn't go over much bebesides the basics of traps in class, and the only teacher who ever stressed that out thinking an opponent was better than overpowering, and even then most people didn't listen.
"I also have pretty good stamina, and I am definitely good at hiding my tracks. A friend told me I have very large chakra reserves, so I'm probably going to be either a juggernaut with a couple of strong moves or I'm going to be a stealth ninja. Probably the juggernaut, considering my outside personality."
"Mask."
"What?"
"Technically it's called a mask. People hide how they're feeling by overplaying a part of their personality instead or by making a completely fake personality instead. Traumatized people usually do it, or people who don't think that there is anyone trustworthy with their true selves." Sasuke spoke with a monotone voice as he thought over what Naruto had said. It made sense that people would use him as a juggernaut if he had incredibly high chakra reserves. Usually people ended up being very visible ninjas with incredibly power jutsus if they had high enough chakra reserves. All Naruto had to do was prove his chakra reserves were incredibly high and he'd end up one. However, Sasuke didn't think Naruto could ever be a stealth ninja. He'd probably end up being killed by a suspicious teammate, if they were from the previous generation. If he found someone he trusted and trusted him, they would probably be a very powerful team...
Sasuke's eyes widened in realization. If Naruto trusted him, then, even if he wasn't strong enough just yet, Naruto could help weaken that Man. He kept his face normal as he thought about the possibilities. All the books said trust had to be a two way street, so Sasuke would most likely end up trusting him.
"Naruto," He started slowly, hoping that the boy wouldn't blow up like last time, "what if we were to partner up? I already know how they choose teammates, so if we were to rig the system, I could help you escape, claim that a rogue ninja attacked and killed you, and I couldn't stop them. All you would have to do is team up for a mission with me one time when I ask you to. That would be all I want in return." Naruto stared at him for a second before folding his hands and leaning on them, thinking about his answer. Sasuke, since he was the last Uchiha, was most likely always going to be a public ninja, regardless of the reasons. People would hand him powerful jutsu left and right if they thought it would leave him indebted to them. If all he wanted was help on one mission, he didn't see why there would be a problem with getting his help leaving.
"Fine," he said, "but this doesn't ever leave the room. I'll do whatever it is that will get us on the same team, and you'll do whatever you can to help me escape. A simple deal." With that, the two shook on it, a solemn air clouding the room.