Adult-FanFiction.org : Naruto

Sector Five	By : FlairForTheVeil Category: Naruto AU/AR > Yaoi - Male/Male Views: 2291 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 2
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto nor its characters. Rightful ownership belongs to Masashi Kishimoto. I make no profit of this fanfiction.

Chapter List
- 18
- 19
- 20
Chapter 18: Scar Tissue

Sasuke coughed, wincing when his raw throat protested. “What friends?” He asked, his voice slightly raspy and giving out every few words.
“Eh…” Naruto shrugged his arm, hiking Sasuke from his slouching posture. “I guess you’ll see when we meet ‘em.”
He slightly tsk’ed his tongue in irritation. His neck ached as it was jolted with each step he took with the support of Naruto towards the center of the camp. Kakashi’s tall figure was coming more into focus now, holding a hurried conversation with Karin and Juugo. He was unknowingly standing in the ashes of their bleak inferno, finally brought to an end by this horrid attack. By his side were Jiraiya and Gai, chattering amongst themselves, seemingly oblivious to the destruction behind them. However, Tsunade was nowhere to be seen. Sasuke had expected her to drag all of the past days out of Sakura, but the girl was nowhere to be found, either.
Naruto glanced down at Sasuke, at the dark bruises interrupting the pale skin on his throat and the dry, brown streaks of blood on his temple and spread on his cheek. For Kami’s sake, why the hell didn’t he chase after Sasuke? Why did he stay behind to listen to a useless report that Lee had given him on the gun count of the officials? Why did he stay behind to tell Sai that he was glad he stayed with the group when, instead, he could have backed Sasuke up? Naruto lacked the words to explain the amount of unadulterated fear that had washed his blood cold when he thought Sasuke was dead under Kimimaro.
After all, the only one that would put up with him was looking ghastly pale under a figure in a crisp but torn uniform. The one that would listen to him ramble after long days during the cold nights with their backs turned to each other, and sometimes face to face. But when their backs were turned and he heard the fluidity of Sasuke’s words, inspirational and thought out, he couldn’t decide if he was jealous of them or strongly attracted to not only his looks but Sasuke’s being as well. He was overwhelmed with relief and gratitude to whoever it was that had finally ended Kimimaro’s life – he couldn’t even recall which side of Kimimaro’s head had been split open when the bullet escaped. The only thing on his mind was that he had possibly failed his best friend. Friends were supposed to be there at all times for each other. But there he went again, confusion sending his mind reeling. His hand felt shaky on Sasuke’s side, his heart faint and his head going nearly haywire. As he spotted Jiraiya in front of them, Naruto made a mental note to ask him about his own health.
Kakashi turned to them, grimacing as his eyes immediately darted to Sasuke and then sparing a glance to Naruto. The man was sweaty and looked exhausted, wielding a nasty welt on his temple.
“Sasuke, Naruto,” he said hurriedly, quickly but roughly laying a hand on Naruto’s shoulder and transferring Sasuke to his own. The boy didn’t seem to look too happy with the sudden change of positions and scowled and Kakashi attempted to pick him up like a child.
Before he could even open his mouth to protest Kakashi’s actions, a familiar voice was nagging in his ear and the zipper of his sweater was being pulled down even further.
Sasuke was sat down on a suspiciously smelling log and immediately fussed over by Karin. He didn’t need to open his eyes to know that Kakashi was looking at him with pity. He could feel it in the own sinking of his heart into his stomach and the usual way he felt when someone stared at him, the subconscious realization of someone else’s stare. Kakashi’s single eye, although he attempted to put up a front of curiosity, held deeper volumes of concern and empathy for Sasuke. Unfortunately, that wasn’t what he wanted right now, and it certainly wasn’t what he wanted. He had already gone through an emotionally exhausting conversation with Naruto, and that was all he needed. Sasuke simply wanted to sleep.
He regarded Karin with slight confusion and detachment, having no reaction when she spread the cut above his eyebrow to have a look for lodged items or a need of stitches. It burned nonetheless and pins prickled the back of his neck. She murmured something under her breath that Sasuke couldn’t hear. He listened to the soft conversations around him, the occasional grunt of pain and the painful gust of cold wind in his gashes.
He finally realized how exhausted his body was and how heavy his limbs felt. Naruto said something to him, but he sounded muffled and Sasuke couldn’t be bothered to answer him. Karin’s fingers felt cold on his forehead, spreading triple antibiotics above his eyebrow and placing butterfly closures on his gash.
Sasuke, just this once, let it slip when Karin ran her fingers a bit too slowly over his uninjured lips. She pressed her fingers along and beside his jaw as well, lifting his hair out of the way to inspect his ears.
“Tilt your head back,” she murmured, crouching in front of him and craning her neck so that she could get a better look at the ovular bruises on his neck. Sure enough, there were two large ones just half an inch apart from each other on Sasuke’s Adam’s apple. Karin winced and thanked Kami that her friend was sitting in front of her at this moment, though he looked sullenly tired and was practically nodding off right there.
Naruto supported Sasuke’s head so he wouldn’t have to strain his neck. He made a weak attempt to slap Naruto’s hand away and quietly grumbled his disapproval, turning his head away from his hand.
Karin leant over Sasuke and glanced at the back of his neck, finding eight more consecutive bruises and slight crescents of nails. She sighed and raised both of her hands, running her fingers over them to check for swelling. Then she placed each one over all eight bruises, aligning the wide fingerprints and leaning back to see the front of Sasuke’s neck-
The blond suppressed a gasp and held his hand out, stopping short as to not smack her square in the chest. Sasuke’s eyes snapped open and he quickly shoved her back into Kakashi, raising his hands to his own neck-
“Hey!” Naruto called, grabbing his friend on the shoulder to snap him out of it. He shook Sasuke slightly, effectively making his hands fall from his neck and dark eyes focus on him. A muscle in the other’s jaw jumped.
Behind the inner workings of Sasuke’s mind, he weakly reminded himself that this was Karin, his longtime teammate, friend, and sister figure. She was an excellent medic. She wouldn’t ever attempt to intentionally hurt him, and this certainly wasn’t the case. He was just overreacting, remembering the bulge of Kimimaro’s veins out of the backs of his hands from the corner of his eye. He was only back on the ground in the forest for a few seconds, and then Naruto grabbed his shoulder.
He glanced at Naruto, noticing that his breathing had ceased and that Kakashi was holding Karin by the shoulders, all of them waiting for some sort of response from him. Slowly, he inhaled a deep breath and lamely returned his hands to his side, irritated that he had put himself in the spotlight.
“I’m sorry…” Karin said, shyly pushing her glasses up higher on the bridge of her nose. “I wasn’t thinking.”
Sasuke simply nodded once, gently scratching at the tender area on his temple. He didn’t fail to notice that Naruto’s hand hadn’t left his shoulder and the three were still staring at him, Karin and Kakashi holding a pitiful and patient expression and Naruto a bold and encouraging one.
“Karin, why don’t you take care of that cut on Naruto’s shoulder? I’ll patch Sasuke up from here,” Kakashi said, patting her on the back a few times.
Karin nodded and sent a fleeting glance towards Sasuke out of the corner of her eye, leading Naruto to another first aid kit on the log parallel from Kakashi and Sasuke.
The man sent him a patronizing look with his single eye, lowering all of himself onto one knee and resting his arm on his kneecap to dangle his hand between his legs. “What was that about?”
“I’m sure you’ve already heard the word,” Sasuke grumbled, his voice still raspy. His throat felt like two pieces of sandpaper rubbing against each other as he swallowed, no different than when he spoke.
Kakashi hummed and turned around, unlatching a canteen of water from his belt loop and twisting the cap off. He held the camouflaged print flask to Sasuke, dipping his head.
He narrowed his eyes and grasped the canteen, inspecting the subtle crow’s foot on Kakashi’s single visible eye. He tilted it back and swallowed a few mouthfuls of water, not exactly soothing his throat, but refreshing it nonetheless.
“What is the word?” Kakashi asked softly, his single eye alight with mirth. “I’m not very caught up with the hip words you kids are into.”
Sasuke scowled and cursed the tall man. On a single knee, Kakashi was only an inch higher than Sasuke’s head from his position on the log. He was looking down at him. “I’m still sure as hell you know I took on Kimimaro.”
“Sasuke!” Kakashi looked more concerned than ever. “Do you know-“
“Yes, I know,” Sasuke stubbornly interrupted and capped his canteen. “that’s exactly why I took him on.”
“And nearly died because of it,” Kakashi’s eyes flickered to the bruises on his neck. “What would Itachi say?”
“Don’t talk about him,” he snapped and stared at his own boot, his body temperature peaking.
“You need to face it,” Kakashi chided and leant away from him, scratching his chin. He observed Sasuke with curiosity and a mocking knowledge. “Now, have you been sleeping?”
“Of course I have,” Sasuke immediately brushed off Kakashi’s questions. He was accustomed to this man’s constant mind games.
“You know…” the man said, relaxing on his haunches and capturing his eyes. “I went through the same thing with my best friend.”
Sasuke raised his eyebrow. “What?”
“Your lingering memories,” Kakashi murmured, regarding the boy calmly. “about Kimimaro, not Itachi. I-“
“I told you that I’ve been sleeping already,” Sasuke said in a hushed voice. “and that I took all my damn medicines. I’m just tired-“
“You just need to talk,” the man fired back and tilted his head, raising his eyebrow with startling authority. He seemed to want to cut to the chase today. “and I don’t think you’ve even made an attempt to.”
Sasuke leant back and furrowed his brows, regarding Kakashi cautiously. A muscle in his arm betrayed the apathetic mask on his face. If only the man knew. He remembered all of Naruto’s touchiness and his mushy words. If that wasn’t enough, then he didn’t know what was.
“Contrary to your popular belief,” he dug the toe of his boot in the ground out of irritation, “I already talked to Naruto. I don’t need another one of your psychology lessons.”
Kakashi actually looked surprised for a few seconds, his dark eye widening slightly and closely inspecting both of Sasuke’s. “You have?”
He nodded. Kakashi always seemed to know when he was telling the truth or speaking a lie. The man obviously had some past expertise in the art of interrogation, but whenever Sasuke and the others pestered him about it, he’d always say that he was just a natural. Sasuke had no doubt that this man had been a Sector guard himself before and had escaped before things became… violent. It was evident in the way he spoke and in his fighting style, in the way he always made decision all too wisely and quickly, and in the way his eyes looked as if the man were hundreds of years old already.
Kakashi chuckled and shook his head, pushing his left hand off the ground to stand up and rub his hands off of each other. “Well, I’d never think that I’d see the day, Sasuke.”
Sasuke raised both of his eyebrows and watched Kakashi open up the first aid kit by his feet. “The day of what?”
Kakashi chuckled to himself again. Frankly, this man’s games pissed Sasuke off, and he wanted an end to them right now. He wouldn’t be the kitten to take the yarn so Kakashi could milk some confessions out of him.
“Well,” the man gestured for Sasuke to tilt his head back again. “in all honesty, the day you would open up to someone. I should have noticed it would be Naruto, but I’m still surprised regardless. I kind of expected this out of you, Sasu.”
Sasuke scowled at the nickname and took in Kakashi’s words with precise analyzation. What on earth could he possibly be getting at? “Expected what out of me?” he asked, already a bit offended.
Kakashi dabbed a cooling gel over the bruises on his neck and smiled. “Oh… nothing important.”
The boy glared at the shock of silver hair in front of him. Did this mean that the man would finally stop bugging him for “meaningful talks” and all the vague and shady stories from his past, as well?
Kakashi stepped over the log and held a few locks of Sasuke’s hair away from the nape of his neck to put a thin layer of gel over the bruises there. He impatiently watched and listened as Naruto unleashed his colorful vocabulary while Karin poured hydrogen peroxide over the modest gash on his back a few feet away. Sasuke suspected it to be from a low hanging branch, his theory supported by the few pieces of bark Karin yanked out.
“I think you’re the only one behind on a few things.”
Sasuke sighed. Not again.
“What is it now?” He breathed, exasperated.
The other man hummed. “Well, I guess I won’t explain it to you, but rather have it explain itself to you.”
A vein in Sasuke’s head bulged. He was seriously over this man’s mind games. He didn’t want any damn banter or riddles within ten feet of him at the moment. His mind just wasn’t up to the challenge, deprived of sleep and partial oxygen.
“Sergeant!”
His face fell at the title. Sergeant? Were there still military officials on their land? He turned his head in the direction Kakashi had yelled in.
A woman now stood directly behind him, dressed to the nines in an odd maroon pantsuit and strange shoulder tassels. Behind her were two men, one whose face was ridiculously covered in what looked like a child’s finger paint job and the other tanned to the danger of melanoma and matching sun-bleached hair.
“You were missing this one, Kakashi?” she replied, an easy look on her face but with an intense and firm look in her eyes. She was robust and self-assured.
“Sasuke,” the silver-haired man nodded. “this is Sergeant Suna. The reason we weren’t here for a few days… Jiraiya originally got into contact with her a few months ago-“
“And harassed me into bringing my men over here,” Suna finished boldly and fixed her dark green eyes onto Sasuke. She gave off such an impression that Sasuke was sure Kakashi wouldn’t attempt to finish his sentence, and he didn’t question rising from his seat. Her face was strikingly familiar, though, and Sasuke couldn’t recall where he had seen it before…
“I’m going to be very straightforward with you,” she deadpanned. “I’m very tired of telling this story over and over again as your camp seems to multiply every few minutes. I’m going to cut it short…” she pulled a small device from her pocket and a roll of paper was handed to her by a man behind her. “and get to the point.”
Kakashi chuckled beside them. “Now, Lady Suna-“
“I won’t hear it, Hatake,” she interrupted once again. Suna wasn’t exactly the largest woman, a few inches shorter than Sasuke and looking to be just over one hundred and ten pounds. What she lacked in physical traits was certainly made up for in her personality and behavior.
“Look around yourself,” Suna said to him, slightly impatiently. “Do you see this as a home anymore?”
Sasuke didn’t need to look behind himself to know that there was torn tents and personal belonging strewn and mixed with blood. He had already witnessed just a fraction of it. They also had no food or water, and now that the snow was melting, there was no means of fire for this camp. He didn’t exactly know what he expected to return to after all of this happened, but that wasn’t in the front of his mind as he took on Kimimaro. “No.”
“I’m sorry for your loss,” she grumbled. “Jiraiya over there somehow tracked my men and I. Idiot, he is. Blabbering about all the military checkpoint myths and their shelter.”
Sasuke’s heart sank. The checkpoints… were merely myths? All of their details had seemed plausible and credible in the past. They weren’t often spoken of, like a wish that might not come true if you spoke of it.
“Not exactly myths,” she corrected herself. “The ones I have invaded are used for recreational purposes like storage and… testing, you could say. Prototypes of the Sectors’ new technology. Those who haven’t attempted to enter one are lucky. It was a dead end for those that believed.”
“I have my own kingdom of working bees similar to that,” Suna held the paper out to him.
It was a blueprint, slick paper that only the Sectors provided. Sasuke glanced to her bored face and back down to his fingers to unroll the long paper.
At first, he was slightly confused. For a moment, a wave of embarrassment washed over him as he thought he was holding the blueprint upside down. But the words were right side up…
“Yes, it’s underground,” Suna said. “For means of safety from the Sectors, this is unheard of to them. Their strategies for attack are…” she winced. “well, let’s just say that when the Sectors let us go, they didn’t just lose their population. They lost most of their brains.”
A victim that had made a stand, Sasuke saw.
“I can already tell that you’re a smart one,” Suna chuckled. “The reason why the infirmary is closest to the surface of the earth…”
“Just think about it, I guess. I built this myself, but don’t shun the credits to my men, and with efficient strategy. With the healthiest and strongest on the lowest level of this whole building and majority of our population on the second. But the sick and injured… if we were ever to be invaded, or an earthquake was to destroy the foundation, we lose the weakest ones first. Of course, not without a fight, which I guess you’ll see why if you agree to recruit. It’s strategy, not cruelty, by the way. That leaves our strongest population to dig themselves out and restart a new generation, a new foundation.
“You have a choice whether you would like to come with us or not, like I said before,” she raised a hand. “I think we all know that in this world, we have complete free will.”
Kakashi nodded empathetically. He harbored admiration for this woman’s actions and steps towards all of this…
“That leaves us - with what we’ve always had, by the way – with a fighting spirit and a yearning to explore the unknown and challenge the impossible.”
Sasuke raised an eyebrow, not exactly sure that he had caught on with this woman’s rapid explanation of what seemed to be her recruit camp. “And what is the point of this?”
Kakashi shot him a warning glance and tensed, notifying Sasuke that he had done something wrong. The men behind Suna shifted their arms to their sides and glared at him. The atmosphere became tense as Suna raised her flaxen eyebrow and gazed at Sasuke firmly.
She looked at her own shoes. Silence washed over them for a few moments and the two men behind Suna glanced at each other, sharing a look that didn’t give much away to their thoughts at all. The smaller of the two placed a hand on her shoulder, opening his mouth.
She chuckled, her shoulders quaking with each short laugh. Her guard slowly took his hand away from her shoulder and returned it to his side, stepping a respectful distance away from her and resuming his glare at Sasuke. Suna raised her head and fully smiled, shaking her head at the pale boy in front of her and reaching her hand towards his shoulder.
“Now I definitely want you in one of my divisions,” she smirked and placed a hand on her hip. “more blunt than I could ever hope to be.”
“If you were politely wondering, all of my recruits are given a healing window and immediately put into conditioning for division testing. All of you are immediately signed up for various missions I need done around there. They can range from floor cleanup to invading a Sector for their technology, information, and goods. Whatever reputation you earn yourself, the higher ranks of missions you get. Also depends on what division you’re in, since I tend to assign the heavier tasks to the stronger or larger ones. But there’s not a day in the Center where you’re not doing something productive. All I’m warning you is that, if you join us, you’re in for the ride of your life.”
Sasuke nodded as she spoke, processing the information she spurted and occasionally glancing down to the blueprint of her building. This…. Center, as she called it, was definitely an opposite idea of the “freedom” Kabuto had stuck in his mind. He and the others he took with him would live a pointless and unbeneficial life...
His thoughts took a nasty detour back to his brother and he shook his head slightly.
“So what do you say?” Suna tilted her head back and smirked. “Join us or not? You learn more once you join, by the way.
Sasuke’s eye twitched. And she said that he had a choice. Suna was bribing him with knowledge, which was a path that Itachi had always taken with him. He pictured himself in that building, doing whatever the hell Suna’s orders applied. But, before he could stop himself, he subconsciously glanced to his side for Naruto’s answer. Of course the blond wasn’t there, but he happened to be sulking across from them in the direction that Sasuke had glanced in. He cursed himself for his reflex and he could practically feel the upturn of Kakashi’s eyes.
“Ah…” Suna smirked and let a smug leer come across her face. “That’s your pal, huh?”
Oh, he begged Kami to shoot him. There was no point in even opening his mouth as he willed a flush of anger down to the sound of Kakashi muffling a giggle with a fake sneeze.
“Attached by the hip,” the man put his two cents in and grinned at Sasuke.
Suna snorted and crossed her arms, sending Sasuke a sly look and tilting her head to the blond. “So you wanna know what Naruto said.”
She cast her eyes to the sky and scratched her chin, all the while holding a mischievous expression that sent Sasuke off the rail.
He grunted and ground his teeth together. “Can we move on?”
“Relax a little,” Suna drawled. “after all, if you say yes, you’re in good hands.”
“Why did you do this?” Sasuke asked out of irritation. His voice was full once again and now he felt a bit more confident in himself, ready to shoot Kakashi down should the man make a sly comment.
Suna seemed taken aback by the question. She had probably been expecting an immediate answer from Sasuke, not an abrupt subject change. She glanced behind herself and to the two guards, sharing a look with both of them and turning back around.
“What a weird question,” she said quietly and raised an eyebrow at him. “but I guess, since you asked, you’re expecting an answer.”
Sasuke nodded. His hair felt tangled from where he had been rolling on the ground in his own and others’ sweat and blood. Trust him, nothing sounded better than shelter with an illegal system of energy and working sewage pipes. But to him, this woman needed an earnest reason for him to consider giving her an answer…
“I had a brother,” she said quietly. “he was five years younger than me. We lived in Two. Ever since the extermination of the people…” she shrugged. “we were separated. Behind me is my other brother, and we have been looking for him for the past ten years. I guess the impact of his absence really got to me and stirred up the need to help others that are lost. There’s not a moment that goes by where I think he’s dead, so he’s not. It’s our sibling bond. Family doesn’t give up on each other.”
He narrowed his eyes at Suna and at the familiar shape of her face. It was unhealthy to harbor such a sight about her brother’s death. Ten years of absence? That was ridiculous – in his opinion, that brother had only about a one to two percent chance of survival on his own. If he were five years younger than this woman in front of him ten years ago, that would make the boy anywhere in between the ages of four and ten. No child could survive like that out here, and most importantly of all, alone. He glanced at the tall man behind her, his face almost completely square and baring little to no resemblance to her own delicate features. The only thing they had in common was their eye color, though they were both different hues of green.
“What’s your first name?” Sasuke asked.
Suna now stared at Sasuke, contemplating why on earth he would be asking that question. It was rare that she was questioned for her first name in the first place – most recruits assumed that Suna was her first name, and if anybody were to ask, she’d take on a pseudonym for her family’s safety. But now it seemed like the days of easily fooling others were coming to an end as her chat with this Sasuke became longer and longer.
Kakashi discreetly elbowed him in the ribs, an obvious indicator that Sasuke had done something wrong yet again. But to him, a question was a question and an answer deserved to be a valid one.
She narrowed her eyes. “Why do you need to know that?”
Sasuke didn’t answer and continued to stare at her, expecting an answer within the next few moments. It was best not to let her change the subject and Sasuke, though quiet and reclusive, could easily recognize certain body languages. Suna was evidently suspicious and, if he remembered correctly, the way her pupils dilated indicated that she was slightly nervous. But without the body language or not, she was very good at concealing her emotions – as expected of a leader figure like her.
“Temari.”
Sasuke blinked. He didn’t recognize the name from anywhere. Maybe his mind had played a trick on him?
“Neither of us recognizes your name,” Kakashi said softly, offering her a respectful nod. “perhaps telling the others might help.”
“What was your brother’s name?”
“Sasuke,” Kakashi snapped and sent him a warning look. “That’s enough.”
Frankly, Sasuke had had it with all of the scolding from the perverted man. If there was a question to be asked, why not ask it? In fact, he found answers to be pretty damn useful. Even though his questions might not be polite all the time, they couldn’t be considered intrusive or threatening. He was simply wondering.
Temari sighed and looked behind herself at her brother. He was obviously an aggressive man, a story told by the deep scars on his face and the venomous glare he was sending Sasuke.
“The point of this whole conversation was to recruit you,” the blonde grumbled.
“Gaara…” the man behind her suddenly grumbled.
A look of shock came over Sasuke’s face. He glanced over to Kakashi, whose face had become amazingly expressive for one half covered in spandex. Their sights connected and a hush fell over the small gathering. Kami… Sasuke would have never expected such a moment like this to fall upon them.
“What is it?” the man behind Temari spoke up again. “You look like you know something!”
“Kankuro,” Temari said softly. “don’t get excited. They may not even know him.”
“Sergeant Suna…” Kakashi began pulled the patch off of his left eye. It had been a while since Sasuke had seen the thick scar over that eye. His own felt heavy and slightly burned.
“We do know him,” the man pocketed his eye patch. “or we did.”
Temari seemed to be indecisive of how to react – she was caught in some sort of odd mixture of anger, confusion, sadness and joy. Sasuke observed her cautiously as she visibly swallowed and licked her lips, her eyes only widening for a few seconds.
“Gaara?” she asked, her hand suspended in midair at a height Sasuke recognized as a small child’s. “What does he look like?”
“Red hair, green eyes,” Kakashi simply stated. “Neigh tall…” he held his hand up to his shoulder and held it there. “maybe just a bit over a hundred pounds.”
Temari sighed shakily and closed her eyes, biting her lip. “He’s always been so malnourished… that has to be him…”
“Why didn’t we hear about this earlier from any of you?” Kankuro interrupted, appearing to be a bit frustrated.
“We did report to you that five disbanded from us,” Kakashi replied. “but you never asked their names.”
“Who was he friends with?” Temari suddenly asked and turned back to the scattered population of their camp. “I need to talk to them.”
Sasuke glanced to the ground and then back at the blonde. “Naruto was, but…”
“Naruto,” she called and turned to the snoozing boy across from them. His head bobbed in his sleep as he slept sitting up against a log, his head falling onto his shoulder over and over again before swaying to a slightly upright position again.
His friend looked stupid when he slept, Sasuke thought. “Naruto!”
Said boy’s head snapped upright and his eyes fluttered open, his hands raising from his sides and spreading his fingers out. “What?” Naruto mouthed repeatedly as he struggled to completely wake up, fumbling with his blanket.
“Please come here,” Kakashi demanded rather than asked. “it’s very important.”
Naruto finally stood up and messily draped his blanket over the log, mentally promising it that he would be back later. Glancing towards where the Sergeant, her companions, Kakashi and Sasuke were standing, he frowned and wondered what the situation could possibly be.
He approached the group tentatively. “Yes?” his eyes darted from Suna and finally stayed on Sasuke, sending him a questioning look. He looked frazzled and well past the marker of exhaustion.
“Were you friends with Gaara?” Suna suddenly asked, fixing her hard gaze upon him as she expected an immediate answer.
“Yeah?” he said. “I guess I was, anyway. Actually, just about a month ago I-“
“Oh my goodness,” she breathed and grabbed him roughly by the shoulders, nearly dislocating them with her strong grip.
“Uh, yeah. So just about a month ago, I was travelling-“
“In which way did he leave with Kabuto?” the Sergeant interrupted once again. She was leaning heavily on Naruto and he dug his heels into the ground to prevent himself from toppling over.
Naruto held up his finger and squinted his eyes. “Uhh… that way,” he pointed to his right, the exit Kabuto and his cronies had used to abandon their camp. He hoped that she didn’t bring Itachi up in this conversation. “Like I was saying, we were-“
“Kankuro, send our trackers back here tomorrow. With the hounds, as well.” Suna dropped her hands from Naruto’s shoulders and turned to her men.
“What, you’re not going on an immediate search for him?” Kakashi inquired and raised his eyebrows. “Perhaps it’d be best if you did.”
Temari’s lips twitched. “An immediate search would do nothing but send him and the others running away even faster than they were before. Besides, I think I know exactly where they’re going.”
“Really,” Kakashi stated, not showing too much interest. “Kabuto notified us that he was going to be travelling to an abandoned military base.”
She winced and crossed her arms, shaking her head as she looked to her subordinates for support. “Dream chasers, they are…” she coughed. “I know which base that they seem to be heading to. There’s definitely a couple in that direction.”
“Are they going to be successful in their so called mission?” Sasuke cut in.
“Honestly…” Temari blinked a few times and pursed her lips. “they actually might have a chance of owning a whole base to themselves. But who’s to say that there’s not completely deactivated Katons or scouts hiding from their own Sector presidents. That seems to be a common rumor going around in the world of those believers. I know one of them was completely demolished by a Sector, and one of them has a fifty to fifty chance of being empty of occupied. But either way, it was a pretty damn stupid decision. Think of it as walking right into a Sector’s trap.”
Like we had, Sasuke thought. They had walked straight into a trap. Their whole group was no different than the newfound enemies they’d made of Kabuto, Itachi, Neji, and Gaara. He found it ironic that the second Hinata was gone, everyone else finally seemed to notice her presence and have some odd contest of who was the closest friend to her.
“Anyway…” she shook her head and smiled. “this is some amazing news.”
Kakashi nodded. “We were glad to help.”
“And thank you for that,” she quickly added. “So, Sasuke… is it a yes or a no?”
Now that Naruto was actually by his side, he didn’t glance over into empty space. He consciously stopped himself from looking at his friend to avoid the embarrassment.
The fleeting second in when their noses had passed each other and their breaths mingled back in the forest opening… his whole body felt warm and his stomach jumpy. That was definitely something he hadn’t experienced before, a moment so intense that he’d surely wouldn’t forget it. Most of all, it was shared with Naruto, a boy who seriously seemed to be racking up the firsts in Sasuke’s experience book. He was unfortunately left feeling very confused. It was like his soul had packed his bags, jumped out of his body, and had taken off after whatever it was chasing. He would make sure to fit the puzzle pieces together, though, with any chance that he would get.
Sasuke pursed his lips and glanced to the ground. Why was the action even necessary? Of course he was going to say yes. There was absolutely no way that he’d strand himself out here, and he was sure that Naruto wouldn’t, either. So he raised his head and nodded calmly.
“I’m joining.”
Temari stared at him for a few moments, the hand on her hip flexing. She offered him a tight smile and a grateful nod, her eyes speaking more volumes than he could recognize – this woman wanted him at her center what seemed to be very badly.
“So Sasuke was the last person you had to consult around here?” Kakashi rushed. “You’ve even spoken with Shikamaru?”
A smile slipped on her lips. “I woke him up to do so. And yeah, Sasuke’s the last one.”
“So what happens now?” Naruto asked and scratched his cheek.
“Now we pack up,” Temari clapped her hands together and glanced into the tent area. “whatever personal items you have, bring them. Except clothes – we have plenty and you’ll eventually be issued uniforms. Make sure to bring all of the weapons you have left over, too, since I’m sure that we have the ammo for them.”
Sasuke was slightly moved. Issued uniforms? Temari must have had a somewhat large population back at her underground center. From the scaling of the blueprint, the building was already moderately large enough. But now he really wondered what kind of organization this was, besides its front of running missions against the Sectors.
“Thank you for taking the time out of your schedule to come over here once again,” Kakashi said. “I’ll make sure to tell the others.”
Sasuke and Naruto nodded at her, turning back to the tent area. There was ripped pieces of cloth spread everywhere, blood mixed in snow, clothes and shoes strewn everywhere. Altogether, the sight was disastrous.
“We didn’t have anything that important… right?” Naruto winced. He seriously didn’t want to step over some of the blood and other slaughter to get to their tent.
“Nothing,” Sasuke replied, unless you counted their hoard of blankets as important.
Naruto sighed. “Thank Kami.”
Sasuke nodded and they bathed in an awkward silence for a few silence. His fingers twitched by his sides and Naruto glanced off into the woods, digging his hands into his pockets and drumming against his thighs. Now the ramifications of their all too intimate moment really caught up with them.
Sasuke remembered something. “Naruto…” he pulled on the loop of his belt. “here.”
Naruto regarded the Jericho in his pale hand with surprise. “What’re ya doing with this? I thought I had it all along…” he patted his sides.
“I don’t know,” Sasuke answered honestly. “I guess I picked it up when you dropped it.”
He took it from the other and twirled it in his fingers. “Ah, thanks. I would’ve lost it.”
Sasuke hummed. “Are we supposed to be walking to Temari’s center? How far away is it, anyway?”
Naruto looked around himself and Sasuke. He knew one of those guys was standing around here somewhere, picking through the mucky aftermath of their battle and searching for Sector DNA or something like that…
“Who are you looking for?”
The blond gasped and jumped, whirling his body back around to be blinded by the shade of Sai’s skin. A cold smile stretched across the boy’s face and he tilted his head.
“What the hell, Sai!” Naruto yelled. “When did you get there?”
“I’ve been here the whole time, dickless.”
Sasuke glared at the two of them. Maybe he really should have left himself to this world. He didn’t want to listen to this headache inducing shit when they were at the recruit center. Admittedly, he was tired of Sai’s antics as well. But the boy had no censor or common sense, so he did as he pleased.
“Damn you, Sai,” the blond grumbled. “where the hell are Suna’s men?”
“I always had a suspicion of where your preferences lay,” Sai deadpanned and nodded to himself. “I believe you just confirmed them.”
Naruto’s face turned all kinds of red and his fingers twitched in front of his face with the desire to strangle this sheet white dude. “You’re the one always drawing naked guys and dicks! You’re one to talk!”
“It is called art.”
Sasuke sighed. He, once again, wanted nothing more than sleep.
“Is there a problem here?” an all-too familiar voice bellowed and closed in on the three. Sasuke nearly groaned – would he ever get a fucking break?
Gai was suddenly standing in front of them, his hands on his disturbingly protruded hips. His sun-wrinkled face was set in one of authority.
“It appears to me you are arguing about the expression of your youth.”
“Sai’s fuckin’ creepy!” Naruto screeched and pointed at the pale boy. “He keeps making a bunch of inappropriate comments!”
“Youth,” Gai fisted both of his hands in front of his face, quickly turning red from all of the air he was holding in his lungs for his lengthy speech. “is expressed in many different ways, my young ones.”
Sasuke stared at all of from the figurative sidelines. Honestly, he had had a choice to walk away – and he devastatingly missed it. Now, if he were to move an inch, Gai would be on his ass like no other.
“Whether it be in exercise,” the man nearly dropped to his knee in an expert lunge. “or beautiful works of art or in the shots of a gun,” Gai closed one eye and pretended to shoot something in the distance. “it is all… youth. Youth is youth. All of you – you are in the prime of your youth. The springtime of it.”
Though Sasuke wouldn’t have said a word either way, he was left speechless. Gai teared up in front of the three of them.
“I just want you kids to live the springtime of your youth,” he breathed and squatted to the ground, grabbing some stray sand and sprinkling it to the sides. “so please… do as you wish. Follow your golden little hearts.”
Even Sai had been shocked into silence, sending Gai a frightened look as he continued to meditate while doing squats. Naruto blankly stared at the man throughout his whole outburst, not making a single comeback or comment.
He watched Gai press his hands together and move his head from side to side as he rose in the squat, holding completely still for a few seconds and doing the same movements as me moved down.
“How are we leaving?” Sasuke demanded and prepared himself for the man’s reaction.
“We are leaving in the most generous of ways,” he replied and opened his bug eyes. “Sergeant Suna’s energetic men have fixed the government vehicles for us to use since our population is so large. She says that her recreational center is twelve hours away by vehicle!”
He sighed. At least he would get-
“Sasuke,” Gai said and stepped closer to him, reaching his hands out for his shoulders. “Sasuke…”
Then, it seemed Sasuke’s vision had gone into a tunnel – he only saw the shaky and thick fingers of Gai and the monstrosities he called eyebrows.
Youth.
In that moment, his thoughts blurred by sleep deprivation and hunger, Gai seemed like a monster. He seemed like a fairytale villain that sucked the youth out of children and teens to make himself look younger.
I just want you kids to live your springtime of youth.
Sasuke quickly dodged the hands of Gai by moving to the side.
Gai fell to the ground on his face, his hands still extended and his fingers still open to grip what would have been Sasuke’s shoulders. Naruto wheezed out a laugh next to him, slapping his hand over his mouth to cover it. He smirked, glancing over his shoulder to see the man performing a few sets of pushups.
“Sasuke! Naruto!” Ino jogged over to them, a piece of cloth holding her hair out of her face. “Sai… where have you been all this time?”
“I have been around.”
“Okay, well, we need to leave right now before the Katons start coming out where the center is,” she breathed. “Did ya get all your stuff?”
The three of them nodded. Sasuke had his shotgun, Naruto had his Jericho and hunting knife, and Sai had his backpack full of art supplies. All they really owned couldn’t even fill a duffel bag.
“Okay,” she struggled to catch her breath and motioned wildly for them to follow her. “we’re assigning adults to cars because we have so many people.”
Ino turned her back to them and jogged back to the right of the camp, to the same opening that Kabuto had left through. It was the one that led their heavy footsteps to a now-filled parking area.
Kakashi leant against their large SUV, patiently waiting as Kiba and Shikamaru placed Suigetsu in the trunk on a homemade cloth stretcher. Next to the black vehicle were the two compact cars that the group had already owned, the two military issue vehicles that Naruto had snuck into just hours earlier, and two more huge black SUVs that topped every other car in the area.
Kakashi knocked on the metal of their vehicle, gaining Naruto’s and his attention. “Let’s get going,” he said and grabbed a rail at the top of the SUV to swing himself into the driver’s seat and launch it. Sasuke glanced behind himself as the windows illuminated their traditional electric blue and the doors opened on their own.
Before, it had just been their SUV and the two aforementioned little compact cars of this group. Now, it had multiplied into seven vehicles all carrying a comfortable number of members. This camp had come a long way, and he would make sure to remember this part of the world in which he’d read so much books to learn about himself. Too many things happened here, he had been close with Itachi, and now he would be over a day away from his brother.
He climbed into the vehicle after Naruto, getting a window seat and the accomplishment of not being next to Karin. Juugo sat in the front and, once again, Suigetsu was in the back – albeit-
“I’m glad he’s out cold,” Karin grumbled. “finally fucking quiet around here.”
Sasuke snorted. It really would be a relief. The grinding of rubber against rock announced the first exit of a vehicle, as well as a few more to follow their four-wheel drives. Kakashi didn’t exactly wait for Tsunade’s vehicle to back out and narrowly avoided a three-way accident.
Before he knew it, they were speeding down both lanes of the road once again and constantly switching should any of them become a certain target. Sasuke rested his head against the window and gazed outside to the blurred dark green of pine trees and gray of the slush and rocks.
He glanced back to his right to see that both Naruto and Karin had already fallen asleep, their quiet snores alternating beats. Karin’s glasses hung off her face as she pressed it against the cold window and hugged herself in her sleep.
Sasuke tucked his back into the small corner between the door and the seat, stretching his legs out diagonally so that they wouldn’t uncomfortably tangle with Naruto’s. He slid down a bit and relaxed his shoulders, watching the calm rise and fall of Naruto’s chest and the movement of his eyes behind his eyelids.
Of course the moment he got the chance to sleep, he couldn’t. He raised his head again to glance at Suigetsu’s unconscious body in the trunk, reaching over and grabbing a couple of blankets for them. Juugo’s soft voice filled the vehicle as he talked with Kakashi in the front.
Knowing that Karin tended to be prone to hot flashes, he carefully draped a fleece blanket over he and Naruto’s laps, using the second one he grabbed to cover their torsos. He fit himself back into the little grove he had made himself comfortable in and stared out the opposite window.
Something… about Temari’s recruit center seemed concrete. Maybe it would be the final place they would all settle down after struggling to look for a home for a very long time. Too long of a time. Sasuke would be living with a purpose, and not a second of his time would be wasted. It was the best life an evict could possibly live, and he was thankful for the opportunity Temari had presented them.He wondered what the center would have in store for his future.
He tugged the blanket closer to his chest, taking a deep breath and letting it out slowly. Sasuke’s eyes slid shut and the gentle bumps in the road finally lulled him into a long-awaited sleep.
- 18
- 19
- 20
You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.You need to be logged in to leave a review for this story.
Report Story

Sector Five