Chapter Five: The Common Enemy

"I hope that you are a disaster.
I hope that you are thunder and lightning.
I hope you are a forest fire,
I hope you kill the dead wood and
burn off the rotting leaves.
With the canopy gone,
the sun can get in.
You need new growth.
I hope you're terrible and broken and
perfect."
-J. Comeau

It's almost a relief when Kakashi finally walks in the door. Sakura has been sitting, staring outside the window at the annoying, tenacious, annoying bird that just won't stop bloody chirping and trying to ignore the other two people in the room.

Usually she'd try to talk to Sasuke, but there's a strange tension in the air - some cross between hostility and companionable silence that is a paradox and should not exist. Sakura isn't suicidal, so instead she slowly suffocates in the tenable tension and unknowingly exercises her meagre killing intent on The Bird, which chirps ever more insistently in alarm.

So when the silver-haired shinobi walks in the door she practically leaps out of her seat to greet him. "Hi, Kakashi-sensei? You're a little late. I'm Haruno Sakura," she babbles, and she knows she's babbling but the words stumble out uncontrollably anyway, "and you must be our instructor? It's a pleasure to meet you! I look forward to working with you!" She dips a quick bow and glances up at him.

"Ah," Kakashi murmurs through his mask. "Enthusiastic, aren't you."

It doesn't quite sound like a compliment coming from him. She withers, fiddling with her fingers.

And then the new girl stands up, fluidly, with the kind of grace Sakura has never possessed, and sketches a low bow.

"Kakashi-sensei," she murmurs. "We've been waiting for you." Somehow, it sounds like a reprimand. "I am Uzumaki Naruto."

Sakura doesn't think she is imagining the way his eyes linger on her, or the suddenly soft set of his single visible eyebrow. Something resembling resentment wells up in her at the way he seems to almost immediately like this Uzumaki girl, when he almost immediately seemed to dislike her.

Not to be left out, Sasuke stands and somehow nods with his upper body, managing to make it look unrepentantly patronizing. "Uchiha Sasuke," he intones.

"Well…" The man deliberates, "why don't we get to know each other a little better?" He sits on a desk and beckons Sakura closer to join them. She scampers forward and slides into the seat across the aisle from Sasuke carefully.

"What do you want to know?" Naruto asks, an amused tilt to her voice.

"Everything!" Kakashi's single visible eye crinkles in a smile. "Likes, dislikes, interests," he lists off on his fingers, "dreams, strengths, weaknesses… Deepest, darkest secrets." There's a definite tone of some strange humor in his voice that Sakura can't quite decipher. She shivers. "Since you're so enthusiastic," Kakashi continues, "why don't you start, Pinky?"

"Yes, sir!" Sakura winces at her own high-pitched, childish voice and leaps to her feet, banging her hip against the table and swallowing her cry of pain. She bites her lip and can't quite bring herself to meet her teacher's eyes, or the inquiring gaze of the other girl, or Sasuke's complete disregard, so instead she speaks to the board in between them.

"I'm Haruno Sakura, and I like… Well," she doesn't dare look at Sasuke now, and can't bear to see his contempt for her, especially not in the face of Uzumaki, who despite being around for only two days already seems to eclipse Sakura easily. So Sakura rushes out, "Reading. I don't like pain, either for myself or others. I… keep a small garden in my spare time and hang out with friends. One day, I want to marry somebody I love, and become-strong-like-Tsunade-sama."

The last part comes out in a rush. Sakura gasps for air, focusing on the board and trying not to imagine their faces. "I'm - well, I've always been told I'm smart. I have a good head for books and tactics. And I've always been good at chakra exercises! But, well, I always lose in practical matches, because my stamina is low."

She sits down without looking at any of them. Shame heats her neck and face as the silence stretches on. Almost forgotten, she tacks on a quiet, "I don't really have any secrets."

Then the girl yawns and makes a lazy, satisfied noise in the back of her throat as she stretches. "Tsunade of the Sannin, eh?" When she smiles at Sakura there's too much kindness mixed with something unreadable and immeasurably understanding in her expression.

Sakura hates it. Sakura hates her. And most of all Sakura hates the part of her that likes Uzumaki Naruto, even though within the space of 48 hours she is already everything Sakura aspires and fails to be.

As she sits there with slow-simmering fire stewing in her heart, Sakura hears the roar of waters in her ears, blood rushing onward in her veins. The sound burns, and it blocks out almost everything else. It sounds like shame. It sounds like jealousy. It sounds- it sounds like determination, a long-forgotten storm that calls back days with golden blonde hair and book races, the red ribbon and rising higher higher higher.

But old habits fade slowly, and dreams never die. So still she hears him.

"I like training. I dislike annoyances. My taijutsu is adequate, and my ninjutsu," a heavy pause, "below standards. One day I will kill a certain man and restore the Uchiha clan."

Sakura's eyes slide without her consent from his face, beautiful in fierce and vindictive righteousness, past the unamused and unimpressed countenance of Hatake Kakashi, lingering only momentarily on Uzumaki Naruto, who radiates disapproval despite her unreadable expression. Uzumaki Naruto, who reminds Sakura too clearly of what Sakura didn't want enough to seize for herself.

Sakura's neck turns a couple degrees to the left; her eyes find the light of the window. Through the pristine glass panes shine a bottomless blue sky, framed by the faces of four legends. Her heart beats a staccato rhythm, the drums of war in her chest.

They clash, juxtaposed and ferocious in desire. One side croons of a comfortable life, of mundanity interspersed with emotional passion, of love and romance. It is solid; it is assurance; it is the hope of a good future.

The other side sings in operatic wails, hoarse and unbalanced, emotional and unyielding, like Inner: of Ino's back before her, of the golden moment of newly born confidence. Of deciding, in that moment, to stand firm on her own merit, for herself and before others. Of protection - no, of protecting. It is uncertain; it is difficult; it is the desire for strength.

In a nearly deserted and familiar room, Haruno Sakura's heart becomes a battleground for a war that will rage with feverish heights for a few days. It is a war that will change her; it is a war that will save her.

What she doesn't say:

"I want them to be happy, healthy, and safe.

I want them to keep smiling forever.

That's my dream.

But you know, some dreams don't come true."

"The Hokage has declared a special provision for your team," Kakashi says. "Usually I would give you a test tomorrow, one with a 66 percent failure rate, and you would fail. However, since one of your team members is new to you, you'll be failing my test after three weeks instead. You will enter a three week probationary period, during which you won't take any missions but will train under me. We'll meet at seven in training ground seven tomorrow. Dismissed."

He says it all in a calm but quick voice. His eyes travel over their faces, assessing, searching. He sees everything, except the things he does not want to see.

So there they sit: the civilian girl turned toward the window, a slight unwilling curve to her neck bringing her eyes to his; the still mourning boy with eyes downcast but hardened, always angry and bitter and seeking; the lost girl with sad eyes and her beautiful beautiful fake smile.

So there they sit, and Kakashi sees but does not know the quiet realizations in green eyes, the fearful walls around a battered heart, and most certainly not the fragile hope in a bruised but still tenaciously welcoming soul.

"They must come to rely on each other," the Hokage murmurs, his chin resting on intertwined fingers. HIs voice is slow and grave. "They must connect, and share bonds. They must bind themselves to Konoha. We will not lose them."

Kakashi says nothing, standing as still as he once did when he was only a shadow.

Sarutobi Hiruzen continues as if he has voiced a resounding agreement. "You will not fail, Kakashi-kun. You cannot. You can train them like the shadows of this village. You can bind them with blood and fear. You can teach them to love in the darkness by the fire. You are well-acquainted - more familiar than most - with the Will of Fire."

Unsaid is the history that weighs behind each word, more resounding than any sound the Hokage can speak. Kakashi bows his head under the gravity of two dozen years of compiled sorrow, and accepts a new burden, one of three parts told in excruciating detail through compiled reports, surreptitious surveillance, and the Hokage's own instruction.

Three lives - not to kill, but to keep. Somehow.

Kakashi must make them right.

It comes as a surprise the first time she asks, a week into their probationary period. They have been meeting at seven and training before Kakashi shows up around noon. She is stretching, hands wrapped around her feet, on the trunk of a tree, her toes pointed to the ground.

Sasuke regards her a little jealously, still struggling with the tree-climbing exercise himself. Sakura managed it in one go, and Naruto taught them in the first place. Despite Sakura's appeasements and explanations about chakra control, it rankles to be the one that is behind.

Her words fall out of the blue, blue sky and chase the jealousy from his mind.

"Who is it you want to kill?"

There is a short pause; he considers her, and she lifts those blue, blue eyes up to meet him. Peripherally he sees Sakura roll around and prop herself up on her elbows.

He doesn't know what he hopes to find there, but there is something in the slight furrow above her eyes. A part of him rebels at it. Something deep and innate tells him that there is no going back, and he balks.

"It's none of your business," he grinds out.

Maybe he hits a little harder in sparring that day, a little more vicious when he manages to catch the girl that flies with uncanny speed around his punches and pulls her hits as light taps. Kakashi gives him a long, hard, considering look for his victory spelled out in purple on Naruto's arm, and he returns to an empty home that night with bruises of his own.

The bruises fade, but the question and her accepting expression stay etched into his mind. He doesn't need understanding, trust, or anybody to stand by him. He doesn't want it.

Sasuke lies himself to sleep that night.

Sakura is literally shocked speechless when she spots Naruto in the store. In the lingerie store. Holding a bra at arms length and examining it doubtfully. The attendants are nowhere to be seen, and the overhead speakers only play quiet radio music, so she uses every ounce of shinobi quiet that she has picked up in the past one and a half weeks and sneaks up behind her ever self-possessed teammate.

"Is this your first time buying a bra?" She asks, perhaps a little louder than necessary. Naruto jumps and whirls around to face her, blonde hair flying and blue eyes wide.

"I - This…"

For a second Sakura considers her. Naruto has always seemed so far beyond her - even beyond Sasuke. She's unnaturally fast, quicker than Sasuke by a solid margin even though he's always been the best in the class. Her chakra control is nearly as good as Sakura's, and she seems to know about everything. When Sakura stands next to Naruto she feels shorter, uglier, and less adequate; when she sees her accomplishments Sakura feels as though she has been wasting her life.

It's a nasty feeling, and she hates it and she hates herself and most especially she hates Naruto for making her feel as if she could have been something more if only…

Sakura has always been good enough. Good enough for her parents, good enough to beat Ino, good enough to top the Academy kunoichi-in-training rankings every month. She's always been smart enough, pretty enough, talented enough. But in the past week she's realized that she could have been better and her bygone victories taste like ashes in her mouth. And she blames it all on the girl that arrived with all the force of a natural disaster: Uzumaki Naruto and her persistent efforts, her dedication, her composure - Uzumaki Naruto and the way she manages to be everything Sakura thinks she could have been if only...

But standing there in the pink and white store as Naruto quickly blushes fire-engine red and moves the bra out of sight, Sakura has an epiphany.

She giggles and tugs on Naruto's arm. "Don't be so embarrassed! Let me help you out."

After an afternoon of talking about the brooding ("but hot," Sakura adds with a giggle) asses on their team, the pros and cons of short hair, and the best specialized weapons, they stumble out of Yakinawa's Weapons: Naruto with a new bra, Sakura with a new set of weapons, and each with a new friend.

Sakura thinks to herself that, while Naruto is no Ino, she's not that bad at all. And, while polishing her new kunai on her bed, her eyes drift to a worn red ribbon in a patch of dust-free wood and she wonders if maybe it's time to rekindle old fires and rebuild burnt bridges.

"Who do you want to kill?"

Sasuke pauses before sinking into an offensive kata. In his peripheral vision he sees Kakashi glance sharply their way. It irks him, since despite his superior strength and daily training Naruto matches him almost evenly in taijutsu. The bruises he leaves on her, she pays back in full - and hers are gone the next day. Yet every time Kakashi gives him an acutely disappointed look that says, Didn't your mother ever teach you to be nice to girls? when he's clearly the one that assigned them to spar together anyway.

Sasuke's mother was a woman who dominated the family with quiet strength, subtle and elegant. That graceful power is one he sees in the kunoichi walking the streets of Konoha, the same ideal that the girls in the Academy aspired to and failed to be.

But Naruto's strength is breathless and unwavering, solid and overwhelming, undeniable despite his best efforts. She is unshakeable, a solid foundation - the kind that nations were built on. It is a strength that lies not only in the quantifiable, not only in solid hits and monstrous chakra.

He grits his teeth. No matter how good she is, no matter how persistent, no matter how relentlessly friendly, she's nothing more than a distraction. A distraction and a danger. Why, just a moment ago she had him thinking about his mother again.

Sasuke can't afford thoughts like those. Inside his chest there is a black abyss with Itachi's name on it, a plunging hole where everything else used to be.

There is no room for anything but justice. He has to make things right.

"It's none of your business."

Sakura concludes, stumbling into her house with already throbbing muscles and barely making it to collapse on the couch, that Uzumaki Naruto is a demon.

"Sakura?" Her mom calls from the bathroom, confused and questioning. Sakura always works like clockwork, precise and timely. "You're late today?"

"Training," she manages to groan loudly. With my demon-possessed teammate. She fights back a dry heave and considers the long, long walk to the bathroom.

Her body will be torture tomorrow. Sakura thinks about staying home as sick, but the realization that Naruto will be out there at some awful morning hour sparks that recently rekindled competitive fire in her. After happening upon her teammate cooling down before the team meeting, Sakura joined her for her late afternoon workout.

When she feebly left for home, Naruto was still going strong. As Sakura drags herself to the bathroom, she swears in her mind that she won't be left behind forever.

Kakashi regards them. And maybe he smiles a little, underneath the mask.

"So I had this nice little test planned out for you," he tells their wary faces. "You were going to compete with one another and I was going to lie to you and make you hate each other." They're unconsciously grouped together, back to back; Sasuke's eyes are on him and the girls scan the trees, knowing better than to expect him to be where he appears to be. All three turn to regard him with the utmost suspicion at his deliberate, dramatic pause. "It was going to be so fun."

None of them speak. Naruto returns to her peripheral tree scan, discreetly palming a kunai. He smiles again, wider, crinkling his visible eye. He notes Sakura draw in a shaking breath at his change in expression. (Perhaps he's been a little hard on them the past couple of weeks?)

"I've changed my mind." They tense, and a glance later scatter into the foliage. A bit extreme, to be sure, but they know him well enough after three weeks of 'training' (torment). He finds their caution prudent enough. Besides, this is their belated graduation test, and perhaps the death-release form he had them sign yesterday gave them some ideas?

He speaks, still tracking them, well aware that they can hear him.

"The test is simple. Survive until noon."

Like any exercise Kakashi decides to participate in, it is less of a fight and more of a continually breathless excursion in evasion.

Even then they know he is holding back.

A week ago, Sakura showed up with a white face and an entire stack of books dedicated to their teacher - the elusive, eccentric, and evidently incredibly skilled Copy Ninja of Konoha. They skimmed the vague, public reports on his exploits, which were frankly quite ridiculous (even Sasuke visibly reacted to a couple), and returned the next day with a new appreciation for the man.

Pervert he may be - perpetually late and purveyor of the most awful jokes known to man - but Hatake Kakashi is no doubt a living legend, too big for even a shinobi to hide.

(It doesn't make his jokes any less tasteless.)

Thus, when they meet a couple hundred meters to the right of the original clearing, they spare no time for wasted words. Breathless suggestions tumble into the air; though all three are perhaps the most prideful of their graduating class, all know better than to overestimate themselves.

Unspoken and instantly understood is the implication that they needn't win. Kakashi has only asked them to survive.

"Is he even allowed-" Sakura pants, stamina and speed still nowhere near up to par to Naruto, who catches her breath within scarce moments, or Sasuke, who arrived half a minute ago and is still relaxed.

"Sakura," Sasuke snaps, though not unkindly.

Sakura remembers the death release form and gulps down a strangled sob, reaching within herself to find that recently cultivated strain of calm and determination.

"Two hours 'til noon," Naruto murmurs.

"Too long," Sasuke snarls. Naruto glances sharply at him; while he appears stoic, Sasuke is just as emotional as Sakura. He catches the look, eyes as sharp as an Uchiha's ought to be, and forces down his ire a little.

They know better than to break apart now. Kakashi made it plenty obvious within the first two days that they had barely a snowball's chance in the sun's raging fires even while working together and pooling their resources. Pride is a difficult thing to beat down, and emotions are heavy things to release, but, Academy lessons aside, they are each and every one well versed in masks.

They aren't quite comfortable with each other yet; their trust is still unstable, the daily high-tension escapades helpful but relatively few, little time spent outside of maniacal improvement in the face of the inexorably approaching deadline. But Naruto has not lived as herself most of her life, and the others are no different.

They aren't a team yet, but they can damn well pretend to be. And the bonds, while fragile, have nevertheless formed over last-minute plans, frantic training, and constant, shared failures.

"No - fighting in - village," Sakura breathes between pants.

They share a look that speaks more than breathless words could at this point. Training Ground seven is not far from the village - and they are far from delusional.

"No close combat," Naruto suggests, looking at Sasuke.

"I'm not stupid," he mutters. "Evasive number three?"

"Tried that - Monday," Sakura gasps.

"Two," Naruto says. Sakura gives her a sharpest look - Evasive number two was a product of desperation, and calls for Naruto to engage in close range and put herself in the dangerous position of encountering not only Kakashi, but also Sakura and Sasuke's admittedly imperfect aim.

But there is no time for further planning. As Kakashi watches hidden from their knowledge in the treetops above, they depart. Sakura runs point, fingers molding the outlines of a perception-affecting genjutsu she picked up by necessity last week; Naruto brings up the rear, stretching chakra senses out to her fullest extent, while Sasuke scans with eagle eyes and prepares his favorite fire technique.

Kakashi smiles, just a little, underneath his mask. Hope he has long forgotten tugs up the corners of his mouth without his bidding.

It's a feeling he hopes he won't lose for a long time yet.

It is a little cruel, Naruto thinks, how far Kakashi allows them to travel before he attacks. They are scant minutes from the borders of the nearest residential area, barrelling ahead at full speed, so close to the end goal and yet unwilling to hope.

Hyperaware, they've had two false reactions. The mistakes do not slow their hearts or lessen the adrenaline. Their response to his actual attack is quick.

Instantly Sakura releases her chakra, forming the last seal, and jumps into far-range support. Sasuke releases his fireball nearly simultaneously, retreating and beginning hand seals for the Phoenix Flowers.

Naruto darts right to meet Kakashi as the fire burns itself out with a sweep of her right leg. A quick exchange of punches - he indulges her by not overpowering her immediately. There is a sharp crack that Sakura winces at, but Naruto doesn't retreat, relying more heavily on her undamaged right arm. Every time Sakura sneaks in a shuriken, he evades with such speed it seems more like a missed throw than a dodge.

There is a flare of chakra as Sasuke finishes his technique. Naruto disengages and retreats, scraped and bruising, guarding a limp left arm close to her side. With choreographed accuracy, she follows Sakura in the mad dash onward as fire rains down.

But Kakashi is already in front of them, kunai slicing through the air. Sakura evades in her peripheral vision and Naruto snatches the handle, a twist of her elbow slicing the metal back at him.

When his hands come together Naruto curses under her breath. Kakashi rarely uses techniques, but when he does it is deliberate and slowed for their benefit.

They escape before the slicing Wind Gale hits, but even at the range of her farthest forward Kawarimi, Sakura bears the periphery of the technique. She grunts as small, papercut-like incisions pepper her skin and directs chakra for a breathless second movement to join Naruto.

Sasuke arrives seconds later, panting from exertion. Naruto turns to leave but Sakura touches her sleeve in reminder that not all of them bear her admirable recovery rate, and they wait precious moments for Sasuke's tired but stubborn assent. This time Naruto takes the lead, Sakura and a winded Sasuke behind by mere steps in their breakneck pace for the now visible rooftops that signify freedom.

With debilitating ease, Kakashi steps in their path again. "Maa," he sighs. "Where have I gone wrong? All my cute little students are running away from me."

He smiles. He's seen two already - now for the last.

Sasuke realizes something is wrong almost immediately after he moves in to attack. He disengages from close combat to where Sakura and Naruto have fallen prey to the Hidden Mole technique that Kakashi favors (probably for the humiliation factor).

Sakura's eyes are downcast. her expression vaguely resigned. Naruto is visibly struggling at the dirt, but it will take her long minutes to unearth herself. She glares at Kakashi venomously.

Kakashi crinkles one eye at Sasuke. "How about it? I won't attack you if you want to run." He waves one hand invitingly at the rooftops visible, scant seconds from them. Konoha laws allow no fighting in the residential area. Sasuke will be safe as long as he gets there.

He thinks fleetingly of the scroll, heavy in his hands, weighty legal words and the signature in blood. He thinks of Kakashi, who despite it all has not been a bad teacher - targeting weak points unerringly and willing to lend a hand. And Sasuke thinks of three weeks spent under torturous pressure, meeting each day to discover a new way to fail horribly, and yet somehow getting by on lunch planning sessions and panicked training.

It is far, far later that Sasuke realizes Itachi did not shadow his thoughts that moment - that, indeed, the weight of his brother had not crushed Sasuke during those three weeks like it so often did before.

Naruto is perhaps two minutes from freeing herself. Sasuke calculates, and finds himself lacking. He can't hold Kakashi off for even two seconds, and he knows this all too well. He eyes the rooftops again, and something heavy and warm chokes his throat, sliding down to settle on his chest. It's not an unpleasant fear, somehow.

He slides into a defensive position before his teammates.

"What?"

"You pass," Kakashi reiterates, this time just amused.

"But," Sakura sputters, not quite able to process this development. "It's not even eleven o'clock yet!"

"I'm feeling nice," Kakashi offers. "And I quite like you all. I think perhaps I'll keep you." He smiles again, eye squinting happily at the distrustful looks Naruto and Sasuke are giving him. "See you tomorrow."

As he walks, he channels chakra to listen in on their rushed whispers.

"Is this a trick?"

A whimper. "Careful with the arm, please."

"Sorry."

"Let's just hide out in the village for a while."

"Naruto, you need the hospital. I think this is a fracture."

"Shit, he actually broke your arm?"

"It'll heal. Let's go… I'm sure he's still around here somewhere."

He leaps into the trees and watches them dig Sakura up with three hands between the two of them, and flee top speed toward the village. He chuckles a little to himself, opens his book, and follows. He quite enjoys this image they have of him.

Soon they'll have to trust him on the same side as them, though. He considers for a moment dropping in on the shared lunches they've been having recently (out of desperation to plan for whatever he's planning on putting them through). Still chuckling quietly to himself, he shakes his head. Perhaps they deserve a day's break from him.

Tomorrow, at last, they'll be a team.

The words feel the air before they arrive, cautiously, like wild animals.

"Who do you want to kill?"

He sighs heavily and turns his face away from her. The sun is eating away at the horizon, blood hues scattered across the sky - but soon the crimson will wash out, and the world will be plunged into darkness.

His heart revolts, but his lips move without his command.

"My… The man who killed my clan."

The words tumble out of his traitorous mouth, and his rebellious heart lightens as if some great burden fell from it. He has never spoken of it, not even to the persistent Yamanaka, not even to the countless counselors. After all, secrets lose power when spoken.

"And what will you do after you kill him?"

For a brief, incredulous moment Sasuke does not understand. His heart beats loudly. His mind explores this new terrain, chasing sudden and uninvited thoughts and half-formed, old dreams - some vague and distant laughter, kind eyes, a home and supper on the table every night and -

Life. Life after Itachi.

Incomprehensible.

But it is as if a seed sprouted in his renegade heart. He shoves it away violently, locks it up, and spits at her, "That doesn't matter."

Sasuke refuses to meet her eyes. Naruto's blue, blue eyes that always tell him too many things that he doesn't want to know - he can't bear to face them now.

"Then," she begins after an uncomfortable silence in which Sasuke can neither bear to run away nor meet her gaze, "What do you think killing him will do for you?"

"What?" It comes across surprised and weak, spilling out before he can consider her question or his response. He looks up and blue captures him.

"Will it bring you closure?" Naruto asks flatly, a question that expects no answer. "Will it bring your family back?" He's drowning in blue. "Will it make you happy?"

The words explode out of him. "You don't understand!" It sounds childish, hanging in the air between them. He repeats it, more calmly, injecting the venom always in his heart, "You don't understand. It's vengeance. I am an avenger." Somehow, the words he has always held in his heart feel weak. "It is justice."

She looks away from him, and after a moment he thinks it's over, but then she lets out a long sigh.

"Do you think Namikaze Minato is a good man?" She asks. There's a strange shade of wistfulness in her voice.

Blindsided and uncomprehending, Sasuke makes a noise of agreement.

"There was a man - a ninja, who went to war," she says, her words picking up speed as she continues. "He left his wife and a two year old daughter at home to fight for the ideals of his country, at the order of his Kage.

"But the battlefield was a slaughter. Neither he nor anybody there returned alive. His wife died from grief, not eating enough to sustain herself, and his son lived to hate the single man who stood against him on that battlefield - Namikaze Minato."

"Do you know, Sasuke, that there are hundreds of sons out there? Hundreds upon thousands, each one full of hate."

"There is a child that was hated. Everybody thought the child was a demon, because the child was the jailor and jail of a demon. So they treated the child like a demon, hating and cursing and spitting. The child thought that they were all demons, each one full of hate, until one day the child realized that they were, all of them, just humans. And that humans are full of anger and sadness and love, and it makes them do horrible things to one another. And who can judge? We are all just humans, so what right do we have to judge?"

As he is still digesting this, she barrels onward. "There was a girl who loved three different people. One was her best friend, her big sister - the other two the only mothers she ever knew. Two are dead and one has been driven insane now just because they cared for her, and because somebody else thought that hurting them would protect themselves and the ones they loved."

At some point she has gotten closer to him, the oceans in her eyes burning, her voice hoarse and quiet, a strangled scream killed before its birth.

"Tell me, Sasuke! Would killing the Hokage reverse his orders? Would killing him make Nonoko-sensei well again? Would killing myself take away their pain? Would dealing pain to others make theirs any less? Would it be right? Would it be just? Uchiha Sasuke, tell me the truth!" The pause between her words is a silence too vast and horrible for him to breach. "Is that justice?"

Into the silence of a world holding its breath she tells him in a voice too old for her years, "You can't find happiness from the past, Sasuke. You can't find justice there, or anything else. All you can find is anger and sadness and broken love, and that will make you hate, and you will become a demon fighting other demons. Whatever you're looking for, you'll have to move forward to reach it."

He has lost his whole family: hundreds of Uchiha clansmen; men of pride, of hot sweet bread and his name on the streets, of tales that rocked him to sleep and fueled his dreams. He has always been the most unfortunate, the one who loved and lost the most, to somebody who shouldn't have even contemplated taking away. His family. His family.

And yet somehow her pain seems to burn brighter than his own, searing his beliefs and turning them to ashes. It enrages him. Sasuke has lost his whole family, the one thing he ever had, to his brother, the one person he ever loved, and he opens his mouth to tell her that he doesn't understand, and she doesn't understand -

"You don't understand," she throws into the air, his own unspoken, traitorous words hitting him like a punch. Sasuke flinches. "And the worst thing is that you don't want to. Your brother, whom you loved," her voice lilts wonderingly, "Uchiha Itachi," the familiar rage wells up, "and your entire family. You don't understand why, and you don't want to. You just want it to stop hurting, and you think that hurting him will help."

The rebellious part of his heart tells him to run far, far away, but his feet are rooted, his bones struck by a suddenly overwhelming gravity. It occurs to him, then, that she has known the name of Uchiha Itachi, the answer to her question, all along - but that isn't what she's seeking.

She leans in closer. "You know I don't scar." He does; he's seen kunai scratches heal in minutes and horrendous bruises disappear overnight. "But I have one, right here," she draws a long line down her right side, lifting up her shirt where her fingers stop. He glimpses it - a wide white gash, and his mind supplies the blood and horror. "From when I was a baby. Because when people are hurt, they just want to hurt others. When they suffer, they don't want to be alone. They need to blame somebody. They think it will make it right. They think it will make the pain go away. But, Sasuke, that never works. It just becomes a chain of hurts, and in the end the scars don't go away just because you bandage yourself up with somebody else's blood and hurt."

There is a dark weight of past terrors in her eyes: of years on the street and each night full of fear and a hundred thousand monsters - her own city, army, nation full of Uchiha Itachis. It pins him in place and chokes his words.

"Namikaze Minato was a hero," she says. "And before that, a ninja. But to the broken in Iwa, he is a monster. Your brother is your monster," she says, and his mind makes the connection and tears it apart all at once.

"No," he whispers, hoarsely, after the desert in his throat gathers the water to respond.

"I know less than you," she whispers, like a secret. "So I am fortunate. Sasuke, you've been blinded by the things you think you know."

"No," he says, like a prayer.

"On a stranded island," she says, "there is a circular wall. There is no way to see inside from the outside, and no way to see out from the inside. Nobody has ever gone from one side to the other. The people on the inside believe the wall is keeping them safe from the people on the outside. The people on the outside believe the wall is imprisoning the dangerous people on the inside."

Naruto's eyes glimmer at him meaningfully. Her voice rasps, "Which of them is right?"

In Sasuke's mind there stands a ruin of the blood-soaked night that his family died. He runs through the streets and sees his brother and his heart shatters again and again, fire in his veins, burning broken bridges that would never rise again.

And in the same place he sees a wall and the deluded people who will never see the truth of the lie they live simply because they are too frightened to reach out to the other side. He sees the Yondaime's face on the mountain and the broken families in Iwa.

In his mind, Uchiha Sasuke sees Uzumaki Naruto and he wonders.

His heart, however, is hard. And even as she walks away and he ponders these things in silence and that so-familiar aching aloneness, it refuses.

But a seed of doubt grows - doubt in the truth that he has believed for so long. And in time, it thrives. After sleepless nights and days of thinking, it roots deep in his heart. Uzumaki Naruto doesn't transform him that night, but she plants the doubt that will.

You see, the doubt wriggles inside his head and stays there. It makes him look from both sides of the wall. It makes him think about things he had never dared touch before. It makes him question things.

It makes Uchiha Sasuke wise.

When Kakashi arrives the next day at his customary time, after they've completed their warm-ups, morning spars, and strategy discussions for today's torture during a second breakfast, they're surprised by the scroll he tosses at them.

Sakura's eyes light up. "Mission?"

Sasuke is oddly quiet, even quieter than usual. Paired with Naruto's uncommon introspectiveness, it's downright unnatural.

"We're going to change up the schedule now," he says. "Instead of training first, we'll do a mission, get lunch, and then train."

"So the mission won't take that long?" Naruto asks, finally seeming to wake out of her quiet stupor. Sakura begins unravelling the scroll.

"I'm fully competent in your capabilities as official genin," Kakashi says, waiting for the opportune time as they gather around the scroll. "Besides, whitewashing fences shouldn't take that long."

It's been a day of surprises. Kakashi joins them for an awkward lunch ("How are we supposed to strategize with him sitting right there?" Sakura hisses indignantly, as Kakashi sits there with the already empty bowls of polished-off ichijū-sansai in front of him). Even stranger, Kakashi also stays behind after another maniac game of hide-and-seek-and-dodge - the variation that involves less fighting and more steel weaponry flying in their direction.

They gather, as always, after practice to regroup. After the second session, when Naruto and Sakura decided that putting their heads together to plan would be preferable to another day of running around like headless chickens, Sasuke joined.

Now, Kakashi sits down with them.

"Okay," Sakura bursts out. "Today you're being unreasonably strange, Kakashi-sensei. How the heck are we supposed to plan against you when you're here with us?"

"Ma, I thought I should get to know my cute little students a bit better."

"Cute," Sasuke mutters to himself, rolling his eyes. The strangeness of the day has eased him out of his introspective funk from the previous night.

Kakashi smiles under the mask, an expression they've all gotten more used to distinguishing. "You know, I'm not your enemy-" ("Debatable," Naruto murmurs.) "-At least consider me a valuable resource, children."

There is a short pause before Naruto asks incredulously, "Does this mean you're here to help?"

In response, Kakashi turns to Sasuke. "Your speed is coming along well, though you'll always be built more for power. You specialize in ninjutsu, which, despite being powerful, is not always suited to every situation. Against me, in this setting, your fire was of no use. To improve your speed, focus on chakra control and cycling through your body to the muscles in short burst-style. Run with light weights on the route that takes you up the Hokage Mountain stairs twice a day. Your stance and form are a little tight; watch out for tenseness and misplacement."

He pauses, taking in Sasuke's wide-eyed stare. "Do you need to take notes?" He teases, knowing full well that the three are trained in memorization. "The next step for you in ninjutsu is testing your chakra affinity. That's a chunin skill, and we'll cover it soon."

Turning to Sakura, he says, "Your biggest issue is stamina. You've managed to build up a decent speed but you can't keep it up long enough. Also, you sometimes freeze up and panic when there's more than two threats to your person. Train your stress reactions and build up endurance by gradually training longer. Focus on getting your feet off the ground faster; you like to linger."

At her nod, he continues, "Your chakra control is one of the best I've ever seen, but you lack chakra. Building chakra can be dangerous if you go overboard, so make sure one of us is around when you're attempting. Just do an chakra-intensive exercise until you reach about 7% reserves, and then eat, exercise physically, and meditate. You should be able to do three rounds of this every day, but I'd recommend only two. Since your control is superior, also read up on medic-jutsu in the library. After you've progressed in that and genjutsu to a sufficient level, I'll find an advisor that specializes in medic-jutsu to help you continue your studies."

"Yes, Kakashi-sensei," Sakura murmurs, blushing, her mind already racing on to consider this challenge.

At last he looks at Naruto. "Naruto, your speed is very good, but your aim is not. Practice your aim; you'll never be a specialist, but you need be a decent shot. You pay attention to your teammates and come up with great improvisations, but when you have a plan you need to stick to it. Sasuke and Sakura have so far been very accommodating, but they need to be able to rely on you being where you've planned to be. You're not at the level you all need to be to come up with on-the-fly work just yet."

"Individually, you're particularly suited for ninjutsu, though up until now you've been focusing on taijutsu. Your Academy style is decent, but it actually doesn't suit your body type. Read up on different styles to get a feel for the ones out there, and we'll be looking at taijutsu styles shortly. Your speed is good, and you have great stamina and reflexes, which have helped you with an ill-suited style so far. Still, it would be a waste not to take advantage of your chakra reserves and control, which would be suited to ninjutsu and maybe even fuuinjutsu."

Naruto considers him carefully. "Why are you helping us?" She asks, slower to trust than either Sasuke or Sakura.

Kakashi smiles with his single visible eye. "Naruto, you're smarter than this. Haven't you figured it out yet?" He pauses meaningfully, then says, "I'm not your enemy. I'm part of your team. I'm on your side."

Perhaps something undefinable and intangible passes between them in that moment. Naruto smiles back suddenly, a bright beam, and Kakashi wiggles his fingers at them all jauntily before poofing away.

"So," Sakura inserts into the slightly stunned silence. "Library time."

She hesitates beneath the window. She eyes the trellis that her hands and feet scrambled up countless times before and the faulty window latch that, after all these years, still beckons invitingly. There is a soft golden glow coming from inside the glass.

The heavy weight of four years of cold war roots her feet in place. "Tomorrow for sure," Sakura says, and turns back home.

"I really hate fish," Sakura declares resolutely.

"Green jumpsuits," Sasuke says, in a tone that, for Sasuke, is practically a cry for help.

"If you feel so miserable, you can trade me places," Naruto offers.

Sasuke actually lets out a short huff of laughter. "Not in your wildest dreams."

"Fish are definitely better than Kakashi-sensei."

"I hate you both."

"Go on in, Sakura," Ino's mother's familiar voice breaks Sakura out of her inner contemplation. She offers her daughter's oldest friend a soft and knowing smile. "Please." There's a note of pleading in the word.

She has seen her daughter grow up and grow sad. And while Ino will not - can not - have everything she wants for her daughter, she will do anything for every spot of happiness she can arrange for her only child.

A kind of understanding passes between them.

The bell tinkers lightly. Walking into the shop is like walking into a perfume store filled with the comforting scent of her mother's favorite fragrance. Walking into the shop is like walking into a battlefield with no weapons in hand but a white flag. Walking into the shop is like walking home.

Ino murmurs a soft, polite greeting that loses coherency as she looks up and sees Sakura. Something caustic rises to her lips and dies just as quickly when Sakura holds out her hands, palms up.

"I've come to say sorry," Sakura manages to say through a mouth that feels suddenly like Wind country. "Some friendships are worth more."

"Green jumpsuits," Naruto says. "And the sunset. I'm blind. I've gone blind. Save me, Sakura."

"Shut up," Sakura moans into the table, her back muscles no longer capable of holding up her spine. "I hate you so much right now. I hate you almost as much as I hate Kakashi-sensei."

Sasuke just stares at his piece of paper like maybe intensified hatred will help it burst into flames.

"Is this the Naruto-chan I've heard so much about?" Ino asks, her smile sharp. Her hand tightens around Sakura's.

Ino is an inherently jealous person. Acerbic, talented, and an only child, she is possessive of everything she considers hers. And Sakura, her best friend long lost to the politics of teenage love and strained, barely-there civility, has finally returned to her. It's the detente, the end of the arms race, and she won't let anything jeopardize that.

But Naruto smiles. "You must be Ino-san," she says with a laugh in her voice. It's a persuasive kind of laugh, a bubbly feeling that whispers reassurance. It's a laugh that shouts, laugh with me, Ino! I'm on your side. I'm for you.

Ino leans in subconsciously before she draws on twelve years of living with her father and recoils a little.

The smile is still there, though Sakura is now looking at her with concern.

"I've heard so much about you," Naruto continues. Sakura now turns confused eyes on Naruto - she hasn't said much about her strained friendship with Ino, broken since the day she decided she didn't need to rely on the rock that had supported her anymore.

Naruto's eyes are captivating. Her smile is inviting. When Ino looks at her, she feels like Naruto has seen all of her and judged her - and found her lovely. It's a familiar expression. It's one her daddy wears all the time.

But there's a falter, a crack. Naruto's eyes break away. They sweep the horizon and something like pain or longing or bitter jealousy crosses fleetingly in the reflection of blue blue skies.

"You're a lucky girl, Ino-san," Naruto says quietly. "You are loved so, so much."

The words stay with Ino that day, and many days afterward. Even when Sakura apologizes laughingly for her teammate ("Naruto's fun, but she can get a little weird sometimes. Don't worry about it."), Ino considers the longing and the sentence and wonders.

Ino has never considered herself lucky. She's normal, and yeah, she's beautiful and smart and her daddy loves her. But she's just Ino, and these things are just natural. Love is something that happens like the sunrise every morning. She's never questioned it, nor has she ever found it fortunate.

But there's a ring of truth in that longing statement that makes Ino hug her daddy tighter that day, and hold on to Sakura's hand, and tell her mother she loves her. There's a bit of truth in blue eyes that makes Ino wonder if she's taking things for granted.

Two pieces of paper and a rock lie on the counter as they wait for the food to arrive. Three pairs of eyes regard their respective objects wearily.

"It's not just a matter of projecting chakra," Naruto murmurs. "But getting the right kind of chakra… How do you generate wind-natured chakra? What does it feel like?"

"Isn't this supposed to come naturally?" Sakura bemoans.

"Wind is swift and changing," Naruto mutters to herself. "Sharp and light, but also heavy… Ugh."

Sasuke keeps staring at his paper like maybe his rage, grown and nurtured for a week already, will manifest in flames and eat up the paper.

"A C-Rank mission," Kakashi says, and his students all turn to look at him suspiciously.

"No more painting fences?" Sakura whispers to Naruto.

"No more cats?" Naruto whispers back, gleefully.

Sasuke says nothing, but all his teammates can sense his barely contained energy.

The Hokage considers them all for just a moment, trying not to dwell on the way Naruto's eyes refuse to meet his. He sighs heavily, feeling as if the very air is heavier today. Gravity pulls down on his limbs and draws words from his mouth.

Minato, Kushina-chan, where did I go wrong?

"Very well. Team 7, a C-Rank mission."

Iruka says nothing as he hands Kakashi the scroll. His face is pale. Sarutobi knows that guilt weighs heavily on the young man, and he knows that it confuses Iruka, because Iruka's mind knows he did the 'right' thing.

But Sarutobi also knows that right is not so easily defined. And he holds that power - the incomprehensible power to say what is proper in this country. It is a responsibility that is too heavy to bear.

There are many things he does not say to Team 7 in that moment. There are many things that pass through his mind that will never reach his lips.

I am now sending you out to kill. I am now sending you out to die. I am sending you into a realm of shadow. Perhaps you are bored. Perhaps you thirst for action, for fighting and for glory and for vengeance. Perhaps that is what you think you desire.

I am now sending you into a place where all that is possible. And one day you will realize that it is not what you want. You will realize that you've lost things of great importance. You will turn around and wonder what it all was for, and then you will answer yourself with a lie so that you can keep living.

I am now going to ruin you. And for that, I am sorry.

But he says nothing at all. Sarutobi watches them walk out the door into the future they have unknowingly run enthusiastically toward.

He turns and beckons the line forward.

"Next."

Author's Notes:

My birthday present to you.

The bell test has died several thousand horrible deaths and it needs to stop as badly as I need to get into college.

Liffae ^-~