Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or any of the characters; they belong to Masashi Kishimoto. I don't get any money from this. This is also AU-canon divergence of Sasori's and Sakura's fight; you'll just have to wait and find out how.

Warnings: No warnings. Some mentions of NaruHina and ShikaTema.

"So tell me, how long have you known about Orochimaru's association with Kuno?" Gaara asked steadily.

This was not a good question (Sasuke long ago had determined that any question about Orochimaru or his time spent in Sound automatically qualified as a bad question); this was not a good day. All Sasuke had wanted to do was finish this forced trudge to Suna and be done with it. All Sasuke wanted to do was reach for the opium-laced drink he promised Naruto and Sakura he would not have. Baki kept looking at him sideways, reminding Sasuke of an Ibiki glaring out one-eyed through half-curtain mask. Sasuke could not remember if it was because he tried to kill Baki at some point or another. After thinking this thought after the tenth person or so, this thought had stopped to amuse Sasuke even in his darkest humors. Now whenever he thought it, he felt hollow as if his chest was going to collapse on him. Still, chest collapsing, he had to trudge on.

"Orochimaru and Kuno…I don't know anything about them working together in particular," Sasuke admitted half-heartedly. Technically, this was true, and Sasuke did not want to say anything else. Orochimaru had blown away soundless with the dust from his and Naruto's last fight. Though honor made him look for Orochimaru and report back to Hatake, when he had found no trace, Sasuke was content to leave it there. He did not want to think Orochimaru was still alive and doing the things he had done when he was Sasuke's teacher. If he was, then Sasuke knew all of this would be his fault. After all, it was Sasuke who had revived Orochimaru in the first place.

Gaara kept on glaring at him steadily. Sasuke scowled. Sakura said Kuno had taken genin; children were at risk. Sasuke hasn't sunk that low; he wouldn't risk a child's life just because he did not want to talk about something. He was not at the level of those Council of Elder fuckers who had a fourteen-year-old carry out their murders for them. No, Sasuke would never sink that low again if he could help it. Even though the name meant nothing now, he was still an Uchiha. His clan –family—had had honor once, even if it was so far back the stories did not remember it.

"After he disappeared after the Fourth War, I looked for him in Sound and all his other hideouts but found nothing other than whispers. Even when I asked Taka, my old team, they had had no contact with him. From what I can tell, there will be claims of a sighting of him in Grass, but when I get there, all trace of him or even the source of the rumor will be gone."

"And?" It was amazing how guilty the other man could make Sasuke feel with one word and a half-raised eyebrow.

"Kemuri, the village in Grass where the nuke-nin who attacked you were from, was a village he attacked. Grass was weak even before the war…now they're even weaker afterwards. If Orochimaru was going to be centered anywhere, it would be Grass. When he was building Sound, Orochimaru chose the Land of Rice Fields because it was a small nation with a collapsed government. None of the neighboring countries cared because all there was to Rice was starving children and failed crops, and all the starving children were glad for some order."

Sasuke paused, unused to talking so much to someone who was not one of the handful of people he allowed himself to care about on a personal level. He continued, "So Grass would probably be where Orochimaru would locate if he had the means to and if they did not hate him… but they do hate him. He has made a name for himself—not in a nice way—down there. Other than that, I don't know what Orochimaru would do with Kuno. Poison and sabotage are his specialties, but the taking your genin from Suna…Orochimaru never took children anyone would miss—just orphans and street urchins—he was pragmatic like that."

Sasuke bit back the bitter taste in his mouth. Children nobody would miss. Stupid foolish orphans who thought more killing would somehow make the killing of their family better. Oh to be twelve and murderous again…I won't let him lead anyone else down that path. I might have gone down it anyways, but he sure as hell made it a lot kamisdamn easier.

"Sending a note bragging about it seems like Orochimaru's style, though. Pragmatic, yes, but old fuck did like his monologues."

There, was that enough words? Fuck, Sasuke had always hated talking. He was never sure when to say something, so he usually just remained silent. If he was quiet and ignored the outside world long enough, it would just go away and he was left with himself.

Gaara tilted his head and jerked his chin. Sasuke hesitated before deciding to follow the other man. The water felt cold against his skin; there was no logical reason for him to stay there any longer. His muscles felt tight and his skin clammy. He might as well sleep warm in a tent than cold alone. But he could not sleep and he had promised Naruto that he would try to live; he had promised himself not to make Sakura cry again. So Sasuke would have no more drinks, no more opium-induced haze. The cramps and the clamminess would pass, but until then sleeping would be hard to come by. He would just stay tired.

Sasuke forced his mouth curve upwards into a smirk. If he was in the village, these were usually the times when he would meet Naruto at an empty training and fight until the bad feelings went away. Well, he had another body here—one that could be easily used as a sparring partner.

"So do you want to spar?"

His answer was a dagger of sand hurtling towards his head.

Sasuke was always more comfortable fighting someone than anything else. Some nights he was afraid to think what that meant about him, but most nights he didn't care. The dance of the fight was intoxicating, especially against a worthy opponent.

xxxxx

Naruto rested quiet staring at the stars, listening the sound of Hinata's breathing beside him. Shikamaru sat seated and smoking a cigarette on a rock ten feet away. It had been a long day. Despite trying to track the puppeteer who had attacked them, they could find no trace of him (or her, a voice in Naruto's head sounding much like Sakura told him). Naruto slowly rose, draping his jacket over Hinata before wandering over to Shikamaru.

"So you sent the letter to Kakashi-sensei. What do you the think the odds are that he actually reads it or he tosses it in a pile of all his porn?" Naruto asked.

Shikamaru grunted noncommittally. As Naruto's future advisor, he was being trained by spending more and more time in the Hokage Tower and more and more time trying to force Hatake to actually get work done. While Hatake was not as bad as the Godaime Hokage in regards to avoiding paperwork (which was not saying much), when he did do it, he was remarkably efficient.

Naruto took this at face value and decided to change the subject to something more interesting: Shikamaru's love life.

"So you and Temari?"

"Me and Temari what?"

Naruto smiled; Temari and Shikamaru were one of the couples of his generation that fell in love during the war despite the stench of blood from the battlefields. It was nice to see that someone could come together with another person to create future life in the face of all that death. Besides, he had been listening to enough of Shizune's and Kakashi's discussions on foreign affairs to know a marriage between the Kazekage's sister and the head of one of Konoha's leading clans could only be beneficial for the peace.

"I know what you're thinking," Shikamaru said, "Don't…I don't things will be like that. People are already saying that the peace is making Suna less powerful, too dependent upon Konoha and other villages; you see that with the coup Lady Kagome's husband planned saying the Gaara was making Suna weak. The Kazekage's seat is hereditary; if Temari and I start thinking about that while Gaara and Kankoro don't have heirs, they'll only see that as Konoha trying to increase its influence by worming its way into the Kazekage's family."

Naruto tilted his head, absorbing this. During the war, all he could think to keep going was simple: get Sasuke home and everything would be all right. Now Sasuke was home and things weren't all right. It wasn't the perfect ending the way Naruto imagined things would be when he was younger. Two villages that had fought each other less than ten years ago simply just couldn't trust; Sasuke simply couldn't get better, not trusting the world or even himself. Naruto could trust though, so Naruto would trust his friends as he had always done.

When he was twelve, Naruto had trusted Gaara, once seen as a monster, to become a better man; by the time Naruto was fifteen, Gaara was one of the best men Naruto knew. All Naruto had done was trusted and had faith in Gaara. Perhaps Sasuke could find something of himself in Gaara and follow his example to learn redemption was possible and he did not have to see himself as others did.

But Naruto also was not that fifteen-year-old anymore. He understood the need of watching problems that were occurring and planning to stop them before they turned to full-out catastrophes. Using Sasuke-metaphors as he often did in life, Naruto realized that if he had applied this philosophy to what he did when he was twelve, he would have noticed Sasuke's inner turmoil a lot sooner and knocked him out way before he ever thought of running off to Sound. Now, that would have saved a lot to trouble.

Biting his lip in determination, Naruto asked "What if Gaara or Kankoro were to marry a Wind Country girl and have children then? Would that help things?"

Shikamaru blew out a ring of smoke before beginning to answer the question. Times had changed since the days where the most intelligent conversation he and Naruto had was whether miso ramen was better than shoyu ramen.

xxxxxxx

Kakashi slumped down in his office chair, tossing the letter from Shikamaru up in the air before turning it to ash with a small fireball. The damned chair was too hard—he knew that it was supposed to be some kind of symbolism that a Hokage could never rest easy—but Kakashi thought that this was overkill. Even after a (Kakashi recognized the irony of the following statement) war for peace, enemies were still crawling out of the woodwork.

Only a complete idiot would think that being Hokage was an easy job. Even Naruto looked at him with squared shoulders and grim expression whenever anyone mentioned him being future Hokage these days.

According to letter just burned, Hinata, Naruto, and Shikmaru had been attacked on their way through Grass to Iwakagure. Grass—where all the whispers said Orochimaru's ghost roamed; Grass—where Kuno recruits seemed to haunt. Kuno was attacking Sand jonin with poisons that were formerly Orochimaru's signature. Now, an unknown nin—possibly Kuno's—was attacking Konoha jonin with Sasori of the Red Sands's old puppets. Kakashi's headache grew worse.

So trouble was brewing in Grass? The fact that four puppets attacked a peaceful emissary from the most powerful hidden village when there was nothing to gain from it meant that it was unlikely to be an act of any legitimate villages in the Alliance. Someone making use of Sasori of the Red Sands's old puppets was just another headache in the equation. Kakashi thought back to Sakura's mission report from her and Lady Chiyo's fight with Sasori; all the puppets had supposedly been destroyed after Sakura and Chiyo fled from the collapsing cave. But then again, when Kabuto had revived the majority of the Akatsuki, only Hidan and Sasori were left behind. Kakashi had assumed this was because Sasori couldn't be revived because he was more puppet than man…but what if it was because he was alive and buried under rock like Hidan…no, it was most likely he was dead.

Kakashi fought back a shudder. Kakashi had seen too many things to put any purposeful energy into jadedness, but not a lot of things could phase him anymore. The memory of falling rock on Obito's face was one of those few things, however. Being buried alive is not a fate Kakashi would wish one anyone. Kakashi sighed and reached a hand out to his stash of porn. Just three pages and then he could safely start to think of the best thing to do…

It was on his second page of porn that Kakashi realized, like he did most important realizations in life, that Sasori of the Red Sands used to be Orochimaru's partner in the old days of the Akatsuki. Kakashi knew that the unknown attacker was already making use of Sasori's puppets, but what if someone was using the puppet that used to be Sasori's body? In the aftermath of Gaara's abduction, no one had bothered to try to retrieve the body. It would not be below Orochimaru to use his old comrade's corpse. Actually, it was what would be expected of Orochimaru.

Kakashi thumbed the next page of his book. What would be the purpose of all of this though?

Almost reluctantly, Kakashi put down his book and began to write a letter to Neji. The traveling party to Suna would be passing through the Land of Rivers right now. At the very least, they should be warned to be on guard for any opponents similar to the ones that attacked Naruto. Besides, the Land of the Rivers was where Sasori of the Red Sands was buried. It would not be that far out of the way to ask Neji to investigate.

xxxxx

In terms of times for Neji, Baki, and two minor Sand councilman to walk in on Gaara and Sasuke sparring, any other moment would have been better. But since there were no gods, Gaara thought, they walked in the moment that they did. Well, Gaara supposed this was better than the time when he was six and walked in on his father getting a "kiss" on the crotch from his secretary. Uncle Yashamaru had eyes explained to unblinking eyes that it was because his father was a very busy man that had "adult" ways of managing stress.

That being said, the timing was still inopportune because Gaara wanted to continue the fight. Judging from the observers' faces, the scene could, Gaara supposed, be considered socially awkward even by his warped definition of the word. Simply put, he was straddling the Uchiha while trying to pin down pale hands that were sparking with lightning. Half of Gaaara's shirt may or may not have been burned off in the struggle before this. It was not his fault the other man was a pyromaniac.

When Uchiha had offered a spar, Gaara had accepted without hesitation; it was catharsis—being able to fight all out against another opponent who could equally match him and probably surpass him. Usually when Gaara fought, it was about survival. Training for future survival, teaching the younger generations and his troops so they could protect themselves, dirty fights to death. All of his past fights with the Uchiha had been just that—dirty fights to death, seeing glimpses of himself in the man trying to cut him down and blasting them back at him. It was different fighting the man as a comrade though. Not friendly exactly, but consuming. Gaara guessed he could see some of why Naruto liked to pit himself again and again against the Uchiha. The man didn't hold anything back, fighting like each blow was life and death, even when he was not trying to wound or kill.

Gaara looked up to glare at the men who had interrupted his dance-fight-spar with the Uchiha. His glare made Baki and the councilman look down. Only the Hyuga held his gaze.

Tongue darting out for just a moment to lick his lower lip, Neji cleared his throat, "I hope we aren't interrupting anything, Uchiha, Gaara-san." Uchiha felt warm beneath him. Gaara didn't want to move or think of anything else. It feels like I have been stopped half-way through a fight and I just need to finish…something, he thought.

Sasuke bucked his hips against Gaara's softly before Gaara slowly moved to get off him. Dark eyes deliberately lingered on Gaara's for a second before moving to Neji's. Sasuke began to as if to prowl towards the Hyuga before letting out a broken, barking laugh at something Gaara could not determine. Sasuke arched his back like a cat before smirking at all of the onlookers and sauntering off as he called over his shoulder, "And with that, I'll call it a night."

"Wait, Uchiha," Neji ordered, "This is something you'll want to hear too."

"Tell me in the morning. It's a long way back to the campsite, and I have to help an elderly grandmother cross the road, " was the only response as the Uchiha disappeared into the darkness. At this, the Hyuga seemed to grit his teeth slightly and struggle with his temper for a moment before regaining his composure.

"Well," Baki said, breaking the awkward silence, "at least that is the most cooperative that he has ever been. When he starts reading porn and showing up to things three hours late, I think we can say he's become Hatake fucking Kakashi."

Neji snorted, turned to Gaara, eyes glancing over his chest, and said, "I apologize for my comrade's behave—"

Gaara interrupted, "There is nothing to apologize for. It was just a friendly spar, nothing less, nothing more." Why did everyone seem to be making a big deal of something so trivial? They had better things to do.

The awkward silence reigned for a few more moments before the Hyuga simply handed him a letter. Their fingers brushed and Gaara felt a jolt of electricity similar to the one he felt when touching the Uchiha run down his spine. He continued to stare at the Hyuga instead of the paper in his hands.

Neji shifted and murmured, "This came from the Rokudaime just twenty minutes ago. I hate to separate from the group, but it should not take that long, and Kakashi-sama stresses that this is urgent."

Gaara read the sum of the letter quickly: Naruto's company attacked by Sasori's old puppets, Orochimaru—Sasori's old partner—at large, and the need to check the place that was Sasori's supposed resting place. The hairs on the back of his neck prickled in warning. He did not get to where he was today by ignoring his instincts.

"No," Gaara said. It would be dangerous if the Hyuga went there by himself.

"Excuse me?" Neji replied clipped and precise. "I have orders from my Hokage to investigate this. If Sasori's puppet or, more importantly, the puppet that is Sasori himself is being used to attack Konoha and its allies, it is imperative for me to find out."

"Take others; Kankoro, Baki maybe. If someone is truly using Sasori of the Red Sands' puppets, it concerns Suna since he a former Suna shinobi. It will need to be dealt with by Sand as well."

Neji nodded. "I will also take Haruno-san as she was the one who defeated him along with Lady Chiyo."

That was logical since the medic-nin was strong and would be guard to watch Neji's back, Gaara thought, unable to quiet the unease in his stomach. Something foul was prowling nearby in his territory, and he did not know what it was. Gaara did not like feeling uneasy.

"The rest of the group will continue to the edge of Sand, " Gaara ordered, "There we will visit the prison where Lady Kagome is being held, and Uchiha will help interrogate her. That should take approximately four days. Will you be able to meet us there at there by the end of that time?"

Neji nodded once more and disappeared in a flicker and shadow. Gaara tried to throw off the feeling that he should be following the brown-haired man, knowing where he was going. Something felt off, and Gaara did not want anyone under his protection (which the Leaf nin technically were since they were working with Sand currently; it was Gaara's duty to worry) wandering in dark shadows where dangers prowled.

Gaara scowled. He must be feeling out-of-sorts because of his spar with the Uchiha; the man usually had this effect on him. It was nothing other than a predatory reflex—a remainder of Shukaku. Gaara was not Shukaku; he was a man. He fought so long to be this, so he would remain like this and fight anything that would make him otherwise.

Face impassive, Gaara bite down on his tongue before walking to Baki and his council. There would be much to discuss.

Finally back home after study abroad! Classes start next week so I'll try to update at least one to two times a month at the very least next semester.