A rivarly?
Naruto Uzumaki was a bright boy, ever since his childhood, a smile was never far away from his face, no matter the hardships he had faced. The boy was quick to forgive and easy to appease. And yet, no matter what, he was always, always treated like… like he was the plague.
Avoided, feared, or even hated.
Naruto didn’t understand why, he never understood why. Everyone liked when other people were smiling, he tried to fix his smile in the pond near his home, he would sit for hours, looking at his smile, trying to understand what was wrong with him.
It didn’t take long for him to come to the realisation that his smile had little to do with it. People hated him for another, a deeper reason, and that only hurt the boy more. It was as if he had been left out of a massive secret that everyone else was aware of.
At least children his age didn’t have those looks, not until their parents talked to them. Naruto could get by with making a new friend every few weeks. They all left after a little while, but, for a little time, he had someone he could talk to, someone to play with.
All of this gave him even more reason to not trust the adult man that had been intent on becoming his friend. Naruto didn’t trust easily, and he always got a feeling from people.
The silver haired person, a shinobi, he would later found out, tried every day to come to Naruto, talk to him, and over some days, Naruto gave in. He would share his dream, not noticing a snicker, he would talk about the village, not noticing a glare.
Naruto would purposefully not notice a lot of things, if it got him a friend, he was happy to be unaware. But his brain would work things out, even if he didn’t want to. His brain was telling him that the stranger was not to be trusted, but Naruto thought it was his experience with other people scaring him. His brain was telling him that the stranger meant harm, but Naruto didn’t want it to be true, so he ignored it.
Ignored it until the stranger knocked on his door one day, with a kunai in his hand. Naruto didn’t know how he knew that stranger had a kunai, but Naruto knew to run. So he did.
He ran as fast as he could, it was something he was good at, he was used to the winding streets of Konoha, and even more used to the dark side alleyways that hid those lurking about, he knew the stone bricks laid onto the ground that were just about peeling off, but Naruto knew every hole and ditch. Still, no matter how much he ran, the stranger was catching up to him.
Naruto ran to the trees, it was his home turf, the trees knew him better than anyone, he ran here when he wanted to practice, to train, he threw kunai and shuriken at them, each time he apologised to the forest for hurting it, and sometimes it seemed to Naruto that the trees responded by shaking their leaves.
But even there, the stranger was gaining ground.
Naruto decided that if he was to face danger, he would face danger head on. But, but he needed to know something.
“Why, why are you doing this? Who are you?” He yelled out as loud as his voice could.
The silver-haired man grinned, though the grin didn’t reach his eyes, they were distant, hateful, everything that Naruto was scared of “How wonderful for you to stop fighting back fox. I’m Mizuki, and you… you killed my parents!” He yelled out and threw a weapon at him.
Naruto could only widen his eyes. He was frozen to the ground, scared and unaware of what he should do, the weapon, a giant shuriken was flying right at him. He begged his feet to move, he begged the body to jump, duck, do anything but stand there, and his body was not listening. At the end, Naruto only managed to close his eyes.
And so Naruto waited for the shuriken to hit him, he waited, and waited. But he felt nothing, was he already dead? Was the shuriken so fast that he didn’t even manage to feel it? Maybe that was for the best.
He opened his eyes.
Mizuki was dead.
Another silver-haired man was standing in front of him, touching his face. Naruto was sure he was saying something, but he couldn’t hear.
“-aru”
“-uto”
“-Naru”
“Naruto,” the silver haired man said, or at least Naruto thought it was him, his mouth was hidden behind a mask, so he couldn’t be sure. “Naruto, are you okay?”
He tried to nod, but only blinks came out of the response.
“Naruto, I’m- I’m Hatake Kakashi, you’re safe with me now okay?” the ma-Kakashi, said, “do you… do you like ramen?”
Naruto tried to nod, but didn’t know if he managed it.
“Good-good. Come on, I’ll treat you to as many as you want,” he picked up Naruto, the boy didn’t even struggle.
As they both turned, they got the view of Mizuki, on the ground, his body already stiff.
“Why?” He managed to ask.
Kakashi sighed. “Because some people are beyond helping Naruto.”
Somehow, Kakashi knew just where to take Naruto. The only people in the village that would smile actual smiles at him were now staring at him, quizzing the silver-haired man.
“What happened Hatake-san?” Teuchi, the old man running the ramen stand, asked.
“An attempted attack Teuchi-san, I’m sure you’ll be hearing about it tomorrow in the rumour mill. A chuunin of the village was willing to hurt one of its young, a shame and a disgrace,” replied Kakashi.
Naruto looked around at the people around him, until the daughter of the old man, Ayame, ran out behind the curtain of the ramen stand and crashed into him moments later.
“Oh, Naruto-kun, I’m so glad you’re unhurt. I-I, thanks Hatake-san. Naruto is… well, people don’t treat him too kindly, but. My dad and I know him as the wonderful boy he is. He’s a flame like no other.”
Kakashi, to his credit, managed to show off a smile even behind his mask, “Maa, Ayame-san, it’s what anyone would do. A lot of us care greatly for little Naruto.”
Ayame nodded and hugged Naruto even tighter. Slowly, his eyes were focusing more, he noticed the smell of the ramen in front of him, the wind rustling his hairs and the curtain behind him flopping on his back. Naruto took note of the ramen stand that he always stopped at, the ingredients laid out in front of Teuchi, the myriad of knives placed behind on a counter and bowls lining the shelves.
The creaking wood chairs and the smooth surface of the customer counter top brought him back to the moment, he had sat here many times, and enjoy many a meal.
Before long, Naruto was eating his second bowl of ramen, giving timid smiles to the three adults and chatting back whenever he felt he could.
It had been a long night for him, and very soon even Naruto was in need of rest.
“Uhm, thank you for the meal,” he blurted out quickly and bowed his head, “I-I should go back, I have classes in the morning.”
Kakashi turned to him and smiled, Naruto could tell that was a warm smile, his brain and his gut telling him the same things. “Of course, let me accompany you. If you wouldn’t mind, of course.”
Naruto beamed at him. They walked in step after waving goodbyes to the father and daughter, Naruto already noticed the small light behind him flickering off. He realized the ramen stand waited for him until they closed for the night. Warmth spread around his body. He smiled.
“Kakashi-san, Mizuki said. He said,” Naruto started to speak.
He was cut off by Kakashi, “That you were the fox. Yeah, I heard that.”
Naruto looked up at the silver-haired man, his eyes wanting answers, “What did he mean? I’m-I’m not a fox-ttebayo” Naruto almost cursed that the verbal tic chose the moment to make itself known. People always made fun of it, and he didn’t want Kakashi to do so as well.
Kakashi again, only smiled, “Hmm. Naruto, there are many things that people are ignorant about. What they don’t understand scares them.”
Naruto frowned at the non-answer, he shrugged — it would’ve been too easy to get the answer now, “So, they don’t understand me?”
“No, no they don’t.”
“Do you?”
“I hope you will allow me to.”
They continued on in silence. Naruto noticed how quietly Kakashi moved, even in the night, when people weren’t walking about, he couldn’t hear a single step from the silver-haired man.
“Kakashi-“
“Hmm?”
“Are you a shinobi?”
“Yes I am, what gave it away?” Kakashi asked playfully.
“Apart from the forest?” Naruto replied.
“Huh, yeah. Apart from that.”
Naruto stopped to look at him. Just because he allowed himself to ignore things, didn’t mean that he was not perceptive, for some reason, Naruto wanted to prove that he was capable.
“Well, you walk silently. Even the Chuunin in my complesk-“
“Complex” Kakashi corrected.
“Are not that quiet when they walk. You don’t have a hitai-ate, but you’re keeping shuriken near your ankles.”
It was Kakashi’s turn to stop. “And how do you know that?”
Naruto, at least had the decency to look sheepish, “Well, I stole them. I mean, I was going to give it back, I just,” he dropped his head, “I don’t have any, and I can’t buy them either, they’re way too expensive. I need them for my training. I need them to become Hokage.”
Kakashi crouched next to Naruto, pulling his face up. “So you want to be the Hokage?”
The blonde boy’s eyes became sharp, determination visible on his face, “The best Hokage.”
Kakashi took a few moments, before he smiled again, Naruto was becoming fond of that smile. “Well then, future Hokage. Would you like my help with that?”
Naruto looked stunned, the air seemed to still around him. No one had ever taken his word and dream seriously, no one ever offered to help him. The memory implanted itself deep into his brain, he knew he would be able to remember the exact place and moment, on Izumo street, near the fish vendor's stall, it was the third day of Risshu.
“Yes-ttebayo!” Naruto yelled out, not even caring for the verbal tic.
“Well, very good. Let's get you home for now, you have many years ahead of you if you wish to challenge the Sandaime.”
Naruto didn’t care. He had someone who listened, truly that was what mattered most.
“Wait, I’m sorry for stealing from you,” said Naruto, “here’s the shuriken.”
Kakashi only gave a wink, “What shuriken?”
If Naruto could smile more, his cheeks would go up to his forehead.
Kakashi took off from Naruto’s home soon after the boy had fallen asleep. He had kept watch beforehand, and laid down some alert and protection seals that would not be noticed. The little bit fuuinjutsu his mentor had taught him would be protecting Naruto. He smiled at the idea.
“Sasuke, come on, you have class in half an hour,” Shisui yelled out in the house, he was preparing a bento box for the boy. The academy didn’t have the tomatoes he liked, “damn princelings and their beauty sleep…” he muttered to himself.
It had taken a few conversations in the hospital, but soon they both agreed that living together best suited them both. The house chosen for the task, surprisingly, was his own. Sasuke didn’t really wish to enter his childhood home, ever since he left it that night. So as soon as the boy was released from the hospital, Shisui had gathered the boy's belongings and brought them over.
Sasuke was, in all meaning of the word, traumatised. The boy would wake up in a cold sweat, yelling Itachi’s name, yet remembered none of it in the morning. Shisui didn’t know how to comfort him, so he settled on the next best thing.
Being himself.
Say what you will about Sasuke Uchiha, the boy was damn perceptive and he hated pity. So Shisui didn’t offer any, they only shared their collective pain, not focusing on their individual feelings. It wasn’t healthy, it wasn’t the best, but it was better than nothing. But Shisui saw another side of Sasuke, after all the boy was a child, and just a few months ago he had been a bundle of joy, especially for an Uchiha.
They got into a rhythm, Shisui would do the cooking, household stuff. At least until he was fit for duty, and when Sasuke wasn’t around, Shisui would train, when Sasuke came back in the evening, they would talk, and Shisui would fill in the knowledge on the topics the academy missed out. Sasuke took to it like fish to water, the boy showed all the brilliance of his older brother, he just needed proper guidance.
And damned be the gods, Shisui would give him the best guidance he could offer. He was a Jounin of the village, and a good one at that.
Shisui checked the clock atop his living room wall, fifteen minutes until the class started.
“Sasuke, I’m coming to get your sorry ass out of the bed!” He yelled out once more, making stomping noises in the kitchen.
He grinned when the raven-haired boy appeared in the living room in seconds.
“Good boy. Now come, drink the pill and go brush your teeth. We’re having onigiri with a snacking tomato.”
Sasuke’s eyes widened at the promise of his favourite food, he gulped down the pill quickly and stormed into the bathroom.
Shisui smirked. While he acted older than his age, Sasuke was still an eight-year old by heart.
Sasuke emerged out of the bathroom, baring his teeth, Shisui insisted that the boy show him that he had brushed properly.
“Great. Come on, sit, the food won’t eat itself, you know.”
Shisui sat opposite of Sasuke, looking out at his apartment. It wasn’t small by Konoha standards, the Uchiha were a wealthy clan after all, and even with him being a second liner, his parent’s made good money with both of them being jounin. Even if it was Shisui that brought money home at the tail end of their lives.
The walls had small cracks here and there, but which house in Konoha didn’t? The place loved having earthquakes at least once a day, so that wasn’t much of a surprise. His thoughts strayed to the rooms adjoining the main quarters, the room Sasuke occupied now was actually his own. Shisui moved into his parent’s bedroom, which still felt strange even after a few months.
He liked the apartment, even if it needed renovations, even if it was entirely too quiet, with only birds and cicada’s breaking absolute silence.
Once they finished eating, Shisui put away the dishes and turned to the little boy.
“You won’t get there in time from here,” Shisui pointed out, “The academy’s too far away, and you my little friend are not able to do the Body Flicker just yet.”
Sasuke actually pouted at that. The boy was adorable without meaning to be.
“Come on, not everyone has the privilege of being transported by the body-flicker expert.”
“Since when were you a master of anything?” Sasuke retorted.
Shisui snorted, “Brat” he thumped Sasuke with a piece of parchment, “I’ve been a shinobi longer than you’ve been alive, and a jounin before you stopped blowing snot out of your nose.”
“I never did that, old man .”
“Oh, is that how it’s gonna be?”
“Yeah!”
“Yeah?”
“Yeah!”
Shisui chuckled to himself and grabbed Sasuke’s wrist, immediately flickering towards the academy.
They were there in seconds.
Sasuke wrestled his hand away from Shisui’s and walked towards the building, not even looking back.
“Sasuke-chan! Try not to blow snot bubbles!” Shisui yelled out from behind him.
Sasuke turned towards him, red in the face, “Don’t trip and break your legs, old man !”
“So mean!”
Sasuke just shook his head and turned back towards the academy, no one noticed the small smile on his face. He was an Uchiha after all.
Soon he was sat by his table, listening to his teacher talk about one of the hundreds of battles during the third shinobi war. Sasuke spaced out by the fifteenth one.
“God this is so boring,” he heard his classmate next to him mutter out, “What good is knowing about battles if we don’t even learn how to throw kunai?”
Sasuke had to agree with his classmate, he’d heard Shisui say that ‘History has a way of repeating itself’ more times than he could count, but still. What if history repeated itself because he just didn’t learn anything useful?
“I know right? I mean we’re supposed to be Genin in what, four years?”
‘Well, five actually’ Sasuke thought to himself before he froze, did his classmate hear him thinking to himself, or did he muse out loud without noticing?
“No one here can actually defend themselves if it comes to it, I don’t think an Iwagakure shinobi will just let you go just because you recounted the Battle of Tawasato valley.”
Sasuke turned to the boy, glad that he wasn’t able to read minds.
His eyes widened when he noticed Naruto Uzumaki sat next to him, the blond hair and the white shirt with an orange swirl was unmistakable. They hadn’t really interacted before, well, apart from once or twice when the boy’s exchanged unpleasant nicknames after Sasuke defeated him in a taijutsu spar.
“Say, Sasuke.” The blond whispered, “wanna train together?”
‘No, obviously not,’ he wanted to say, but for some reason different words came out.
“Great!” The blonde stopped himself from shouting. Returning to a whisper, “ Great, do you know the clearning -“
“Clearing” Sasuke corrected. He didn’t know why.
“Near Amano street? There’s a forest behind it and a clearing just past the first few trees.”
Sasuke nodded, of course he knew the forest and clearing, it was just a few minutes away from the Uchiha compound.
“Uhm, let’s meet at,” the boy hummed to himself, “four hours after the classes?”
He nodded again. A small part of him intrigued by the idea.
As promised, Sasuke and Naruto met up at the promised time, Naruto was noisy, cheerful, and fast.
They exchanged their knowledge, what Naruto knew about trapping, he was terrifying , being fast Sasuke’s eyes couldn’t catch up , throwing weapons, he wasn’t very good at it yet.
Sasuke offered knowledge about chakra, about the elements, controlling and moulding it.
They sparred, Sasuke barely won.
They ran around the clearing for ten minutes, Sasuke was left in the dust.
They threw kunai and shuriken that Sasuke managed to steal away from his-Shisui’s home. Sasuke won. It hadn’t even been difficult.
Naruto threw a stick at him and taunted him to follow into the forest. Sasuke took the bait.
It took an hour to remove the glitter from his hair. Where the hell did he get so much of it?
As they departed, Naruto was smiling and bouncing around like they hadn’t trained for three hours straight.
“Same time tomorrow, duck-butt!”
Sasuke stared at the retreating form of the blonde, he tried to come up with a retort, and he knew it was weak even when he said it.
“Better be stronger then, blondie!”
Naruto’s chuckles only intensified the annoyance.
Sasuke muttered to himself, “Zappy? No, too cool.”
He started walking home, muttering nicknames after nicknames.
Naruto really enjoyed himself at the training session. Sasuke was good, and fun in his own way. Even if he was a little bit condescending when he showed off his chakra control, it wasn’t his fault that chakra just didn’t listen no matter how much he tried.
Still, he had a training partner who was as good as him. Kakashi said that a ‘rival’ would help him more than anyone else, and it didn’t take long for Naruto to single out Sasuke as the only rival for him. He was good at fighting, or, sparring at least.
He hurried back home, the training took a long time and he wasn’t willing to miss the class tomorrow, the teacher mentioned a lesson on different shinobi arts.
He slept with a smile on his face, the last few months had been the happiest he had ever been. Kakashi would show up once a week, and while he rarely talked about jutsu’s or how to hit a bullseye with a kunai, Kakashi always had a lesson to teach him.
And while Kakashi thought that Naruto didn’t notice the extra bills in his toad wallet. He always did, and he was grateful every time.
Shisui noticed that Sasuke didn’t greet him when he entered the house, his faced was scrunched up in concentration, muttering something under his breath. He also noticed the dirtied clothes, scratches on his fists and,
Was that glitter in Sasuke’s hair?
Shisui chuckled, already an idea of what happened forming in his head.
“Sasuke-chan. Were you perhaps out training with someone other than me?” He called out.
The muttering stopped for a second, but only a second.
“You wound me so!” Shisui called back, “Come on, I have tuna and heirlooms.”
Now the muttering completely stopped, a few loud steps later the boy was sat in the living room.
“Eat, and tell me about your day.” Shisui said, though it almost sounded like an order.
Sasuke took a bite of his food and closed his eyes. “Hmm, a classmate asked me to train with him after the academy.”
“Huh, and you accepted his offer?” Shisui asked.
Sasuke shrugged, “We shared the same thoughts about the academy curriculum.”
“The fact that it’s mostly useless?”
“Mhm” Sasuke agreed as he chewed on his food.
“And who is this mysterious classmate?”
“Uhm, hesh name ish uzshuma-“
“Swallow your food before talking Sasuke.”
Sasuke glared at the boy, but complied with the request nonetheless.
“His name is Uzumaki Naruto.”
Shisui eyed Sasuke before chuckling, laughing and soon he was holding his belly and wiping his tears.
“Oh dear, this is priceless, you trained with Uzumaki Naruto?”
Sasuke pointed the older Uchiha a glare, “Yeah, should I not have?”
“What? No. I mean, yes you definitely should,” Shisui laughed again, “Oh Kakashi will love this, you started training with the chibi” ‘Yondaime Hokage’ He was going to say, before he was rudely interrupted.
“CHIBI, OF COURSE!” Sasuke yelled triumphantly, his chopsticks dropping on the table, “Why didn’t I think of that?”
“Hey duck-butt!”
“Hello, chibi ”
“What did you just call me?”
“What are you talking about? Chibi ?”
“Okay, that’s it. You are getting glittered all day.”
“Uh, no?” Sasuke offered.
“Oh. Yes.”
Shisui barely managed to contain himself as he watched the Chibi Yondaime run around the forest yelling obscenities at Sasuke.
He couldn’t contain himself when Sasuke came back home with glitter still falling from his clothes.
“I’m going to strangle him.” He had said.
“It seems you’re going to need to catch him first,” replied Shisui through the chuckles.
“I’m going to catch him, and then strangle him.”
“That’s the spirit.”
Kakashi was not easy to find, if he didn’t want to be found that is. Not many had seen the jounin outside of the council meetings. He was an enigma to many, a jounin at twelve, an Anbu Captain at eighteen, and now a council member at twenty-one.
The one thing everyone knew about him was that the man was practically untouchable. He was by far the strongest shinobi in the village even at this age. And with Itachi becoming a missing-nin, there were not many who could really challenge that claim.
But Shisui knew him better than that. The man had been his captain after all, and a close confidant since the massacre of his clan.
Not many had seen him outside of the council meeting, but he had seen him almost every week, this month was the longest they had gone without meeting, the jounin actually being outside of the village for a mission.
“Which one today?” the silver-haired jounin asked him.
“Hmmm, chamomile,” Shisui offered.
Kakashi raised an eyebrow, “Have some grand news you want to share?”
Shisui smirked, “Maybe.”
Kakashi shrugged, not many things surprised him nowadays. He poured the chamomile tea and sat down opposite Shisui. His room was littered with papers upon papers, and Kakashi looked like he hadn’t gotten much sleep over the past few weeks.
“So? Out with it.”
Shisui sipped his tea and hummed, “That can wait, tell me more about this project of yours.”
Kakashi looked around his room, as if noticing the mess for the first time. He sighed, his shoulders slumped.
“The politics in this village is a shit-show,” he said.
“The clans giving you trouble?”
Kakashi scratched his chin, “Not particularly. I haven’t done much at all to be honest, a few votes here and there, a few recommendations for proposals. But no, it’s just, once you look into the politics, the whole ‘Will of Fire’ seems much more feeble.”
Shisui put down his tea, his attention grabbed by the strong statement. “Go on.”
“Well, take Ino-Shika-Cho for example. Yeah they work great and are great friends and all that, sure. But under all of that, there’s this whole political game they’re all playing. The Akamichi with all of their businesses pay just unbelievable amounts of money to both the Yamanaka and Nara.”
Shisui nodded, urging him to continue.
“The Nara don’t really care for business, and they don’t produce much of anything, apart from a few seals here and there. What they do care about is research, experiments, planning, and that takes a lot of money. The Yamanaka on the other hand are just about the biggest producers of, well, produce in the village. They have an effective monopoly on the spices, fruits and vegetables the Akamichi use.”
“Seems very mutually beneficial.”
“Doesn’t it? Well the Yamanaka have about as much dirt on anyone as one could gather, which allows them to charge the Akamichi higher than the market rate in exchange for silence, and their ability to expand the farmland makes the whole thing even worse. The Nara? Well they want the ANBU. Not officially, of course, but the Hyuuga have tried to do an informal takeover, Akamichi money stopped that somehow. You know the Nara are the backbone of ANBU.”
“Leaping into the shadows is a good technique.”
“Yep,” Kakashi emphasized the word, “and well, the Hyuuga are the richest clan, but the Akamichi are not far behind. The Hyuuga are also quite well versed in politics-“
“And the Akamichi aren’t”
“No, they are not. But you know who are?”
“The Nara, and they give political advice to both weaken the Hyuuga for themselves and the Akamichi, and they get money for their own projects.” Shisui replied.
“Mhm” Kakashi agreed, sipping his tea.
“Okay, so why are you telling me this? And what does all of that have to do with everything?”
“Well, you, my dear Shisui, are the retainer of the Heir of Uchiha, and as the retainer of an underage heir-”
“I have a seat at the council”
“That you do, and I need your support to accomplish my plan.”
“Which you still haven’t clued me in at all”
Kakashi put down his cup, stood up and grabbed a very large piece of parchment and handed it to the Uchiha.
Shisui quickly read over the contents of the parchment.
“Well. Fuck, Kakashi. I’m in.”
He smiled, it was vicious, animalistic, dangerous, and genuine. “I hoped you would be, now tell me about this news of yours.”
“Well you know how you encouraged the Chibi Yondaime to find a rival?”
Kakashi pointed him a stare, “Uhhh, sure?”
Shisui palmed his face, “You don’t remember?”
“I mean, I do, but I didn’t think he’d take it that seriously, it was more of a, that’s what you should do when you graduate recommendation.”
At this, Shisui burst out laughing, “Oh, this is great. Yeah, the chibi took that advice to heart. He found a rival, and they’ve been training for a month already.”
Kakashi narrowed his eyes, “How do you know-“ he paused, “Wait, oh.”
“Calls him duck-butt.” Shisui replied, finishing his tea.
Kakashi couldn’t help but chuckle, “Well then, I guess time to be even more active right?”
“No time like the present. Honestly, they’re advancing quickly. They won’t be genin level by the time they graduate if they keep this up.”
“All the more reason for you to get in that seat soon.”
Sasuke was used to getting contracts, letters or other things handed to him by masked individuals, he knew they were ANBU, knew they were from the Hokage, so he signed them all the same. Without checking much.
Today, whilst walking towards the clearing, another one, an ANBU with a mask that he didn’t quite recognise appeared in front of him and handed him another parchment.
“Will only take a few moments, Sasuke-san,” the Anbu had said.
Sasuke wanted to get it over with quickly, he took the quill offered to him and looked for the box for his signature.
“Hey, duck-butt!” The familiar voice stopped Sasuke in his tracks, he looked up from the parchment, “What the hell are you doing?”
Naruto appeared beside him, the boy’s speed was unreal, Sasuke begrudgingly admitted.
“I- well I just sign these whenever, they’re some clan stuff, I don’t really care.” He turned his attention to the parchment, which had at some point disappeared, “It’s not yours chibi, give it back.”
Naruto shielded the parchment with his body, his eyes scanning it. “Uh, no. Sasuke, I’m sorry but this” he pointed at the parchment, “Is bullshit.”
Naruto turned to look at the ANBU “What the hell is this?”
The ANBU was not there anymore.
Sasuke elbowed Naruto and stole back the parchment, “What do you think you’re doing? This is Uchiha clan business, it doesn’t concern you,” he seethed.
Naruto shrugged, “I don’t really care Sasuke, but that contract is bullshit, read it, really read it.”
Sasuke rolled his eyes at the blond, he didn’t understand anything about clan politics, bullshit contracts were a part of life.
“No they are not, just read it you moron.”
Sasuke growled at the boy, annoyed that he mused out loud again. “Okay, fine,” he snapped. Unfurling the parchment he read the text.
As he scanned the first few lines, his eyes widened, “Restoration Act…Age sixteen…keep the bloodline?” he turned to Naruto, “This is bullshit”
The blonde grinned at him, “Yeah, it absolutely is. Come on, I know just who to talk to.”
“Pardon my intrusion Hokage-sama”
Hiruzen Sarutobi sighed, “Dragon, you’re dismissed. Enter Hatake-sama.”
“Hokage-sama, I apologise for my language in advance,” a paper was slammed into the desk of the Hokage, “But what the ever living fuck is this?”
The Sandaime took a look at the paper, his pipe dropping on the table, “I am entirely too old for this.”
The councilman didn’t react, though Hiruzen thought that he saw the slightest inclinations of a nod. He decided that he did not care about that at the moment.
“Hatake-sama, we will deal with this, thank you for bringing this to my attention. Dismissed.”
As soon as the councilman left the room the Hokage knocked twice on his table.
Two ANBU appeared in the center of his office. “Get Danzo Shimura in here right now.”
The ANBU made to leave before Hiruzen spoke again, “Tell him that if he isn’t here in five minutes, his head will be decorating this office until the end of time.”