Team 7 was scheduled to meet up for a last-minute practice, and Sasuke promptly left an hour after the meet-up time. He had quickly grown accustomed to Kakashi's tardiness, as he wasn't about to waste precious time waiting for his teacher, but was surprised to see that he was the last to arrive. However, the people standing idly by weren't his teammates.

Team 8's members were occupying the area and looked like they had been waiting for a long time. Shino was as solemn as ever and stood with his arms crossed, Hinata was sitting on the ground twiddling her thumbs around, letting out a sigh every once and a while, and Kiba was sitting on the fence as he vocally complained that their teacher was late. The Inuzuka's ear quirked when the sound of Sasuke's sandal scraping against the dirt alerted Kiba of his presence, and the boy hollered, "Hey, did you happen to see Kurenai-sensei?"

Sasuke ignored the question and claimed a spot by the fence about a meter away so they knew not to bother him.

Kiba muttered an insult under his breath and was quickly chastised by his female companion for being rude. Not like it bothered Sasuke much anyway. The only thing currently bothering Sasuke at the moment was the fact that he didn't leave at a later time. Then he wouldn't have to stand here with the mutt, the bug, and the mouse on top of his already noisy teammates, as they waited for their instructors to arrive.

And as if they had been summoned, everyone in the vicinity could hear Naruto and Sakura shouting at each other as they approached.

"Aww, but Sakura!" Naruto whined. "I told you I was sorry! It was an accident, I swear!"

A loud smack followed the comment and Sasuke fought off the urge to wince as he thought he heard the sound of bone cracking.

"I don't know who is dumber: you for being such a clumsy oaf, or me for underestimating the fact that you can be such a clumsy oaf!"

Kiba's snickering was enough to make Sasuke open his eyes and glance at his team. Sakura was waterlogged and the droplets falling off of the hem of her dress was enough to leave a trail for Kakashi to find them. If he bothered to show up that is. The girl was also sporting more orange than usual as she wore Naruto's signature jacket, which meant that Naruto, for once in his life, was wearing less orange than usual. At the sound of a high-pitched squeak, Sasuke guessed that Hinata had overcome her shyness long enough to look at the object of her affections before fainting at the sight of Naruto's (underdeveloped) physique through his mesh top.

God, that looks like it chafes, thought Sasuke, as he watched the material cling to his teammate's skin with a grimace.

"What happened to YOU?" asked Kiba.

Sakura's face scrunched up in anger.

"This idiot," she jabbed a finger back at Naruto, "managed to push me into the lake on our way here and with Kakashi's sense of time management, I didn't know whether I had enough time to go home and change."

"So I offered her my jacket," said the blonde, totally unfazed by Sakura's complaint. "Kind of romantic, huh?"

"Not really," said Kiba and Shino in unison, which made them look at one another suspiciously because everyone knew that speaking-at-the-same stuff was creepy as hell.

It also seemed to catch Naruto off guard too, because he stopped sheepishly scratching the back of his head and asked, "Hey, what are you guys doing here?"

It was Shino that spoke up this time. "Kurenai-sensei told us to meet her here at 9 AM sharp for a mission and we've been waiting for an hour and a half. We haven't heard anything from her so we're wondering if something came up."

Naruto let out a low whistle. "An hour and a half? That's pretty long but she's got nothing on Kakashi. Last week, he made us wait three hours in the rain and, when he finally showed up, he told us practice was cancelled. On account of rain!"

"Though that's quite impressive," said the Aburame, his tone suggesting he thought otherwise. "This is quite unusual for Kurenai-sensei."

Naruto opened his mouth to reply when Sakura sneezed loud enough to send birds flying off from fright. She sniffled twice before wrapping her arms around herself and shivered.

Amazingly Hinata made it to the girl before Naruto did. "Sakura, you should change out of those wet clothes. Wearing them will only make you colder. And sicker."

"I would love to, but I'm wearing a dress," she said, sending Naruto another glare to remind him that he was the reason she was in this predicament in the first place.

Hinata began to unzip her jacket and Sasuke noted that her two teammates tensed at this motion. This piqued Sasuke's interest and he decided to pay close attention to the exchange, though nothing about the scene stood out to him.

"You can wear my jacket? It's pretty big so it'll be enough to cover y-y-your… um?" She didn't get to finish, as her face grew red from the idea of saying anything pertaining to bare flesh even if Sakura was of the same sex.

Sakura looked unsure as Hinata held it out to her, but then Naruto piped up, hands going towards his fly. "Sakura, I can give you my pants too if you want?"

That was enough to get everyone to object as Kiba and Shino each grabbed onto Naruto's arms to resist him from flashing everyone. A nearly shirtless Naruto was too much to handle let alone a Naruto with bare thighs. Sakura didn't even dignify the request with a response as she swiped the Hyuuga's oversized jacket and ran into the bushes to change.

Sasuke, who had been in his spot by the fence the whole time, was deeply bored by the recent events. Even if he did admit that the sight of Kiba and Shino struggling to detain Naruto was kind of funny, he was still wondering what about Hinata shrugging off her baggy jacket would elicit such a response from her two teammates.

She was self-conscious as ever as she hunched her shoulders so she appeared smaller than she was, nervously looking in the direction that Sakura went off to from time to time, and holding herself as if she felt naked without that jacket of hers. Maybe that was all it was: Kiba and Shino were probably just tensing at the novelty of the Hyuuga shedding some layers. Sasuke was about to dismiss their strange reactions altogether UNTIL he spotted the curve of something through her shirt. Make that two things.

Those losers, thought Sasuke as the answer dawned on him.

Sasuke's gaze quickly averted to his feet as he heard something growl. It was Akamaru, bearing his teeth and making a couple of lunges for the Uchiha's sandals. When there was also the faint, but distinct, feeling of killing intent, Sasuke looked up from the dog to make (sort-of) eye contact with Shino who stared back through his sunglasses. Sasuke raised an eyebrow at this, more bemused than anything, when the boy threateningly flashed a couple of his sharpened kunai before quickly pocketing them as the Hyuuga in question turned to them.

"Is something the matter? Why is Akamaru so angry?"

Sakura made it out of the bushes by then, Hinata's jacket covering her just before the knee, which was a bit shorter than where her dress stopped, but it was a better option than wearing Naruto's pants. Sakura was wringing out her dress and Hinata's ingrained sense of politeness had overridden her curiosity long enough for her to offer hanging up Sakura's dress up to dry. Naruto volunteered to do it, but then noticed that his teammate didn't have his own jacket with her.

"I must've left back in the bushes. Go get it yourself."

"Ugh, but Sakura~!" He whined, making his way into the bushes to retrieve it. "I told you I was sorry!"

Sakura sighed. "Still want to help me with my dress, Hinata?"

Hinata squeaked before nodding gingerly. A Hyuuga never backed out of an offer, especially from such an intimidating kunoichi. "We have to wring out as much water as we can first."

"Okay. You take one side, I'll take the other."

They went off a fair distance to drape the dress in a sunny area in order for it to dry faster and that left Kiba, Shino, and Sasuke. And Akamaru.

"Uchiha…" muttered Kiba, as soon as Akamaru had filled him in on the details.

Sasuke was a genius and the Number One Rookie, so he thought that he'd definitely wipe the floor with both of them, but he'd rather not fight with two clan heirs OVER A GIRL. That was just pathetic.

"I do NOT have a thing for the Hyuuga."

She was weak, too nice, and possibly the most insulting thing of all was the fact that she seemed to have eyes for Naruto. If all of those times he spotted her watching Naruto from behind a tree didn't mean she liked him, nothing did. He obviously wasn't going to vocalize this to her smitten teammates though.

"You better not."

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure he has a hard time fending off Naruto anyway. Ha ha!" Kiba made kissy faces at him, taunting him for the incident-that-shall-not-be-named during their team announcements, and Sasuke was about to drive his foot up the Inuzuka's ass when something occurred to him.

"Well I wouldn't overlook Naruto."

Kiba just laughed harder. "Was that a confession, Uchiha?"

He smirked. "You'll see…"

Once their little gang regrouped, they fell into silence as both teams waited for their respective Jounin instructors to show up.

Sasuke felt especially uncomfortable, as he'd catch Kiba or Shino glaring at him for checking out the Hyuuga's goods, and Sakura had been inching closer and closer towards him. He could've sworn she was trying to flash him her inner thigh by the way she'd stretch back her arms so the jacket's hemline would rise. Though it wasn't having the effect on Sasuke, it was definitely working its magic on the dobe. If she did one more failed yawn and stretch routine, the blonde would probably strain his eyes or pop a blood vessel trying to catch a glimpse of her underwear or something.

Ten minutes.

Twenty minutes.

Thirty minutes.

Then an indiscernible amount of time passed.

"GAH!" cried Kiba, pulling on his unruly hair as he spoke. "This is insane. Where the hell is Kurenai-sensei and why would she call us out here and not show up? We've been waiting for over two hours now!"

"Do you think it's a coincidence that both of our teams were told to meet at the same place and that Kakashi-sensei and Kurenai-sensei are both missing?" asked Sakura.

That grabbed everyone's attention and even Sasuke managed to spare his teammate an interested look.

"I mean, what if this is some sort of lesson and we're supposed to look underneath the underneath?"

"Look underneath the WHAT?" asked Kiba.

"It's something Kakashi-sensei told us about. Like looking underneath what's below you or something or other… Actually," Naruto said, scratching his cheek. "I have no idea what that means ha ha ha!"

"I-I think I get it," said Hinata. "It's like reading between the lines. Like if you were on a mission and your comrade didn't show up, you wouldn't just stand around. You would have to go and investigate their disappearance! We have to figure out the meaning behind their lateness."

Shino wasn't quite convinced. "But where would they be? It's not like they'll be at their usual spots just waiting for us to find them."

"Maybe something happened. Do you think we should go inform the Hokage?" asked Sakura.

"Nah," Naruto responded, waving his hand. "They would have sent someone to find us if something that serious occurred. Kakashi-sensei is just late like usual and Kurenai-sensei is… I don't know. Maybe she's picking up on his bad habits."

For once, Sasuke actually agreed with Naruto. He knew for a fact that there wasn't a deeper meaning behind their instructors' absences. Kakashi-sensei wasn't the type of guy to collaborate with another Jounin to push some little teamwork exercise. It was too convoluted. The older man was probably still at home, chuckling to himself that he managed to, once again, delay his training session. As for Kurenai-sensei, who knows? That was none of Sasuke's concern although he was rather bored with all of this waiting.

Sasuke had recited his usual plans of how he'd confront his older brother and avenge his clan, but he could only go over those so many times before even he couldn't take it anymore. He even briefly entertained the thought of screwing around with the boys of Team 8 by feigning interest in the Hyuuga to pass the time! But even a cold-hearted bastard like him knew that just straight up cruel. With his thoughts on the Hyuuga girl again, Sasuke watched her as she sat across from him and couldn't fathom why the two boys were so protective of her. Was it her frailty? Her kindness?

Sasuke's mind was on autopilot and his eyes landed on the Hyuuga's chest as the thought crossed his mind. Is it because she's the first genin to sprout boobs?

Or…was it her eyes, which were staring right back at him.

Sasuke's whole body tensed and he was basically willing himself not to blush as he had just been caught checking out Hinata's body for the second time.

Her eyes, he thought. They're actually kind of… pretty?

Now he could actually feel himself blushing. Just a teensy bit but even that was enough to make him angry that a mere GIRL could have this much impact on his emotions.

It took Hinata a second to adjust to the attention, as she wasn't accustomed to Sasuke's gaze upon her, but she was able to maintain eye contact albeit with her usual blush dusting her pale cheeks. They stared at each other for a few more seconds with Hinata wondering what exactly about herself that had grabbed the Uchiha's attention whereas Sasuke had too much pride to look away like a Peeping Tom that had just been caught. But then Sasuke realized that they were having, what people would call a "moment," and he mentally scolded himself since this sort of behaviour was not very becoming of an avenger-to-be.

He was going to finally sever all eye contact when the Hyuuga's eyes, along with the rest of her body, were covered up when Kiba threw his jacket over the girl.

"Here, Hinata, cover up. You look cold without your jacket."

Hinata looked confused but did what she was told anyway. She felt too exposed in her t-shirt and Kiba's jacket brought her some relief.

Sasuke blinked owlishly before glancing up at Kiba, who didn't show any sign that he witnessed their "moment," yet the convenient timing of his gentlemanly gesture and his aggressive tone when he addressed Hinata seemed to suggest so. Man, Team 8's jealous, overprotective shtick was getting old.

"Hey, why are we switching clothes all of a sudden?" asked Sakura.

"Yeah, I call dibs on Shino's glasses next!" cried Naruto.

One would expect Shino to brush off this remark but he surprised everyone when he proffered his jacket in exchange for Naruto's discarded orange jacket. The two made the switch and once Shino put the article of clothing on, a faint buzzing sound could be heard emanating from the boy. (Shino would later on inform everyone that the insects were enticed by the smell of instant noodles coming from Naruto's jacket. Weird.) All of a sudden, everyone was trading their clothes and although Sasuke objected at first like the grumpy stick-in-the-mud he was, he eventually caved. That's the power of peer pressure and conformity, kids! In fact, it was actually Sasuke who received Shino's glasses after trading his white arm covers for them from Kiba.

Basically everyone was either wearing someone else's clothes or was loaning theirs out. Everyone took the time to lightly poke fun at Shino who was the silliest looking out of them all. He was sitting on the ground with his knees pulled to his chest underneath Naruto's infamously bright orange jacket, looking very much like a tent, still vibrating slightly from the happy insects in Shino's body. And without his sunglasses concealing his eyes, he made do by pulling down his forehead protector to shield them. Their rag tagged group wasn't the most fashionable at the moment but their little exchange seemed to pass the time and soothe out the tensions between their two teams.

Of course when things were that peaceful between two usually dysfunctional groups, something was bound to throw off the balance. And for once, it wasn't because of Sasuke's wandering eye. Kiba and Shino were finally witnessing Naruto's powers over their teammate.

"Hey Hinata," said Naruto, approaching her and getting too close for comfort. The collar of Shino's jacket was covering the lower half of his face so it just intensified his piercing, blue eyes, making his gaze all that more nerve-racking to the Hyuuga. "Don't you ever get tired of wearing over sized clothes? It's like you're always hiding. Kinda like the other day when I spotted you behind that telephone pole on my way home…"

Hinata's blush went into maximum overdrive as steam was literally coming out of her ears.

"Uh… w-well, y'see. There's an excellent reason for that. I…" She stuttered, twiddling her thumbs. "I wasn't. I mean, not really…"

"HUH?!" Naruto asked, approaching her in concern, but that just made her more nervous and she started to retreat. "Are you okay, Hinata?"

Sasuke was trying to suppress a satisfied smile as he watched the realization come over Team 8 like a harsh wave. When Shino actually started to physically buzz more from possible agitation, Sasuke couldn't help it and doubled over in laughter.

Sakura cast an uneasy glance at her childhood crush, who was laughing like a man starved of humour, and then at her blonde teammate who was just so, so clueless. Boys were weird.

"Naruto," the young kunoichi growled. "You idiot!"

"What did I do NOW?"

The two began arguing. Sakura was trying to drill the concepts of "personal space" and "not embarrassing people in public" into Naruto's thick skull while he was still trying to figure out what he said was so wrong. Naruto was so preoccupied with incurring Sakura's forgiveness that he didn't notice Hinata's well-intended attempts of justifying – I mean, EXPLAINING – her stalking habits to him. And with the sight of Shino preparing his insects and Kiba sharpening his claws, due to the Hyuuga's crestfallen face, Sasuke managed to pick himself off the ground long enough to note that he was in the most complicated love polygon that a twelve year old could possibly be involved in.

Where was Akamaru in this situation, my dear reader?

He was watching everything unfold on the sidelines.

Humans and their mating rituals, he thought tiredly, scratching his ear with his hind leg.

Akamaru stopped his scratching when he caught the scent of another nin-dog approaching and he managed to bark loudly enough to warn everyone of the impending presence.

Everyone stopped dead in their tracks as a giant puff of white smoke engulfed them all. When it all settled down, what was revealed was Pakkun. The old pug wasn't really looking forward to seeing his master's team so soon after their mission to the Land of Waves, especially with the message he was told to report, and he felt particularly reluctant when he caught sight of Team 7 and 8 in their mismatched outfits and fighting stances. The sight of both Sakura and the Inuzuka boy strangling Naruto from the front and back was something to behold and he had no idea what had caused the Aburame heir to be in such a catatonic state. He was literally vibrating.

Pakkun didn't dare risk accessing the rest of Kakashi and Kurenai's students and he opened his mouth to ask what they were doing, but closed it at the last second when he decided that it was best not to know.

"Yo," Pakkun said finally after all of his gaping. "So I'm guessing you're wondering about the whereabouts of Kakashi and Kurenai-sensei."

"Yeah, about damn time we get an answer!" cried Kiba.

"Both of your team's training sessions have been decidedly cancelled for the day and are rescheduled for tomorrow."

"Why?" Sakura demanded. After all of the drama she had to deal with today, she better be learning something important tomorrow or so help her-!

"Well… you're not going to like my answer," replied the nin-dog, who was looking rather nervous.

"Try us," said Naruto, his voice sounding hoarse from his tag teamed strangle.

"Kakashi and Kurenai-sensei are kind of," he paused, not out of dramatic effect, but for anticipation of the pain his hypersensitive ears were going to experience. "They're kind of hung over."

"WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAT?!"

The combined lung capacities and vocal range of Sakura, Naruto, and Kiba was so extraordinary that their angered cries managed to reach Kakashi-sensei and Kurenai-sensei who were still recovering from the last-minute bash at Anko's apartment. Oh, and Asuma-sensei was there too. The wild kunoichi was just informed that she was going to be in charge of this year's Chuunin exam and Anko could not wait to celebrate with the prospective Jounins who would be recommending their students to be subjected to her evaluations. She and Gai-sensei were faring well – the green beast even did a couple of laps around her apartment complex before bidding his farewell – but the others were not so lucky.

Asuma grunted before using the last of his strength to chuck a loofah at the former shells that used to be Kakashi and Kurenai.

"Did you hear that? I told you to send a message to your rookies sooner."

Kakashi tried to get up from his spot in Anko's bathtub but still felt way too woozy and merely draped an arm over his eyes to stop the room from spinning. "They've dealt with worse."

"Mine haven't. They're going to kill me tomorrow." Kurenai's face turned inexplicably green as she dove for the toilet. "If this hangover doesn't first!"

Asuma was going to act like the gentlemanly boyfriend he was but then figured that it was too late for chivalry now when his headache actually seemed to worsen. All he could do was crawl into the hallway and hope that Anko was coming back with the medicine that she promised them.

What kind of person had a medicine cabinet without any actual medicine in it?

The news that their respective Jounins stood them up because of a drunken party the night prior pretty much dispelled any hormonal, pre-teen melodrama that Team 7 and Team 8 had for each other. As they returned each other's clothing in uncomfortable silence, the rookie 6 started to go their separate ways.

Hinata casted Naruto a longing look, as she never got to explain herself but was distracted when Sasuke was the one to return her jacket.

She shot him a timid glance.

"Don't make this weird," he muttered. "Sakura's just gone to change into her dress."

She nodded and took her jacket back before being steered away by Kiba.

"Let's go, Hinata. We've basically got a free day to do whatever we want now."

Shino stepped inline with them as they walked away from Team 7 and sighed. "My insects really do miss Naruto's jacket. They're not buzzing the same way anymore."

"Dude, will you give that up? If you ate or slept in as many noodle cups as that dweeb than you'll basically get the same effect."

"You really think so?" Shino brightened.

"You're a lost cause…"

Hinata was happy to listen to the banter between her two friends and was going to join in when she felt eyes on the back of her head. Turning around, she saw that it was none other than Sasuke Uchiha looking at her as his two teammates were also engrossed in their own conversation to notice. He smirked and raised his hand in goodbye before falling back into formation with his team, who were now bickering over where they should go for lunch.

Akamaru let out a single bark at Hinata and she put her index finger to her mouth, signaling to him that this was their little secret and he happily complied.

ClockRepair message: I don't know what this is. It's hugely inspired by the fact that I've never written a Sasuhina set in the actual Naruto universe and because I thought how amusing it would be to write about a love polygon between everyone. If anyone was wondering I make up all of my stories as I go and I actually started this fic about a year a go and got stuck at Sakura suggesting everyone "look underneath the underneath". I've been slowly adding to and trying to finish this story ever since then and it's only been in the last few weeks that I've been able to write something I was satisfied with.

You don't know when inspiration will hit because I was trying to fall asleep last night at 3:00 AM and suddenly jolted up from my bed and suddenly knew how I was finally going to end this thing. I hope everyone enjoyed the story even if it was kind of random and everyone was weirdly passive aggressive.