From the Ashes

"What the fuck happened last night...?"

My head is pounding.

I remember going to sleep because I wanted to get over my muscles' pain—and they are, thankfully—but what the hell happened with my clones? Vague memories filter through my head as I extricate myself from my hiding spot into the kitchen, only to be interrupted by a feeling.

Someone is here—no, outside.

And I've been noticed, too careless just now.

But who the hell would be sneaking around my house?

I suppress my presence and check my chakra. It's at full capacity, give or take a few Transformations. I can deal with this before I try to figure out yesterday's shitshow. Sneaking to my nearest stash of weapons, I arm myself with a pair of holsters.

But just as I move out to investigate, a familiar voice calls out.

"Sasuke-kun...?" a tentative, quiet voice calls out from outside the front door.

Sakura?

The hell is she doing here?

I raise my guard, just a little as I open the door, Sharingan taking her form in. No Transformation, chakra residue, or any other signs of foul play. The scratches on her fingers and the details in her cornea look right, too. Her thoughts seem—

"Sasuke-kun!"

She jumps at me, arms outstretched for a hug, unshed tears rimming her eyes.

I step back, maintaining my ma'ai from her.

"What are you doing here?" I ask, frowning at her, before my eyes are drawn to the side at a memory. Tiger balsam? Nice. Not that I need it anymore.

Just a little stiff, where yesterday I want to put a kunai to my throat. Still would be useful.

But she's incoherent, holding herself physically back after recoiling at my refusal to let her near me. She hiccups, trying to gather her wits.

"You were gone, but you were hurt after, and—they said your brother was here, and you went after them, and you were gone...!"

Some of that does sound familiar...?

I remember hanging out with her with one clone, preparing for a second ambush on Itachi, and...

"Hold on..." I frown.

Yesterday is a complete mess, not as bad as the day before was by any stretch, but none of the thoughts and observations seem to fit anywhere properly. Something about the divide between ninja and civilian societies? What the fuck? Who cares about any of that...?

Sakura lets out another sobbing hiccup, holding herself back from jumping me. Seriously?

"They were all clones, calm down. I slept through all of yesterday." Of course, that does little to calm her down, but whatever. Emotional teenage girls are hardly reasonable. "Sakura, sit down and shut up. I need to think for a little while."

She nods, closing the door and taking off her sandals, making sure to dust off her feet properly before entering.

At least she has manners...

I go to the kitchen, mechanically starting the preparations for some breakfast as I try to figure out my jumbled memories. The first thing that stands out, is that one of the clones is just gone. No memories. None at all.

Shit, did Itachi somehow get to it?

Alternatively, if Kisame ate the whole clone with his Samehada, that might work, too.

No, wait...

Second clone's memories. Shadow Clone Explosion. It detonates the clone with its own chakra, and... ensures no memories are returned.

Well, now I have a memetic hazard contingency for Shadow Clones. Of course, it only came the fucking cost of losing all my observations on how Itachi and Kisame fight...!

"Fuck," I whisper with a grimace, slamming the frying pan on the stove to cover my voice from Sakura. "God fucking damn it."

"Sasuke-kun?"

I ignore her, continuing with my breakfast preparations. I still have that leftover half of cold-smoked salmon still. Should I make the extra effort?

The second clone didn't do much better either, despite his preparations with Sakura. Speaking off...

"Did you have my wallet, Sakura?" I ask without looking.

"Oh, yes! It's right here," she answers promptly.

"Right, put it down wherever. You have any breakfast yet?"

"I di—No, I haven't."

Hmm.

Well, whatever. The egg carton is nearing its expiration date anyway.

I'll boil some rice up real quick and fry it together with the eggs at high to give it some crunch. Goes great with soy sauce, too. Practically a treat.

Great, now I'm comfort eating.

At least the third clone managed to accomplish something, getting Naruto a warning and hopefully buying enough time for Jiraiya to come in and save the day. Though all of my plans for the Amaterasu fire were lost, obviously.

Frankly, I don't even know for sure if Naruto got out alright, but... I do have some faith in his ability to survive.

This was a disaster, start to finish.

Proper preparation and planning prevent piss-poor performance. That was more or less my motto, but I lived in a fluidity due to my primary source of information being an anime. I didn't have solid dates for anything, and while I could check some things like the Chuunin Exams and the finals, others which just sort of happened in a vague afterward weren't so easy to deal with.

I had limited myself to preparing for Orochimaru and the invasion and thus left myself completely wide and useless for my brother's visit. I could bemoan that I had expended all of my resources and I really had nothing left in my quiver, but...

That was just an excuse. The path to power was one that did not accept excuses, shouldering every mistake and owning it.

I need to review the hell out of this encounter. Overall just too damn sloppy.

Why didn't I prepare better? I had more than enough forewarning that they would come, so why hadn't I been preparing for it?

Was I getting cocky? Definitely too damn cocky. Needed to reel it in and get better.

"Kakashi-sensei was looking for you, too. I only found out about everything this morning when he woke me to ask about you."

I look up at Sakura as I set the table, stumbling out of my thoughts to respond.

"Huh. Well, I'm sure he'll show up sooner or later again. Hopefully with my sword."

She nodded, sitting happily in the chair, her arms pressing down on her thighs as he legs swung back and forth. Was she humming now, too?

I get the rest of breakfast served and then sit down to eat.

Sakura blinks when I don't say anything before starting to eat, but she digs in a moment later too. It's nothing special, but it's healthy food. Everything a growing boy needs to become big and strong.

"I didn't know you cooked, Sasuke-kun. It's delicious."

"Hn," I grunt, not even looking up.

Remaining undaunted, she continues. "What kind of food do you like to normally eat?"

I look up at her, the beginnings of a frown forming.

"...Salty and savory foods. Meat, fish, eggs. Low carbs."

Which reminded me, I still hadn't tried eating tomatoes. The contrast in my tastes from before wasn't that big, though, so I doubted I would really like it.

I had a massive sweet tooth in terms of cravings back before too, but whenever I indulged I just found myself disappointed with the taste immediately afterward. That, and sugar was a hyper-addictive poison. So I steered well clear of that shit. Well, sometimes I ate a mochi, stick of dango, or sweat tea in passing, unable to resist.

But after the first few bites, it always seemed to go back to being a disappointment.

So a rare treat.

Probably for the better: no ninja dentists.

Back before I had also loved whole milk, but now the taste just didn't fit my palate anymore. Probably had something to do with my genetics – my grandfather used to always take a small pack of cream, pour in sugar, shake it, and drain the whole thing when he didn't have time for a full lunch break.

Loved that shit back before, too.

Along with raw horseradish with a fat slice of butter on top. Or gingerbread with blue or goat cheese...

I actually missed all of those things, now.

Maybe I should just genjutsu myself into not caring about food at all... Musashi was big on the whole 'fuck food, become independent of everything' and he said to not have any preferences for it...

I was just distracting myself right now, though, from thinking about how badly I'd fucked up. I wasn't getting another crack this good at either of those two ever again. Even I hadn't even planned on following canon, but somehow it had just happened. Well, the training wheels were off now. Past this point, I knew practically nothing.

Speaking of training...

I needed a more thorough understanding of how all the pieces fit together, too.

Taijutsu, kenjutsu—or did they call it something different here?—and throwing techniques all seemed like a simple enough force multiplier, and I was pretty solid at that already. I had a solid basic taijutsu style going on with everything I'd stolen and worked out until now, though I would probably combine the Gentle Fist's upper body defensive and control work with the Strong Fist's kicks for offense after working out the kinks, so with those plus the Sharingan and Shadow Coaching, I was pretty much top-tier there already.

The sword was a work in progress, on all fronts, unfortunately again.

For throwing, all the variations of chakra string technique kept me pretty solid, and my bow added a few dimensions as well.

What was holding me back was simply my age. They were force multipliers - but my base was still too weak; I needed more mass, a bigger stronger body, and more chakra and control so that I didn't always have to work from a position of weakness. With my current skill level, even without any additional training or refinement of technique, every bit of improvement in those areas would prove itself dramatically.

But, only time and training would bring those.

"But you don't like ramen, much...?" Sakura asked and I looked up, a little annoyed to be distracted from my planning.

"I like the taste just fine. The umami of the stock, the saltiness of the pork, the kick of garlic... It's the noodles. Too many carbs - makes me crash for an hour."

"Oh..."

Good, munch on that and let me get back to my thoughts, woman.

Now, where was I...

Ninjutsu wasn't altogether too different, though I needed more chakra there too, and to figure out exactly how well I could use each element before I dived in deeper. The invasion had given me an absolutely staggering library to figure out, as soon as I could really sort through all the memories of the past few days. I needed to build a solid kit, with a jutsu for the most common scenarios that I would encounter, that I could train and get down pat.

I didn't use the Great Fireball often, but usually when I did in the right situation, it worked spectacularly. So I needed to identify and fill in those situational slots, so that when I needed it I could just pull that card out of my deck without hesitation.

Wasn't there something also about electricity that I was looking forward to testing—Oh, right. Fire chakra.

I was pretty sure my affinities were for Lightning and Fire and that didn't seem like a coincidence to me, because both were plasma, the fourth state of matter. Now certainly there was an argument for excluding fire from that category, as it often more accurately matched the category of a gas... But get it hot enough and it would start turning more into plasma, which was to say there was usually at least a little bit of plasma, which was surrounded by gas, in most fires.

So, it seemed like it was time for me to start seriously analyzing how my elemental affinities worked, because I had something of a hunch about those.

"What are those marks in the ceiling, Sasuke?"

I look up, annoyed again by the reminder that my sword was gone. Fuckers better give it back in pristine condition.

"I was training."

She blinks. "Isn't that... dangerous? Inside, I mean."

"Hn..."

Blessedly, she got the hint, turning her attention back to the food.

The final piece of the ninja power trifecta was a problem, though, as I had already observed.

Genjutsu was annoying. There was so very little wiggle-room there. You either won or you lost. And with how much better Itachi was at it, it just seemed completely useless to me right now. Hell, for all I knew he'd installed some kind of failsafe into my mind, one that he could trigger at any moment. It didn't even have to be yesterday - I still didn't know how or why I was here, just that as a result of the Uchiha massacre Uchiha Sasuke had been reborn.

Orochimaru had been shit-talking me about that, too. And now that I had beat him with genjutsu, it behooved me to actually master it.

I need to start pushing more limits with my training. Not just with the Sharingan either: I need to be able to sense and use it the regular way. If there are some principles that are beyond my eyes, I won't know of them unless I figure it out myself the hard way.

But I did have some ideas...

Until now I had been holding back against my clones, not wanting to cause any permanent damage to my own mind. But with the Shadow Clone Explosion jutsu completely wiping its memories, I could just first set a self-destruct trigger and then absolutely scramble its brains.

Endless practice dummies, fully configurable, and always willing.

I chuckled to myself, ignoring Sakura as she looked at me curiously.

Looks like I'm about to hit my Rennaisance in genjutsu.

Though, I had observed the difference that the coils and tenketsu could make, so maybe I needed to train against more variable targets instead? I knew my own coils inside out already and that allowed me to be lazy and complacent with what I did in training. There could very well be things I was missing because of my unique circumstances on that front, too.

I looked up to Sakura, considering it for a second before sighing as she caught me staring.

Same problem as back before, when I'd realized I had trouble with backing away in a longsword match in the heat of things. I always wanted to push, but sometimes it was more advantageous to learn how to back off, especially against a certain kind of opponent who knew how to push and back off in turn. In the old club, we all always pushed, which did make me fantastic in grappling and allowing me to win such matches 11-0, but it was also curbing my growth.

And as such fencers hadn't existed at my club, I had left, joining a kendo group instead - solely to hone that one area properly. It would have simply taken too long to teach someone else to do it adequately to be my training partner, had I stayed.

Still, unless Kurenai is willing to take an apprentice...

Then again, she had tried to use genjutsu against Itachi, so maybe that wasn't the best choice anyhow.

Annoying, but I couldn't complain. Life couldn't always be easy.

There was a knock by the door and I looked up from my bowl of rice with a frown.

"I'll get it?" Sakura asked, standing up from the table.

I shook my head, telling her to keep sitting with a nod. It was starting to get tiresome that the whole damn village was apparently choosing to start visiting me from now on.

"Door's open!" I shouted.

There was a pause, as even Sakura seemed a little taken aback as I went back to my fried egg rice. So good.

Through my peripheral vision, I could see the door being opened by some kind of ANBU, though his gear appeared non-standard.

Clack.

Clack.

Clack.

Who the fuck walks with a cane in Konoha?

I turn around and look at the man who entered, not even sparing a glance or nod to the ninja who opened the door for him.

Black hair, bandages over half his head, black and white robes. And a big damn stick.

Who the fuck is this supposed to be?

"Danzo-sama!" Sakura exclaims, standing up by the table.

Again, who?

I don't remember this guy. But he makes me itch, like I need a shower. His entire persona just reeks of asshole. He reminds me of my commanding officer in the military, a guy completely high on his own farts and who is entirely out of touch with everyone else.

Once I showed up late back from weekend leave, by like an hour and a half because of the bus schedules, so to reprimand me he immediately called me to his office. Made me stand at parade rest outside his office door for exactly an hour and a half before he called me in. I don't even remember what he said, but the gist was 'You have wasted everyone else's time. How does it feel to have yours wasted?'

Which, uh, considering that it was raining cats and dogs outside, where the rest of my unit was digging holes and filling sandbags... Felt pretty good actually. Real warm and comfy.

"I, please, sir..." she says, awkwardly.

Why is she offering her chair to this guy?

"Sakura, sit down and finish your damn breakfast. I went through the trouble of making it, so finish it or get out."

Fucker shows up at my house and starts demanding chairs. And I only have the two, anyway.

She looks torn and overwhelmed until I glare at her and she meekly sits down.

"So. What do you want?" I ask, taking my chopsticks to the salmon and ignoring my newest annoyance.

Mm, just the right amount of salt.

"Uchiha Sasuke. You were instructed yesterday to remain at your domicile until given further orders."

"Mhmm."

Neither of us says anything, the only sounds filling my apartment my eating, and Sakura's awkward fidgeting.

He didn't even ask a question so what does he want me to say? Besides, how the fuck does he even know that? Is he in leagues with Kakashi? He's got the one eye covered, so does he have a Sharingan, too?

Probably not. It's not like these things grow in trees.

"Right, how do I put this..." I set down the chopsticks with a sigh since he's just going to haunt me for the rest of the day at this rate, slowly finishing my mouthful, taking extreme care to chew properly. But without the sound of mastication, since one of my friends back before hated the sound.

Done, I look at him. "Who are you again?"

"Sasuke-kun." Sakura whispers at me heatedly, glancing at the man even though his lone visible eye hasn't so much as budged from me. "That is Shimura Danzo-sama, he sits on the Konoha Council."

Wait, that thing is real?

Oh wow, I didn't like this guy, but now I know he's an asshole.

Because, you know, the Council. Those things always sucked!

Especially since I had a lot of recent gripes with the way things worked in Konoha and I didn't want to hate the old man Hokage, since he was kind of cool and relatively more understanding of my shenanigans than I would have been. But now with this guy; the lemon-faced sourpuss sitting on the Council, I had a perfect authority figure I could pin all my troubles on.

"Riiight..." I nod at her, then point at the man, still standing utterly imperturbed. For all I knew he died on his feet just now. He's old enough for it to be a possibility. "This makes us... what, exactly?" My finger wags between us, as if drawing a line to connect us as I ask the question.

Danzo inhales slowly through his nose, his eye narrowing slightly.

But he says nothing.

I smile winningly, snapping my fingers and pointing at him as if I had solved the puzzle.

"Right. It makes us nothing at all." Because fuck you, I only take orders from the Hokage and Kakashi, and the latter only when I feel like it. "Glad we cleared this up." Did I just see the slightest twitch in his black eye? I think I did. "Anyway, can I get you something? A glass of water, perhaps? Or maybe a cup of 'what the fuck do you want'?"

Finally, Danzo sighs.

"It would seem that this generation of Konoha's shinobi leave something to be desired. But perhaps that can still be remedied." He looks at the door and the ANBU enters, holding a flak jacket in his gloved hands. "During the Chuunin Exams, you have distinguished yourself time and again as a ninja of utmost talent. Additionally, during the treacherous invasion from the combined forces of the Hidden Villages of Sand and Sound, you went above and beyond the call of duty to protect this village and its people.

"Uchiha Sasuke, I hereby promote you to special jounin."

The ANBU hands me the vest and I immediately open the zip, flipping it around to check the seams and feel it up. "Nice. It is a manchira brigandine." I look up at the ANBU who is stepping back to give his boss the floor again, as it were, only stumble at being addressed over his master. "Are the plates metal or ceramic?"

But he goes to ignore me as Danzo continues.

"You will henceforth be transferred to serve in the ANBU black ops, effective—"

I toss Danzo the vest, making him stumble back as he blinks, catching it on instinct. Old man is still in shape and he hasn't slacked in his training, though he's got injuries, I see.

That and while he might have kept up his training, his senses must have gone with age. He's got that old people smell, that they don't realize they have because their noses slowly stop working. I loved my grandparents—both sets—to bits for hitting the sauna every day and abiding by cleanliness with a passion.

Never smelled bad, except when pa's side would come back from the potato fields. And that was a smell earned, like a badge of pride. Best damn potatoes to make mash out of.

"Nah. Don't need it. All the cool kids don't wear them either. I mean, Anko doesn't, right Sakura?"

She's blinking at me, gaping like a goldfish.

"Right, she agrees." I nod, turning back to stare at the old man. "Also, I'm not seeing anything in writing, so walk yourself out that door and try again when you have the Hokage's signature to go with all that bullshit."

I am not fucking working under this decrepit fuck, not in a million years.

He works his jaw, a tendon standing out along his neck.

So, what's it gonna be? Gonna try the kid who took on Orochimaru at age 13 and brought him back in pieces? God, I just made a note about being too cocky. But, I so needed this after the shitshow that was The Uchiha Revenge Rumble round 1.

Danzo says nothing, dropping the vest from his arms and turning on the spot as he moves to leave, his ANBU escort following after him with the body language of a repressed teen wanting to cuss and moan as he glares at me. Good riddance to bad rubbish.

"One more thing that had come to my attention, that I believe you will wish to hear..."

Oh, what is it now?

I turn to look at the doorway where he still lingers, like some ill spirit of misery and mothballs.

"The sword of Kusanagi that you had... appropriated from Orochimaru. It was lost during the infiltration of the village by the two missing-nins yesterday—"

"Bullshit."

The ANBU falls into place between me and Danzo.

I realize I've stood up and I'm now glaring at them, the world taking a decidedly carmine tint as the clarity of unrestrained violence seeps into my whole being.

"They walked in, got some tea, and then got kicked out by way of Maito Express. You're fucking lying. Where is my fucking sword?"

Danzo turns to face me, heedless of the sheer murdermaimkill suffusing the air.

"Should you ever have anything you wish to discuss with me, seek me out. We shall arrange an equitable meeting at that time."

And the fucker just leaves. The ANBU flagging behind, as if confused and panicking, but at least he remembers to close the door behind him. Except the fuckfaces didn't even take off their sandals when they came in and now my floor is completely dirty.

Fucking assholes.

I close my eyes, inhaling slowly and letting the anger bleed out. I hold my breath, even as my head starts to swim a little. And then I exhale all of the emotions out, the air itself hot and turbulent against my lips.

The exhale lasts a full half-minute, leaving me somewhat calm as I open my eyes again.

Miyamoto Musashi preached abandoning all preferences, be it food, home, or even weapons. Hell, arguably even the way you wanted to die.

And he had a good fucking point. It's just a sword.

But...

"I'm going to kill that fucker. I don't know how yet, but it'll happen."

"Sasuke-kun!" Sakura chastises me, incredulous.

It took Kakashi a whole day to find me.

I don't know how – it wasn't like I went anywhere. I just stuck to my yard and trained by the pond. Didn't even try to hide my presence of anything. Hell, I thought the explosions would have eventually tipped him off... But eh.

Sakura left after a while when it became obvious that all I was doing was just staring at my Shadow Clones on top of the water, not feeling up to the task of staying there for extended periods of time. But that was fine; I had genjutsu to train.

Imbuing action-triggers was pretty easy.

It wasn't all that different from how I had used a Shadow Clone against Neji, just sort of inverted and tagged to a specific method, forcing them to do something instead of them preparing an action upon the memories' return. I thought about a code word; going all MKUltra where I could activate my sleeper assets...

But I didn't want them to have premature explosions, and I couldn't be arsed to remember longer, unique phrases.

So a genjutsu trigger it was.

One of the things I was interested in was whether or not it would be possible for me to imprint skills into someone else. Not primarily, but still majorly, due to a flaw of the Sharingan I was potentially worried about. Sure, it allowed me to understand and replicate skills and jutsu on sight, even when turned off...

But what if those skills vanished if, by some chance, my eyes got destroyed or stolen?

Would I lose all my hard-earned skills?

So, I was hoping to make more solid back-ups that way. You know, back up all the hard drives in triplicate? Had saved my mental well-being more than once back before when a computer died on me. One is none, two is one!

But that was only one of my many, many avenues of interest at the moment.

With the ability to safely detonate a clone and erase all of its memories, I had now completely unfettered access to training some of my less restrained genjutsu ideas, which I had only tangentially tried out until now. Permanently fucking with the senses, enabling and disabling certain pathways in the brain to see what it would do, messing with the internal temperature regulation, disrupting neurotransmitters and leaving them stuck as prisoners in their own bodies, upending the brain chemistry to the point of turning the clone into a complete sobbing wreck...

You know, the fun kind of stuff I had done on Orochimaru?

I had decided to append all of these applications of genjutsu under the name eyes of entropy from now on, since I didn't want to start classifying how they worked too rigidly yet, knowing that it might start building a box around my skillset before I had fully explored it.

One of my new favorites was messing with the connection between the eyes and the brain.

See, a lot of what we see isn't actually there the way we see it. Our eyes have blind spots, which are really only filled in by half-memory and half-guesswork from the brain. It was pretty easy to test with just one eye, by looking left or right at something until it would vanish.

With the two eyes, it was a little bit more complex than that, but I remembered there being some program I had seen about it, where they had strapped a camera in front of a reporter's eye and then put a picture in front of him, slowly changing it. Remove objects, put in things, changes that he absolutely would have noticed normally, but because the gear knew his focus was elsewhere, he simply couldn't.

So I found a way to either turn off that fill-in function—seemingly half-blinding you, as the brain simply stopped remembering what it had seen and only fed exactly what it saw into your vision—or then making things start 'popping out' in your peripheral vision. To a highly-trained ninja, something like that got a practically instinctive reaction. The clone I tried that on ended up flinching around in circles at non-existent threats, until I finally put him out of his misery with a bang.

Of course, I also figured out how to disconnect the eyes entirely, but that wasn't nearly as fun and would just make an opponent start focusing on their other senses more. I thought it was better to throw just enough false positives that they would start doubting their own senses.

Another interesting feature was targeting facial recognition. And that was just nasty. I was hoping to pull some 'Since when were you under the impression you were fighting me?'-shenanigans at some point.

Kyoka Suigetsu - Mirror Flower, Water Moon.

I was going to name my eventual sword that. Because of obvious reasons.

Still, through all the training, I couldn't help but worry about Naruto.

I had more or less just left him there with two S-rank missing-nins, who were specifically out there to capture and ritualistically murder him. But there was nothing more I could do at this point. If he had already been caught, then I didn't even have a trail to follow anymore, since who knew what had happened since my final clone had been popped.

Could I have done something differently?

Obviously.

Contact Jiraiya, or hell, contact Kakashi before they confronted Itachi—no, they would just force me to sit it out, even if I fucked up Orochimaru already—and... And what? I took Orochimaru seriously the whole time, but for some reason I didn't put nearly as much effort into this.

The thoughts had floated in the back of my mind for a while, so it was a relief when Kakashi did finally show up.

"Any news from Jiraiya and Naruto?"

Kakashi blinks, halting in the middle of his customary surprise greeting at the edge of the pond. He had been soundless. But I was getting better, thanks to all the flies constantly buzzing around me.

"Maa... We did receive a message – they're both fine."

Judging by the tone of his voice...

I sighed, shoulders relaxing just a little. It was probably ok, then. So long as Naruto managed to buy some more time, then not only should have Jiraiya been there, but also Gai. Or well, wasn't so sure about Gai, but no matter. I could put the matter out of mind for now.

"Alright," I turn to look at the jounin. "What the fuck happened to my sword?"

He looked tired. Not exactly ragged, but definitely tired. Still better than the old Tsukuyomi ride.

But he wasn't dealing with my demands right now.

The first question he could accept unconditionally, as caring for your comrades above all else was kind of his thing. But he was still frustrated with me, apparently.

"Where have you been all this time? I understand that there were extenuating circumstances, but you cannot simply vanish on your own, Sasuke. Especially after I specifically told you not to leave. Konoha may have been one thing, but to go chasing after Itachi was completely out of line."

Huh, he was worried about me.

"Didn't run into Sakura yet? Figured she would tell you. I was home, sleeping off the muscle pains the whole day."

A pause, pieces falling into place to form a more coherent whole of yesterday's events. He had probably been wondering why my attempts had been as tame as they had, considering just who it was we had run into.

I affected a grumpy scowl. "I just sent out a bunch of clones to handle errands. How was I supposed to know Itachi would fucking show up and they'd take a few potshots at him?"

His eye narrows.

I am lying, but does he know that? Can he see through me? Right, how do I play off innocent in all this? I always start overthinking when I'm defensive. So, push.

"Back to the matter of my sword... Where the hell is it?"

We stare at each other, neither willing to back down.

Finally, he sighs and raises a hand to run through his hair. I've never actually seen him this bashful before.

"There was a traitor among Konoha's shinobi... He was only revealed after the invasion, but he still had ties to Orochimaru, and he managed to acquire the sword from ANBU custody."

Fucking Kabuto. Didn't I tell you fucks about him?

I knew I should have wrung his neck at some point. Maybe I could have hunted him down in the forest with the clones? Maybe I should wring Kakashi's neck instead. Sure, he can't do everything himself and he has to trust others, who'll most likely be the one's fucking up like this, but damn it...

Do I have to do everything?

I close my eyes and inhale slowly. My cheeks and head feel hot again, my pulse pressing against the side of my neck, but I forcefully bring my heart rate back under control.

"So, who the fuck is this Danzo asshole and why is he trying to recruit me?"

Kakashi blinks, taking an immediate step forward. "You were approached by Shimura Danzo?"

"Turned up to my house this morning while I was having breakfast with Sakura. Told him to fuck off in no uncertain terms. I'll slit my own throat before I work a single day under his command, thanks."

Kakashi blinks again and then laughs lightly, looking away.

"Maa, seems I was worried over nothing."

"Hmm? So you do know him?" I glare at him lightly. "Is there some 'One-eyed pains in Uchiha Sasuke's ass'-club I need to know about?"

"He... is a contemporary of the Hokage. They were once rivals, until the Third was granted the honor of becoming Hokage. Since then, he has been working in the shadows of the Hidden Leaf, commanding the black ops, among other things..."

I narrow my eyes.

"You've worked for him – under him."

"Maa..." he looks away, saying nothing more.

"Right, ninja NDA. Even more reason not to work with the guy." I roll my eyes.

This guy had all the characteristics of a filler villain. So far we had seemingly managed to steer clear of all that shit, but apparently it did still exist. Which probably meant that the lightningsaber still existed, however minor a positive that was. But would team 7—or me, solo now, perhaps—get that mission?

And what about the movies?

I barely remembered any of that shit. The first movie had snow... and a rainbow Rasengan? The rest is just drawing a blank for me.

Whatever, I'd just deal with it when it came around.

Sighing heavily, I just shook my head. "So how much of his bs can you confirm – do I at least get promoted to special jounin?"

The jounin nods with a small eye-smile.

"The Hokage was planning to present you with the promotion himself in a public ceremony, along with the sword after he had decided how exactly to deal with Orochimaru, but it would appear that Danzo stole a march on him."

Kinda had been hoping for full jounin, but, eh, not gonna complain. Don't want to get saddled with kids of my own yet.

There was probably a lot of bureaucratic garbage I would have to deal with, too. It was better to make the transition slowly. Sure, Itachi had been jounin by now, but he had been working half his life to get there.

"Well, I'm fine with that for now. Do I have to wear the vest, though? I'd rather just throw it back at Danzo's face again if you tell me where he lives, since he left it behind on my floor. I'm not wearing anything a former black ops guy has touched... Who knows what he's put on it."

He blinked with all the information I was throwing at him, his lone visible brow furrowing.

"That might be wise – he is a master of sealing."

"Right. So burn it when I get back to my house. Got it. But I take it I don't need to wear whatever vest I do get later? Because while I can appreciate the overall design, green just isn't my color."

Not anymore. Before I had really nice green and amber eyes. Though I prefer my current crimson ones by about a thousand-fold. I still make them glow and spin every time I look into the mirror, just to see that I can.

So fucking cool.

Kakashi shakes his head. "It is customary to wear it, especially after promotion. But excepting times of war or large-scale operations, it is not strictly necessary."

"Cool. Can I get some custom-made, though? Maybe in black, or as under armor? I really liked the manchira brigandine make. Oh, are the plates metal or ceramic? I didn't cut it open, but if no one cares what happens to the one I've already got, I might just do an 'autopsy' on it before I burn it."

There's a glimmer of amusement in his eye now.

"Maa, I would recommend waiting for Hokage-sama's approval first, before you start experimenting again. But..." The jounin hesitated, looking away before he continued. "There may be a call for you to don it at the ceremony, along with the other genin who will be promoted."

Oh, right.

Because Shukaku and Orochimaru got fought inside of the city walls. Kind of a big deal we contained it at all. Well, contained being a relative term. We still leveled like a quarter of the village with all the fighting.

Which had effectively tripled the value of all my properties, since they had remained intact through nearly all the fighting. The advantages of living at the edge of the village, I suppose?

Not that I really cared about that anymore.

"Right, right..." I scoff, faux-annoyed by all the red tape and ceremony. "Alright, and what about my placement after this? And team 7 as a whole?"

I had kind of started to like this rag-tag mess of a unit. Kakashi was an utter deadbeat, Naruto was an idiot and Sakura was Sakura... though actually, she was starting to grow on me, too. Still, I wanted to keep moving up in the world.

The thing about being a ninja that I had realized, even still in the Academy, was that it was practically my dream job. So long as I got to call the shots, I could run around doing generally good deeds with unrestrained violence and all the imagination I could possibly call forth. Open-ended missions, challenging fights, traveling the world, superpowers, maybe a couple of hot babes to save if Naruto's adventures in filler were anything to go by...

I loved all of it on paper. Even if I often got into really murky moods and swore to kill everyone, Konoha really was a place I had learned to love.

"The Hokage and I had previously considered you for ANBU immediately following the formation of team 7... But given your disposition and preferences, and your considerable growth rate, it might no longer be the best place for you."

That sounded about right.

Paradoxically, the black ops in ninja-land were stricter than the general forces, when back before it had been about the other way round. Maybe it was all the secrets they had to deal with?

"Traditionally, black ops is a place for shinobi to retreat to from the public and hone their skills in, during the gap between chuunin and jounin. To avoid becoming too recognizable before they can truly stand on their own and deal with the consequences of their fame, but..."

"I just took on Orochimaru - I know, I was there."

Kakashi's eye crinkles at my deadpan.

"Rather... Given your habit of experimentation and your ability to draw surprisingly clever conclusions from things no one else has thought before, perhaps you might find yourself more at home in Research and Development? I have been thinking such recently, to be honest..."

That could be pretty neat.

But I still wanted to do missions. The good filler arcs were all outside of Konoha. Besides, I needed more jutsu to steal—I mean, I needed to gather more data points for my research into chakra.

That, and I still wanted to lie about everything I could do for another couple of decades to build up my reputation as a completely enigmatic maniac god of war. I wanted to earn my 'fucking' appellation before I took on any students, partly because I wanted any of my kids to have first dibs on all the cool shit I'd come up with.

"And the other two?"

"Shoo-ins for chuunin. I suspect Jiraiya-sama will be taking Naruto under his wing from now on after they return for the ceremony, as for Sakura... Well, who knows?" He gave his best eye-smile.

I was somehow suspecting, that if I did go into R&D, that she would be right there with me. Well, given our progress with sealing—with Naruto's help, of course—it would probably prove pretty fruitful.

Somehow it seemed as if team 7 wasn't going anywhere at all, after all.

"Speaking of Sakura... did you mention breakfast with her? Am I sensing some romance in the air?"

"Jump in the pond, Kakashi," I deadpan, pointing at the water beneath my feet.

"Maa, you all grow up so quickly."

He pretended to wipe away a tear. The fact that he was doing it over the covered-up Sharingan side didn't make it any funnier.

I shake my head, inhaling slowly again to cool off. "You want some lunch? I'm starting to get a little hungry. I'll even let you eat in another room if you're feeling shy..."

Kakashi hesitates for a long while, before nodding with an eye-smile.

"Why not."

We turn to head back to my house. I hadn't been sweating much, so I didn't really need to wash up. I'd take a dip after Kakashi left, or something. I was still hoping that some of the surveillance would just fuck off already, but I couldn't hold out too much hope for that.

"You know, I've been thinking about branching out. Buy some firebrick and mortar. Make myself a proper smoker... Because the cold-smoked fish they sell around town is nowhere near the true potential of true cold smoking."

I had built like three smokers with my dad, back before. The two first ones had been so-so, but the last one had been pretty divine. I would just need to figure out how to vacuum pack my smoked goods and then how to freeze them for a while, to enhance the flavor the right way.

Woodchips mattered, too, but those last two steps really brought out and spread thoroughly the goodness into whatever you just smoked, and thus were critical. Here, the smokey flavor was pretty much only skin-deep.

"Hmm..."

This, more than anything until now, seemed to have confused the jounin. Good to know I still had it in me.

"Don't know if I'll actually sell it, or just keep it for my own use. But trust me, it'll be good."

"If you say so, Sasuke."

I shook my head at him. "You need some hobbies, too. Icha Icha is good, but it's not enough to live on."

"Maa, perhaps..."

We walked back to my house, where I kicked off the sandals as we walked in. A thought occurred to me, though.

"One thing, though. Pretty much non-negotiable."

"Hmm?"

I look at him, eyes pitch black. Cold. "I'm shoving my hand through whoever stole my sword and frying them from the inside until their eyeballs pop and sizzle. That's a promise."

That was about it for all of my material orders for now.

I walked through the streets of Konoha, distractedly noting the places where building sites had been erected and walking around a few of the old, collapsed ruins as I went. Even without Shukaku within city walls, or me and Orochimaru making absolute havoc, there had still been plenty of other big hazards out there.

Summoned snakes, combined elemental ninjutsu, explosive tags, some apparent sabotage...

It wasn't anywhere near the devastation left behind by the Kyuubi attack, but it was plenty still. Death tolls had definitely been lower, as pretty much all of the hostile ninjas had been contained, though.

Or rather, the civilian population had never really been the target in the attack, except as collateral.

I guess they didn't count?

They just made sure things worked, filling the gaps where a ninja hadn't yet. So while they were of Konoha, they weren't Konoha. It was a weird distinction I was only now becoming aware of because of one peculiar clone's observations. Was it like this in the other large-scale conflicts as well?

Regardless, even if they might not have been in any great danger, I was still treated like a celebrity and hero for the parts I had played in the defense all over town.

Rumors spread quickly wherever you go, I suppose.

I could have basked in it, but it wasn't as if I had risen to the call like others had. I had allowed it to happen and prepared for it, abusing the chaos for entirely my own gains, even if I had been forced to push past my own plans with the handling of the mastermind himself.

Especially since the celebrations were only just beginning, as it were.

Once Naruto returned—with Tsunade, I supposed because I just couldn't see him failing to get the old grouch off her butt—the actual ceremonies would take place, along with the partying.

Though it wasn't all happy news.

Despite my intervention, the aged Hokage hadn't come out of the fighting unscathed. Because—funny little butterfly—the Kazekage was still alive, since Orochimaru had other priorities. Which hadn't ended well for either.

The Kazekage had at least managed to escape with his life, but with two of his kids in captivity and half of his invasion force just dead, it wasn't looking too hot for him right now.

That said, while old Sarutobi wasn't in any danger of dying, talk around town was that he hadn't been seen much since the invasion. So Tsunade was probably being called back to play double-duty in some capacity. It felt a little bit like obeying the stations of canon too much, but I didn't particularly mind that, since it kept things stable enough.

And the Legendary Sucker was alright in my books.

I would just have to rein in the worst of my habits until she wouldn't kill me, where Sarutobi would have just laughed and given me a slap on the wrist.

Especially since my track record with the Sannin wasn't turning out too hot, even if that was all my own damn fault. Maybe if I told her about throwing Jiraiya's book in the river, she would think better of me? No, that would necessitate admitting to having read it in the first place...

So, I was probably taking that R&D gig. At least for a while. Until I made myself too useful in her eyes to just splatter on some wall.

But well, that was still all in the uncertain future to come.

For now, I was training, planning on building my smoker, and getting together a new wardrobe. I still had the smart casual thing down pat, but the clothes were starting to get a little frayed and tight, especially around my thighs and shoulder, which I wasn't really unhappy about.

That, and I might want to look into some kind of cool lab coat, if I was going to live up fully to my new Mad Scientist role. Maybe like a two-tone, with a different colored inside, so I could pull the Hei trick from Darker than Black and turn it inside out when I wanted a quick image change? Could be cool. I already had the kunai on a string and electricity things down pat.

Speaking of electricity, the Chidori was...

Turning out pretty interesting.

Not just because it had retained its Japanese name—one thousand birds—like the Rasengan had and no one seemed to notice, but also because of how it worked. I had gotten the Ox handseal down one-handed thanks to it, already. But only on the left hand, for whatever reason.

It would be a pain in the future if half of my half-seals were on one hand, while the other hand would be on the other, so I would probably have to figure that out if I could get it all to work seallessly.

Regardless, I was hoping to get the Chidori down at least one-handed.

Because the weird way the electron current was working that I had observed? I think I had figured it out, and it was starting to bear promising results for other elemental chakras, too.

They're still following me...

It was starting to get annoying and I was half-tempted to just fly off on them. I thought that with Orochimaru out of the picture, the surveillance would tone down a little, but apparently not. It had even intensified some. No doubt because of Danzo, given his ties to the black ops parts of Konoha.

Whatever...

I had arrived.

Raising a hand to knock on the door, I rapped it twice and stepped back.

A dozen seconds later, a tall man in a heavy coat and dark sunglasses opened the door.

We stared at each other silently for a long moment. And for some reason, his eyes flickered to one of my tail's location, behind me up on a building.

I raised a hand, chipperly saying: "Yo, is Shino home? I came to hang out."

The Aburame blinked, raising a hand to his glasses as the furrowing of his brows had caused them to drop a little.

He said nothing, turning his head away from me as if talking to someone out of sight for a few seconds, and then turned to look at me again.

"Very well."

And then he left, not even bothering to show me the way.

I shrugged and took off my sandals.

A few seconds later, Shino appeared from behind a corner, apparently silently summoned by the man by the door.

"Yo, been a while and thought I should pay a visit."

"Thank you. An unexpected surprise, but not an unwelcome one, Uchiha Sasuke."

"I figured we hadn't hung out in a while – not since the Chuunin Exams second test, at least. Plus, I'm kind of hoping to purchase some more of that first-rate silk you produce."

He nodded, appearing proud. Then, he shook his head and raised a hand.

"I am pleased to hear that, but I must correct you on one account. I—nor any of my insects—do not produce any of the silks you had purchased previously, or will likely purchase now."

I shrugged and grinned.

"I still think of you every time it saves my life, Shino."

"I understand. Please, come inside. I do you wish for some tea?" He led me inside. "I shall inform my father that you wish to make another purchase. Is this to be for another personal set of clothing, or do you intend to perform some manner of research with it?"

"What, does everyone already know I'm headed for R&D? I only heard about my promotion this morning..." I mock-grumble.

He freezes.

"I had not heard, but merely assumed. Why? For you have in the past exhibited a predictably unpredictable tendency to modify and adapt teachings, techniques, tools..."

"I was just messing with you, Shino. No need to get all flustered on me. Oh yeah, and tea would be nice. Plenty of honey, thanks."

He blinks.

Or I think so, hard to tell with the dark shades he's wearing and this angle. But he usually looks like that when he blinks to process something.

"I understand. My congratulations – you have certainly demonstrated the necessary abilities of a chuunin well in excess of a promotion."

"Special jounin actually, I think. We'll hear more when Naruto returns and the Hokage makes a decision. Still holding out for a full jounin promotion, just to make my brother look extra pathetic."

He blinks again.

This time I definitely caught it.

"Regardless, my congratulations. Though pettiness does not suit you."

I smirk at him. "Sulking because you didn't get to fight Gaara in the arena?"

Shino does sulk, then. It's a tiny thing, but I've seen it before with the Sharingan and recognize the tiny signs even without, now.

"I would not have been victorious. That much was made clear when I faced him afterward."

Yeah, a full Shukaku wasn't something any old genin could be expected to face, not even one who's definitely already chuunin material.

"Don't be like that – those sand-crawlers you had definitely made a difference. They kept pressure off of everyone else, giving them time to adapt and survive."

Somehow, that does cheer him up as we enter the living room.

Nice tatami floors, polished wood beams, fine paper screens leading outside, and the barely-restrained hum of ten thousand bugs just beyond.

Comfy.

"Thank you. My adoptive brother procured the stock for them from Wind Country and I managed to get a tamed variant bred in time for the match. But, seeing how little effect my genjutsu had was quite disheartening."

I knew the feeling.

"Yeah, Orochimaru kept throwing off my best genjutsu pretty much the entire fight. Pretty frustrating dealing with something like that."

There was a slight hitch to Shino's movements as he prepares us some tea, but he nodded nonetheless.

"You looking to become a genjutsu specialist, then?" I ask, sitting down by the table "You have the sensei for it, and I can't see either Kiba or Hinata having the aptitude for picking up her mantle. Well, Akamaru has the brains for it, but not the paws. Oh, how's Hinata, she fine after the prelims? I think I saw her running around since, but we don't exactly talk."

"She is well, now. Strangely, in the past day, she seems quite a bit happier as well, though I have not inquired as to why, merely satisfied that she has been so," Shino replies, deflecting a bit from my earlier question.

Still, good to hear. Neji must have worked quick. Combined with their working together to seal Gaara after Shukaku got his lights punched out, I think they'll be fine from now on...

Not that I'm going to let this friend keep sulking just because those two seem alright.

"The problem with genjutsu is that it's pretty much a zero-sum game."

Shino pauses.

"I am not familiar with that term," he says as he looks at me.

I draw a blank as I try to remember the exact definition. Something about game theory, but I could never really get into that stuff.

"You either win or you lose, completely. No in-between," I try to clarify.

He nods, brows furrowing slightly.

"So, while it offers easy wins when it works, you have to prepare for when it doesn't. Have some big ninjutsu or weapon ready for when you need brute force."

Shino considers my words, though it's obvious he's already reached the same conclusion. I can't think of anything of the top of my head for him either, though.

"Does your clan have any summoning contracts? I think those might work for you pretty well..." I suggest.

He appears slightly amused, nodding.

"It heartens me somewhat, that our thoughts run so parallel. Perhaps there is hope for me yet."

I grin at him. "We can't all be Naruto and pull three mountain-sized toads out of our butts, though."

"No, indeed. I still find myself scarcely able to believe how much chakra he wields. It..."

"Reminds you of Gaara a little, right?"

He almost flinches, his eyes seeking me out. But my tone hadn't been suggesting or insinuating anything.

"I..."

"Ask him about it, when he comes back. I already know it, but thinking about it, I should probably clear the air between us. Would do good for him, I think. That, and all the civilians having seen him pull a repeat of the Fourth beating the Kyuubi."

I'm laying it on thick, but Shino is a good guy.

And if we both go 'Hey man, we know, and we don't hate you or anything' it will probably mean the world to Naruto.

"I see. I shall, though perhaps I... We should ask him together? I have never been very familiar with him before, much as you have not been with Hinata. She has inquired about you recently, as well, curious as that is."

"Sure, I don't mind. Oh, the water's about to boil."

Shino hurries to remove it from the flame, appearing sufficiently chastised. Don't want the water too hot for the tea and ruin it; now we'll have to let it cool for a moment.

"But, if you are interested in genjutsu, I was hoping you could help me train. Make it a back-and-forth thing."

He pauses, holding the raised teapot, brows furrowed in deep thought.

One of the panel doors opens, letting through Aburame Shibi – Shino's old man and the head of the clan. He's pretty cool, but he still looks like a two-bit yakuza.

Wordlessly, he seats himself opposite to me by the table, giving me only a nod.

The casual conversation halts there, though I have no illusions that anything that we said earlier went unheard. The old man probably felt it was his duty to intervene due to the Kyuubi law, before I might have implicated myself somehow.

Pretty sure the Hokage wouldn't give a toss, though, since I'm going around and preaching the 'Ninja Jesus loves you!'-message while doing so.

Only when Shino has prepared three cups and the tea for all, along with a rich heaping on honey for me—cravings!—and all three of us are seated, does the clan-head speak.

"You wish to purchase our silks once more, Uchiha Sasuke-dono?"

I nod, taking a fat dollop of the amber stuff and putting it in my tea. Sure, sure, I'm a tea-philistine, but back before I used to drink it with honey, cream, and rum. Let me have my coping mechanisms.

"Yeah, it's the best there is and it's the only thing I want to wear, to be honest. And my current set is getting a little tight, as you can probably see."

I flex my shoulders and arms a little, the back of my shirt going instantly taut.

He nods as well, taking a sip of his own tea, just as enriched—if not even more so—with honey as my own. I guess it's a bug thing for them, though?

"Will one uncolored roll suffice again?" he asks without inflection.

All of the Aburame seem to have problems emoting, which I guess is because they probably do a lot of it through their bugs somehow. So unlike with Shino who I've had plenty of time to observe with my Sharingan, the clan-head and father still remain a blank slate to me.

"Yeah, I think that'll be fine. I have some leftovers from the previous one and I haven't grown that much, yet."

"Do you intend to continue buying full wardrobes for the foreseeable future in this manner?"

"I am." I mean, yeah, it is expensive. But it's the best stuff out there, so obviously I am.

"Then, perhaps we should negotiate a return of your previous clothes. Our insects shall devour and repurpose the cloth. This shall save you money considerably in the coming years."

I blink and then grin.

"That would be very appreciated."

Good guys, the Aburame.

Just one thing...

The sliding door opens again, giving entry to a tall and slim Aburame who is wearing faux-Batman cowl that hides most of his head, leaving only his lower face visible in a reverse of the other two Aburame present.

Shino and Shibi both sit up straighter, the former looking distinctly pleased to see the newcomer.

"Torune."

"Hello," says the shinobi who's been tailing me since this morning.

So, this is Danzo's man.

I hope I don't have to kill him.