The minute Sasuke regained consciousness was also the minute he wished he hadn't. The verbal attacks exchanged between Karin and Suigetsu thundered in the air, threatening to pierce his eardrums.

"Can you shut your mouth for ONCE, asshole?!"

He heard Suigetsu's yelp, accompanied by the splintering of wood. That was the door, Sasuke assumed, rubbing his eyes. It seemed they had taken shelter somewhere. How long had he been out of it?

His body ached from the slight movement he'd made to get up. Sasuke groaned, all too aware of the piercing pain in his back, like white-hot needles jabbed into his skin.

Considering how the fight with Deidara had gone, he counted himself lucky to be alive.

"All YOU'RE doing is proving my point!" Suigetsu hollered back.

But the real miracle was that they hadn't been kicked out yet.

"Enough," came a firm voice. "You're goading Jugo."

Sasuke propped himself up, feeling his elbows dig into the tatami mat. His arms strained under his body weight, but he continued to try and sit upright. Before he could do much else, Kaiho crossed the room.

"Careful," Sasuke croaked, eyeing her.

Her proximity to Jugo had an instantaneous effect, making his arms drop to his sides. Whatever she was doing, it appeared to be pacifying him. Out of curiosity, Sasuke activated his Sharingan. The dense energy flowing from Jugo seemed to be sucked into her body, almost as though she was absorbing it. Then he saw her free hand, the one extended towards the air. On closer observation, he noticed the small quantities of chakra pouring out of it and dissipating into the surroundings.

He let out a sigh, falling back onto the thin mattress. What chakra control! The girl had more potential than he could have ever surmised.

Kaiho faced him, relieved. "Sasuke, I would ask you to go back to sleep, but we'll be having lunch soon." Her gaze flitted around the room. Suigetsu flinched.

"Oh no, you don't, Kaiho!" he exclaimed. "I'm not your errand boy."

Was the girl still struggling to interact with civilians? Sasuke frowned. She had no reason to be; she handled conversations with the team just fine. He watched Kaiho fiddle with her hair and decided to intervene. "Karin, you'll bring us lunch, right?"

Karin arched her brows in response. She stared at him long and hard, but he didn't relent. Finally, her shoulders slumped. "Whatever." She threw a scornful look at Kaiho and Suigetsu before leaving the room.

Sasuke settled himself under the sheets. "How long had I been–"

"A day, but don't think you've recovered just yet."

He agreed. Nonetheless, he wasn't going to be weighed down by this. "How long till we can move?"

Kaiho pursed her lips. "Two weeks, and that's the minimum. Sasuke, I really think–"

"After lunch, train with Suigetsu to improve your taijutsu," he said, cutting her off. Avoiding the anger that radiated in his direction, he turned towards the window.

"You're still weak, little brother. You don't have enough...hate."

Sasuke dug his nails into his palms. How had he let himself grow so dependent? First, it was team 7, and now–

"Sure," Kaiho replied, "but Sasuke–"

"Kaiho," he interrupted, the tone of finality heavy in his voice. "Thanks."

Her lips formed a gentle 'oh' of surprise. "Anytime."

With that, the conversation was over.


The week that came after was a frustrating one for Suigetsu. He'd been asked by Kaiho to spar on a daily basis, surely not an idea that originated from her own head. He would bet his sword that Sasuke put her up to it. He wasn't offended by the fact that she admired the stoic hard-head and the manic woman they had for teammates. Her poor judgement wasn't his loss.

He threw a punch at her chest with more force than necessary, making her skid backwards by a distance of several feet. Using the momentum to position herself into a fighting stance, Kaiho launched herself at him once more. Suigetsu raised his fists in defence.

If the runt kept this up, she'd be a formidable opponent in no time.

Suigetsu propelled himself forward, launching a kick towards her torso. Kaiho swung out of his range and paused before delivering a swift uppercut to his jaw. He jumped away, his right hand automatically swiping down to his sheath as he did so. Instead of feeling the familiar touch of metal, his hand fumbled in the air.

Suigetsu cursed. He'd forgotten it was empty.

Having chosen not to use a sword or liquefaction was a decision he'd made when they'd started this training regime. Even so, it was hard not to slip into old habits. While he was forcing himself to not depend on his weapons and unique abilities, he still had the advantage of experience. The growing number of bruises Kaiho wore was proof. Jugo had made a mention of it the previous night.

"Aren't you going too hard on her?"

He bared his teeth in anger. He had no intention of wasting time with her if she couldn't handle real battles. If it was a fight she wanted, it would be one where he gave his all. He could care less about what anyone else had to say about it.

"Be more fluid in your movements, will you?! You keep hesitating, but the enemy won't. Make every hit count."

Kaiho nodded. Sweat dripped from her forehead and streamed past her dirty cheeks. Her legs quivered, and her body swayed, but her feet were firmly planted to the ground. She brushed back the hair that covered her face and laughed.

Suigetsu felt a surge of excitement rush through him.

"I'm just getting started."

Kaiho generally annoyed him in more ways than one. Her habit of collecting herbs got on his nerves. She handled expenses as though she was unaware of how Sasuke's bloodline limit worked. He hated the guilt that surfaced whenever she paid for the damages indirectly caused by him. To top it all off, the stupid damsel facade she put up in front of civilians pissed him off to no end. He now recognized it as the same act she'd tried on Sasuke when she'd first found them. Then there were moments that revealed her mettle. She was the one who had scouted this open ground to train, in spite of his dismissal to help her. She insisted on fighting him every day, even as her body struggled to keep up. And now, everything ranging from her body language to her determined stare meant one thing. She'd throw herself against the odds and emerge stronger from it no matter what happened. In other words, she was just as insane as he was.

Suigetsu found himself grinning from ear to ear.

"Good. We have sword practice later."


It was always at dusk that team Hebi was at its calmest. Suigetsu and Karin had gone for a stroll, using the convenient excuse of keeping an eye out for informants. Jugo and Kaiho were at the park. She'd carried her scrolls with her as well. Knowing her, she would have lost track of time by studying. In Sasuke's opinion, that was a good thing.

At least she wasn't treating this break like a holiday.

Sasuke paced around the room restlessly. Now that he had almost recovered, he was desperate to search for Itachi. Jugo had already found several hideouts of the Akatsuki from the birds he spoke to. It seemed everything that Sasuke wanted was just an arm's length away. All he had to do was reach out for it.

Except that he couldn't.

Kaiho refused to hear a word when he brought the topic up. Two weeks were two weeks in her eyes, and she wouldn't settle for anything less. She was treating him like a genin who didn't know his limits and he couldn't stand it. Sasuke wasn't a reckless idiot. He'd chosen serious injury over death by explosion. While she had seemed to understand his explanation, she didn't budge an inch from her original verdict. Since he couldn't rely on Karin to be healed, he was left with no option but to wait.

It set his teeth on edge.

The battle with Deidara had taught Sasuke one thing: The Akatsuki couldn't be taken lightly. Regardless of their age or experience as members of the organization, they were fierce fighters. To face them, his team had to be in tip-top shape. He could no longer afford room for error.

Over the week, he had reassessed his team and come to certain conclusions. There were too many members. A combat team ideally consisted of three members, four being the maximum. More members meant more liabilities and that increased the overall risk involved.

That wasn't the only issue. Team Hebi was fragmented. Jugo lost control the moment he was exposed to rage. Suigetsu and Kaiho were still learning to tolerate one other, but he doubted that they got along in any situation besides the spars. Karin restrained herself from snapping at the two, but he could sense the temper simmering below the surface. Due to their history, he knew why she was prone to squabbles with Suigetsu, but he didn't understand the issue with Kaiho. Karin was–

"I'm back," sang Kaiho, interrupting his flow of thought. She walked in, arms filled with her precious scrolls. Light steps thudded against the tatami mat towards the satchel in the corner.

"Where's Jugo?"

Kaiho stuffed the scrolls into the satchel. "He wanted to stay in the park for a while. He finds it peaceful." There was a temporary silence, only pierced by their soft breaths. "I finished reading all the scrolls," she added.

Sasuke blinked. Done in a week? "What did you learn?"

"Transformation, substitution and clone techniques." Those were genin-level techniques that required the perfect execution of hand seals, something she was currently toiling to achieve. Her chakra control must have made up for it.

She did deserve to be proud of that, but it didn't explain how she'd completed learning everything from those scrolls.

"Is that all?" he asked. She nodded, looking quite pleased with herself. Sasuke frowned. "Give me those," he demanded.

His eyes briefly skimmed over the rolls of parchment she passed. Most of them consisted of complex medical ninjutsu, which were far beyond his comprehension. A few of them contained faded sketches of taijutsu moves, along with detailed explanations of how to perform them. This indicated that her taijutsu was supposed to be of chunin level.

There was only one scroll for genjutsu and ninjutsu. The genjutsu one contained the basic definition of the term, its possible effects and the methods of recognizing and releasing a genjutsu. The other depicted some hand signs and a few rudimentary jutsu.

Sasuke's frown deepened into a grimace.

Since Kaiho had perfected her chakra control by learning intricate medical techniques, it would have been simple to teach her other jutsu. It was the most logical route, but it hadn't been taken. The answer to why this was done came naturally to him. As the child of a reputed clan and ninja of the Leaf, he had picked up on some aspects of politics, even if he didn't like it.

"You've been duped."

"What do you mean?" Her eyes were wide with confusion.

"That kunoichi from Kumo instilled potential in you but restricted your growth. She allowed you to learn mainly medical ninjutsu and taijutsu, hoping that you would seek her to learn the rest." Sasuke let his words sink in, expecting the girl to come to her senses.

Kaiho's face bore nothing except shock, akin to that of a person drenched in cold water. "What's wrong with that? Maybe... maybe," she grappled with her words. "She wanted me to join her."

Sasuke huffed. All he could see was a girl entering denial. "Maybe so, but that's improbable. Why didn't she take you with her? She just wanted to make you a ninja of her village."

"I don't see what's so bad about it."

He almost felt the need to grab her shoulders and shake her out of her delusion. "Don't you understand?" His voice came out as a growl, and he forced himself to stop. With a deep breath, he tried to make his point clear. "If she'd taken you with her back then, you'd have been made a common citizen. She didn't care about you. It's all about hoarding power. You just fit her requirements."

That was just how the shinobi system worked. In that sense, no village was that different from Orochimaru. They could excuse themselves with words like 'values' and 'morals', but action defined everything. Even Itachi's actions against the Uchiha revealed that. It was power that everyone was after. If Kaiho saw ninjas as the epitome of goodness, she was far too naive for the world they were in.

"I told you the truth," he added blandly. "What you do with it is up to you."

Kaiho's eyes blazed with fury, but she didn't retaliate. She snatched the scrolls and stalked out of the room.

Sasuke sighed. That wasn't the first disagreement he'd dealt with that week. If he was to pursue his goals, Hebi would have to act as a single unit. Given their abilities in battle, dismissing Jugo or Suigetsu was out of the question. It would be easy to let go of Kaiho since he had never planned for her to join in the first place. It would be beneficial for her in the long run too. Ninjas were ruthless. The sooner she learned that, the better.

His brows knitted together. Despite his reasoning, it didn't feel right. She had walked the extra mile and done more than what he had asked of her. She deserved a chance to prove herself.

So, it was a chance she would get.