So this is a two-shot, but like the previous one, I'm not sure about the length, I had a vague idea, and thought about putting it up! So here goes nothing, yet again!

Tsunade scrunched her nose. She'd been absolutely willing to give up her position to him two years ago, when the Alliance had won the Fourth Great Shinobi war, but he'd just disappeared saying that he wasn't ready just then. And now, when it wasn't just a question of her will, but one of the village's need for a powerful new Hokage, he still wasn't there! It was his childhood dream for heaven's sake! How could he resist the urge and the greed to get it?

But she knew the answer to that, didn't she? She smiled, the boy who was practically a grandson to her, was also one of Jiraya's pupils. On top of that he'd gotten over the evils of hatred, greed, and all that shit, or so she'd been told by Bee.

She sighed. She'd released a searching team for him over a month ago, but there was yet to be any sighting of him. Her team had basically stopped sending her updates, so right now she was completely in the dark as to where he was. She slapped her hand on the table just hard enough for its upper portion to crack. Where was he!

"Master, are you okay?" said a pink-haired Kunoichi coming up to her, and placing a hand on her shoulder. Tsunade looked up at her, and a part of her anger went away. The girl was her student, and she was really proud of the progress she'd made with her abilities. She'd raised a good kunoichi over here, and that really got to her.

"Yeah, Sakura," she said, looking away, " I just wonder where he is."

"He?"

Tsunade looked at her gleefully, "You know, Naruto."

Sakura blushed, "Why are looking at me, my Lady?"

Tsunade comically wiggled her eyebrows, "Oh, you know, he, you, team seven, the war," Tsunade said all this casually, and suddenly gave her a strange waggle of her eyebrows, " Relationships."

Upon hearing her former master say those words, the Konohan Kunoichi, flabbergasted, turned tomato red, and started to hyperventilate, " W-What! What a-are you s-saying master! Nothing like that h-happened! N-Nothing! When he l-left, I w-was i-in love w-with Sasuke! And I haven't h-heard from him since!"

" Yeah right!" said Tsunade, grinning as she looked away, " That emo brat turned you down, and admitted to having gay feelings for Naruto didn't he?"

Sakura's eyebrows twitched, "Sasuke said that he had gay feelings for Naruto? No! No, he didn't do that!" she exclaimed, her eyes widening as she picked up her hands, wiggling them crazily in front of her master, " He just said that Naruto was a special friend of his, not that he felt for him in that way! And he didn't turn me down, we dated for six months."

Tsunade pouted, " Six years of searching, just for six months? Heh. Be it whatever, I'm telling you, those two have a few sick things going on amidst them," she looked up at the ceiling, as if pondering on something, " Perhaps if I applied the truth serum on that Uchiha brat, then..."

Tsunade's eyes moved towards Sakura, as the latter gave a small squeak. Tsunade chuckled, closing her eyes, and bending her head. She knew that what she said was having its impact on her pupil, and was pleasantly entertained by that. She was having a boring day, and her frustration was already hightened by the fact that she couldn't find her idiot of a 'Supposed-Grandson', so, this small little play-of-teasing was a good break.

She stood up, surprising a flustered Sakura, who was red-faced and thinking about the ways in which Naruto and Sasuke could have, er, got together in compromising states, and then she went up and stood by the window of her office, her expression unreadable. She looked up at the sky and her lips curved down into a frown. Her eyebrows scrunched and she slapped a hand on the glass of the window.

"Where are you?"

The blonde man was sitting in front of a gravestone in the forest, slightly bent towards the structure, and a smile played on his lips. He was sitting there with his eyes closed, having had formerly placed a bouquet of flowers in front of the grave. He cheekily scratched the back of his neck, and looked up at the sky for a moment, before looking back at the grave and resuming the monologue he was having with it.

"So yeah, that's how those land of tea-guys gave me a hundred thousand bucks, just for delivering a speech...," his eyebrows contorted into a frown, and so did his face, his sideburns softly grazing the the sides of his headband, which bore the symbol of the shinobi alliance, " I still can't bear with getting paid for nothing ya'know, Ero-Sennin. Its been bugging me for over a year now, I mean, sure," he raised his hands, and unknowingly waved them in front of his body, animating what he said, " Its great being called a hero, and all by the people, but... its just strange, ya'know, getting paid for that. Its not... right," he frowned, "And that's why I've decided on something," his smiled turned bigger as he closed his eyes, bathing in the wave of nostalgia that washed over him, his dimples softly coming up as he did so, " I'm gonna go back to Konoha!" he opened his eyes and gave the grave stone a thumbs up, "Dattebayo!"

One of the security-nin sitting by the gates of the village of Konoha puffed up a bit of smoke from his cigarette as he threw down his next card. He softly chuckled when his team mate made a disgruntled noise, and threw the rest of the cards he had in hands away, admitting to his defeat. The former grinned at the other, and collected the pile of cards, whilst throwing the butt of his burnt-out cigarette away, and placed the deck into a nearby shelf. He then turned in his chair, his colleague doing the same, and looked at the gate.

"Hell, why, why, doesn't anyone interesting come in through those two wooden sets of crap!" said Jin, the first guard, his left hand propping up his chin as he boredly looked through the village-gates. His friend, Rayto, groaned, and leaned back in his chair.

"Its 'cause its the month of June, and the interestin' folk've got business down in their vill'ges," he said indignantly, picking up the two of his legs and setting them up, lazily, on the desk in front of the two guards, which carried the register.

Jin placed another cigarette into his mouth, and puffed up some more smoke, before starting to turn towards his friend, " But you kno-"

The words got stuck in his throat, as a figure walked in through the gates he was previously bickering about. His shocked colleague made a weird movement, trying to jump up, while pushing the chair he was sitting in away, and ended up in the floor instead. He quickly picked up his head anyway, and looked, with wide eyes, at the man walking past them. Fuck interesting! This was gold!

"Er, ah," stammered Jin, not knowing what to say as he tried to address the man, "S-Sir, p-please give your a-autogra-, I mean, signature over h-here-"

The man looked at him, and the two guards gulped. He gave them an airy grin and started to walk towards the desk. Rayto feebly pushed to register towards him, and watched, with starry eyes, as the man signed in the small box beside the place where he wrote his name. He tossed the pen onto the register and softly chuckled at the two dumbfounded guards. He'd got used to that reaction by now, it was characteristic of the guards of every village he visited.

"Havin' a good day, huh?" he asked, bending down to sit on one knee, just as the two guards stood up in reverence, leading to the creation of quite a comical scene. He raised his eyebrows and gave a more audible laugh this time, leading to the profuse reddening of the faces of the two guards in front of him.

"Y-Yes..., I-I mean yes almighty! I-I mean-!" Rayton fumbled with words, yet again in a state of distress.

The man's cheeks puffed up with laughter, "C'mon dude, not that much, ya'know!"

Both the guards turned red in the face, and looked down at the guard-house's floor, comical depression-lines forming over their heads. The man lurched back in response, his words had come to possess a certain power of changing emotions after the war, literally! And he did have to take care of what he said to the people who treated him like a god; which was to say, nearly everyone.

"Hey now," he said, waving his hands airily in front of them as he smiled," It was just a joke, ya'know! I'll accept whatever ya'all call me, but," his eyes suddenly darkened as he turned his head towards the village," I've got some things to take care of."

The two guards looked up at the man, and their expressions became that of surprise, as they saw the man stand up and take out a cloak from the rucksack which was, until then, slung on his back. In one swift movement, he threw the cloak over his frame, and moved in perfect synchronization with the cloathing, to have it fall over his body. He then took hold of the hoodie behind the thing, and flipped it over his head.

"Ah, s-sir? Will you g-go about in t-that?" asked Jin, curiously pointing towards the cloth.

The man turned towards them, a bit of his blond hair visible beneath the material of the cloak, " Yeah," he said, and then added, " Don't want everybody to go off shouting out my name before I get together with the people I want to meet, ya'know."

Sakura pulled the chair on which she sat while she was inside her office up to her office's window, and sat down, in a rather preoccupied fashion, on it. Thoughts concerning her blond team-mate floated to her mind, and she picked up her right hand to support her face, as the thoughts suddenly weighed heavy on her mind. She softly scratched her chin with the ring finger of her right hand, and her emerald-green eyes darkened.

"Here!" said Naruto, pushing a blushing Sasuke towards her with a careless movement of his right hand, " Now ya'all can date, go out, and have all those little Uchiha babes you desire!"

Sakura too, started to blush profusely, and her eyes widened and whitened at the words of her team-mate," B-baka!"

"Wha-at?" said Naruto, waving his hand dismissively in front of her," No need to thank me!"

A nerve temple of Sakura's twitched, and a hand, pale from being tightened to a fist rose up and fluently went on to hit Naruto's stomach. The latter gasped in pain, as sole droplets of blood bounced out of each of his nostrils. His eyes went wide and his body limp, and his frame smoothly fell over Sakura's own.

"Shut up, ya'know!" yelled Sakura, and then went on to blush even more profusely when she realized that she had just used Naruto's catchphrase.

Naruto grinned up at her cheekily, just to have her breath out steams of embarrassment from her nostrils.

"T-That was a mistake!"

" Yeah, right."

Sakura smiled sadly as the memory came flushing back into her mind, and picked up her left hand in a frail manner to rub its fingers on the cold glass of the window in front of her, her eyes looking longingly at the distant mountains which rose behind Konoha.

"Come back," she said, a solitary tear grazing her right cheek as it fell down, " Please, come back," she gritted her teeth, and the glass of her window cracked, surprising her. Her eyes widened, but then returned back to normal when she realized that the cracking of the glass had taken place because of her forcing an amount of her chakra into her hand, unknowingly of course.

Sakura was surprised when she saw the tear on her cheek, and her eyes darkened even more. This is... new, she thought, but then brushed it off thinking that it was just sadness at her friend's absence.

XXXX ( - This indicates a break within the perspective of the same ninja)

Ino Yamanaka walked carelessly up the aisle of the market, happily humming a tune as she did so. Her hands held the bag which contained the groceries she'd gone out to bring, and, judging by the way in which the sides of the bag strained, she'd not bothered to stop herself from splurging a bit. Her eyes were closed, and the wind blew the long strand of hair which hung over her face in a playful manner.

Shikamaru's in for a surprise tonight, she thought as she opened her eyes. She'd started a live-in relationship with the Nara a few months back, and judging by her cheery attitude, one would take to thinking that things were going about flawlessly between them.

She kept walking up the aisle when her eyes suddenly caught hold of a glimpse of pink hair. She did a double-take, and then grinned trivially, before marching up to the figure and grasping its shoulder. Her eyes looked down comically onto the kunoichi in front of her, as the later gulped.

She slung her bag of groceries a bit back onto her arm, and pointed at the kunoichi, " You," she moved her hand to point at herself, " Me," her hand formed into a fist, " Hakumo's Restaurant. Now."

Not bothering to listen to the woman's reply, the Yamanaka clutched her even tighter, and set off towards the restaurant in a cheery sprint, the kunoichi flying comically behind her as she was tugged along by the same.

XXXX

" Pig! You should have at least let me respond," screamed the woman as she addressed the Yamanaka. But, one could clearly see, that under her angry facade, she really was enjoying the meal they were having as they chatted in their counter.

Ino waved her hand dismissively, having had previously kept her bag of groceries beside her, " Nah, and besides, from all the load of work you've been going through as head medic, I knew that you needed something of a break, Sakura."

Said woman glared at her friend in response, but her anger quickly faded away, and her frown turned into a smile. Ino had been one of her closest friends in the village after Naruto's departure. Sasuke was there, sure they'd broken up, but they were still in quite friendly terms, with the man often being subjected to her monstrous punches. But he just wasn't the same as Ino, because, although rivals, Sakura and Ino shared a strange bond, one that was quite parallel to that of Naruto's and Sasuke's, only that Ino had not deflected from the village, Ino had not tried to kill her, and..., wow that was a fair lot of differences they had right there.

Anyway, Sakura felt that Ino was her closest friend, next only to, her eyes darkened as thoughts of him flitted back to her mind, Naruto.

The Yamanaka, fast in spotting her friend's depressed expression, asked her about it.

"What is it?"

Sakura broke out of her daze, and looked at the woman, " Huh?"

Ino frowned, " I know you better than most, pig, and that was some seriously depressed face you had up just a moment ago."

Sakura raised her eyebrows, but quickly settled them back, realizing that it would be of no use against the woman in front of her, " Its nothing," she said huskily, coughing to get her voice back to its normal state, " Just thinking about something."

Ino's eyes widened with unhidden curiosity, " About him?"

Sakura's eyes snapped back to her, " Huh?"

Ino wiggled her eyebrows at her, much like how Tsunade had in the morning, " Naruto."

Sakura felt a blush creeping up her features, and that quickly confirmed Ino's suspicions. How'd she known about the Naruto thing anyway? There were tons of Shinobi in Konoha, why pick him? Wh- Sakura suddenly realized the direction in which her thoughts were moving and quickly stopped them. Naruto was her friend.

"Ooooooooo," said the blond, naughtily.

"S-Shut up! Pig." Said Sakura, looking away in a feeble attempt to hide her embarrassment.

But Ino clearly had no intentions of 'Shutting up', as, just the next moment, she continued, " But ya'know, he's been away for so long," her eyebrows twitched haughtily, " And you've surely-"

"I'm not thinking about him like that!" Sakura protested, but her heart did a double-take.

"Whatever," said Ino grinning like crazy, just making Sakura all the more aware of the fact that they were just about to embark on a long, long, conversation.

Sakura groaned.

Sasuke Uchiha was out on one of the hills beside Konoha, standing still as the wind blew over his clothes; his white top, black 'trousers' (? No clue sorry, I'm no expert on Japanese culture) and the purple ropes which bound his pants to him, his katana remaining still all the while.

One would have thought that he'd been rendered incapable of movement, but the very next moment, he finally showed movement.

He threw a kunai into the air, his eyes still closed, and quickly performed a few hand seals, creating hundreds of shadow clones of the Kunai. They flew into the air for a few moments, and then started to fall freely towards the ground.

Sasuke shifted his legs and firmly placed one a short distance away. His body slumped for a split second, and then he suddenly straightened and faced the kunais. He lifted his right hand to point in their direction, and then, in one powerful movement, opened his eyes to reveal his Eternal Mangekyo Sharingan.

"Sus'aanoo!" he screamed, and the monstrous thing appeared behind him, bow in hand. Sasuke waited for a second, and the thing gathered muscles and flesh, and then scowling at the now-near-the-ground-kunais, screamed.

In a swift movement, the monster in flames picked up its bow, strapped an arrow onto it, and launched it. The arrow flew singularly for a few moments before splitting up into a hundred smaller ones and swiftly moving to intercept every single one of the kunais. A small explosion transpired, and when the smoke cleared, nothing was visible but a few fragments of metal falling to the ground.

The Uchiha smirked at the result, he had only recently been handed back his eyes, having to do with a pair of extremely ordinary ones for the past year, when he'd been under house arrest. He'd been subjected to a trial, after the end of the war, where the kages had pondered on what his punishment should have been. They thought about doing something serious to him, but Naruto had stopped them, saying that without Sasuke, and the latter's brother Itachi, it would have been impossible to stop the edo tensei, since the two were the ones who'd singlehandedly, or perhaps, dual-handedly forced Kabuto to stop the edo tensei, then proceeding to finish him off so that no known users of the jutsu existed anymore.

Naruto, Sasuke started to ponder on the blonde. A rare smile enveloped his face, and his eyes softened. What with the strong outlook he always carried, the man had practically torn himself to shreds trying to bring him back! Sasuke became so grateful of him in the time following the war, that he'd openly acknowledged the blonde to be his brother, amidst many a surprised glance. He rarely showed any emotion at all, let alone proclaim someone to be his brother!

Sasuke stretched out his arms, and then cast a look at the mountains that loomed over Konoha; his face bearing an unreadable expression. One of his eyebrows twitched, and his lips bent into a scowl. He fisted his palms, and gritted his teeth, narrowing his eyes at the mountains.

"Asshole," he said, stretching out his lips, and momentarily pausing. Then he narrowed his eyes even more, " Where are you!"

He let out a frustrated sigh, and palmed his face dismissively. He was about to turn around when his senses picked something up. He scratched his temple, and looked up, eyes narrowed, just as a jonin landed in front of him.

"What is it?" he growled, looking suspiciously at the jonin, who, taking note of the black-head's obvious foul mood, took a few steps back in response.

"W-well, s-something interesting just h-happened at the g-gates, and seeing that it w-would have been g-good to inform you a-about it, the guards sent me here," stammered the jonin, earning a glare that conveyed even more suspicion from Sasuke. Seeing that things were progressing towards dangerous territories, the jonin started to panic, and wiggled his hands urgently in front of him, "Its true! Its important! I-its concerning h-him!"

Sasuke's heart skipped a beat, and his thoughts went immediately towards a shinobi with the greatest 'Sunny-Personality' he knew.

"Who?" asked Sasuke, his voice kept level due to years long of experience in concealing emotions.

The jonin blinked at his sudden change in behavior and grinned at the Uchiha, bringing his hands down by his sides, " Him," he said, his grin widening, " Naruto Uzumaki."

Sakura and Ino were bickering about the former's feelings for the blonde who was once her team mate, when the two turned around a corner and started to walk up the road leading to Ichiraku's Ramen. They continued to bicker a bit more, blonde probing, pink-haired denying, until they finally started to near the Ramen shop. Sakura's eyes went up towards the shop and settled on the small building in the middle of the road.

The pink-haired stopped bickering, and, frankly, speaking, as her eyes darkened with unspoken emotions. Ino noticed her friend's change in behavior, and looked towards the object which had taken up Sakura's attention. She turned her head in the direction in which Sakura's eyes were fixed, and took in the view of the restaurant. She smiled knowingly, and closed her eyes.

Be it now, be it later, Ino opened her eyes, and looked lovingly towards her friend, She will come to seriously consider her feelings for him sometime. She smile, and tilted her head, And that day..., will unarguably be the best of her life.

"Forehea-"

"Sakura."

Sasuke gracefully landed in front of the two. His hands momentarily touching the ground, before he pushed himself up. He dusted his clothes and then, after having given Ino a short nod, looked at the Pink-haired kunoichi with an expression which only the most seasoned eyes could interpret as an excited one.

Sakura tore her eyes away from the ramen-shop and looked at the Uchiha, her eyes widening expectantly when she saw the small glint in his eyes.

"What?" she asked nervously, gulping down her anticipation when she saw the man in front of her smirk.

"Asshole's back."

Sakura felt like time had stopped, and her heart-beat maddeningly sped up. She didn't hear Ino ask her who 'Asshole' was, and neither did she notice her own hands come up to her chest. She looked at Sasuke, and the latter nodded at her affirmatively, having understood what she wanted to ask him.

Sakura looked down at her feet, her eyes wider than ever, and let out a barely audible whisper.

"Naruto."

Author's Note: Yep, the first chapter. I didn't bother to keep them in character much with this one, its more of an AU fic. Tell me what ya'all think! :D

~THA musIc GuY

BTW, the Review button's on the next line! Buh Bye!