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Home Coming - Part 3

"He's late." Naruto complained as he marched back and forth impatiently as Sasuke and Sakura leant against a wooden fence.

"Relax Dobe, this is Kakashi we're talking about here. He's always late." Sasuke said calmly.

'I may not want everything to change but Kakashi-sensei's punctuality is certainly one thing I would like to change.' Sakura thought to herself. A puff of smoke erupted nearby and Kakashi appeared as the smoke cleared.

"YOU'RE LATE KAKASHI-SENSEI!" Naruto shouted.

"Ah sorry, I was on my way here when I had to help a little old lady with her..."

"THAT'S SUCH A LIE!" Naruto and Sakura yelled simultaneously.

"Well anyway... shall we begin?" Kakashi began making his way to the centre of the training field where three large wooden poles stood.

"Sure is nostalgic." Sakura stated.

"Sure is." Naruto agreed.

"Of course, this was the first place that you guys..." Kakashi trailed off as the memories came flooding back.

"The first time we teamed up together." Naruto said absent mindedly as he too was lost in the memories. A jangle of bells snapped everyone back to reality. Kakashi was holding two bells just like he had when they had first met.

"You all remember the rules right?" Kakashi grinned holding up two small bells attached to red ribbons, which he tied to his belt. All three of them couldn't stop themselves from smiling as the memories came flooding back.

"If we don't come at you like we intend to kill you..." Naruto began.

"... we'll never be able to beat you." Sakura finished.

"Right!" Kakashi nodded.

"So are you going to be reading your book this time Kakashi-sensei?" Sakura asked with a sarcastic tone.

"No." Kakashi reach round and put his book away. "This time I'm going to have to go all out." Kakashi lifted his bandanna to reveal his left eye, his sharingan eye gazed at them, the blood red eye catching every detail and movement they made perfectly."The sun is just setting so you have until dawn to try and take these bells from me. Ready...."

"GO!" Naruto yelled, leaping into the air throwing three shuriken at Kakashi who ducked beneath them and threw his own at Naruto. Knowing he couldn't move out of the way of Kakashi's shuriken Naruto quickly summoned a shadow clone next to him, the clone pulling him out of harms way. As he landed back on the ground, his clone transformed into a giant shuriken and he went to throw it, but before Naruto could throw Kakashi had closed the distance between them and restrained his arm behind his back.

"I didn't say go, Naruto. Still too eager to act." Kakashi said calmly, a little smile appearing on his face but was impossible to see behind his mask, this was almost like a replay of their first time doing this exercise, almost. The difference this time was that Naruto was standing behind Kakashi with a kunai pointing at his back, he had grabbed and restrained one of his shadow clones. "Not bad Naruto, very smooth." He smiled to the blond standing behind him.

"I'm a lot stronger than before sensei!" Naruto beamed confidently, releasing his shadow clone and it disappeared in a puff of smoke.

"Lets try this again. Ready... begin!" As Kakashi spoke he disappeared in a cloud of smoke.

"Where'd he go!" Naruto asked, looking around for any clues.

'Above? Behind?' Sakura asked herself looking around trying to spot their sensei when suddenly a thought occurred to her. "No, he's below!" Sakura poured her chakra into her fist and struck the ground, the ground cracked and broke apart like a china plate hitting the floor. Between the large chunks of earth and rubble she spotted Kakashi, looking a little shell shocked. "Found you Kakashi-sensei!"

'I've got to stop acting stupid round Sakura!!!' Naruto cringed as he imagined her punching him with her unrestrained strenght.

"Well done Sakura, I see you've gotten Lady Tsunade's strength." Kakashi praised as he pulled himself out the rubble. "The real test starts now." He grinned before leaping into the tree line, Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke giving chase.

************

Naruto's skill with the shadow clones have definitely improved!" Shizune commented. She along with Tsunade and Jiraiya, who was sitting on a tree branch above them, watched the brief scuffle Kakashi had with his former students.

"Of course he has!" Jiraiya grinned. "You don't think I neglected his training for the two years he was with me did you?"

"Well I'm sure you never neglected your 'research' either!" Tsunade snapped making Jiraiya blush.

"He's a completely different ninja from the last time you saw him, just wait and see!"

"I'm sure he's come on as a ninja, but this test is also to see how well he can act in a team." Tsunade reminded him. "If they can't work as a team then I can't put them together as as a squad."

"He'll do fine, this is his former team mates he's with."

"I've been wondering Master Jiraiya. Why doesn't Naruto use his sword?" Shizune asked. "He's been carrying it around with him the whole time and he hasn't drawn it once."

"Oh, don't worry about that." Jiraiya assured her. "When Naruto draws that sword of his you'll know about it."

"And just what does that mean?" Tsunade asked curiously, giving Jiraiya a suspicious look.

"Oh you'll see, I have no doubt that before the night is done Naruto will draw his sword. Now let's follow them!"

************

"Where the hell did he go!?" Naruto cursed as they walked through the forest trying to find some sign of Kakashi. They had chased him but lost his trail over two hours ago, it was now dark making their job in finding him even harder. "I'm sure I heard a bell sound from this direction."

"Remember that this is Kakashi-sensei Naruto." Sakura said. "He probably made the bell ring to lure us this way."

"I wouldn't put it past him, Kakashi is as good as they come." Sasuke added.

"Yeah, well, I'm way better than you and Kakashi! Believe it!"

"Naruto! Keep your voice down!" Sakura scolded him in a hushed whisper.

"Sorry Sakura."

"Come on, keep an eye out for traps, it'll be difficult to spot them in this light." Sasuke ordered. Naruto wanted to make a comment but decided to keep it to himself lest he piss off Sakura, after her display of strength earlier he was a little nervous about getting on her bad side. The trio pushed on with Naruto on point, his hands poised on the sword at his waist as he pushed forward. Sasuke was using his sharingan to see better in the poor light, scattered rays of moonlight filtered in through the tree tops but it was insufficient for the task at hand. He was following behind Naruto and Sakura when he noticed a glint of light on a trip-wire which Naruto was about to step on.

"Naruto watch out!" He cried, Naruto turned his head in his direction, but it was too late Naruto's foot had already caught the wire. Sasuke and Naruto saw a flurry of kunai and shuriken fly in their direction, Naruto readied himself getting into a position to draw his sword. Seeing that Naruto wasn't attempting to dodge Sasuke reacted on instinct, he shoved Sakura out of the way and tackled Naruto to the ground narrowly avoiding getting hit by the barrage of shuriken and kunai. Both Naruto and Sasuke let out a grunt as they fell to the ground, their hearts were pounding hard as adrenaline was pumping through their bodies. Naruto winced in pain as Sasuke lay atop him, his face only a couple of inches from Naruto's. Sasuke felt his breath hitch as he stared at Naruto, his lips looked so kissable in the moonlight. He was at a loss, his mind gone blank, filled with nothing but the image of Naruto's lips.

"God damn it Sasuke!" Came the shrill shriek of Sakura, pulling Sasuke out of his trance. "Did you have to push me into a prickly bush!"

Sasuke quickly stood up, Sakura was still trying to pull herself from the bush he had pushed her into, and not being very graceful about it. He gave her a hand, earning himself a punch to the arm, it hurt but thankfully she wasn't using her super strength. Naruto had finally picked himself up and wasn't look very impressed either.

"Damn it Teme! What did you do that for!?" Naruto yelled, his attitude snapping Sasuke back to his usual self.

"Sorry, if I had known that you'd whine about saving your ass I wouldn't have bothered." Sasuke snapped.

"You didn't save anything, I had the situation in hand!"

"If you say so Dobe." He replied, his tone suggesting he didn't really care, but he did care, and after his little episode a few moments ago he was beginning to realise just how much he did care about the blond knuckle head.

************

Hidden in a tree some distance away Kakashi was watching the trio, and was smiling to himself, his sharingan eye hadn't missed a detail. He had seen the expression on Sasuke's face after he had tackled Naruto to the ground, he saw how he was a little too slow in getting up off the blond.

"So that's how it is, is it Sasuke?"

************

"If he didn't know before, Kakashi knows where we are now! Be on guard!" Sasuke ordered, his team mates readying themselves. As if on cue three kunai with paper tags struck the ground next to Sasuke's feet, the tag s beginning to smoulder the moment they struck the ground. The trio quickly leapt away moments before the resulting explosion. The area was engulfed in smoke, making it even more difficult to see. Sasuke, Naruto and Sakura had been separated having jumped away in different directions to dodge the explosion.

"Sasuke! Naruto!" Sakura called out. "Are you guys okay?"

"Yeah!" Naruto yelled back.

"Be on guard!" Sasuke yelled, he knew Kakashi and he would be following up his last attack in the next few moments. The attack never came, several minutes passed and there was no sign of Kakashi.

"He's playing with us!" Sasuke hissed.

"He probably used the explosion to run further away, we need to find him before dawn or we fail!" Sakura said with a hint of desperation.

"Wait till I get a hold of him!" Naruto growled clenching his fist tightly.

"It doesn't make sense..." Sasuke sighed. "It was the perfect moment to attack, why didn't he?"

"Maybe Kakashi wants us to get desperate, he wants us to split up to find him so he can pick us off one at a time."

"Possibly." Sasuke sighed as an idea crossed his mind. "Unless he's already struck!"

"What do you mean?"

"We lost sight of each other after the explosion." Sasuke explained.

"So Kakashi could be posing as one of us?!" Sakura deduced. "This is like the chunnin exams all over again!"

"But we'd know if one of us wasn't really us... right?" Naruto questioned.

"No, Kakashi knows all of us well enough to copy us."

"So how do we know if we are all really us..." Naruto rubbed his head as the whole situation was getting confusing.

"We'll need to ask each other a question that we know the answer to but Kakashi wouldn't." Sasuke said.

"Like what?!" Naruto bellowed.

"Sakura, what was the reason I got a check up at the hospital for last month?"

"Sasuke, that's confidential!"

"I was the patient! So as my doctor I'm giving you permission to say!"

"Fine, you had an upset stomach from eating some bad sushi!"

"Right! Hmm... Naruto! During our fight when you came after me to stop me going to Orochimaru, how did our fight end?"

"Uh..." Naruto scratched his head as he tried to remember. "You fully activated your curse mark... and... you used you're chidori against my rasengan."

"Right."

************

"NARUTO!!!"

"SASUKE!!!"

Naruto and Sasuke charged each other, their chidori and rasangan connecting, the attacks repelling each other and burst into a bright light which engulfed them. The next thing that Sasuke knew was he was kneeling over Naruto's unconscious body, staring down at Naruto's face, unsure what he was to do. He had fought Naruto and won proving that he was stronger than the blond, now he was free to go to Orochimaru and learn the jutsu he needed to become strong enough to beat his brother. But he couldn't tear his eyes off Naruto's face, he was feeling conflicted, a few minutes ago he was willing to kill the blond but now...

The heavens opened, a crack of thunder roared over head, water rained down around them heavily. Sasuke couldn't explain this feeling... he had experienced it before, he could never forget this feeling. Remorse, the same feeling he had felt when it had finally sunk in that his family was dead, after his brother Itachi had slaughtered them all and left him alive. He had suppressed that emotion for another, anger, he would spend the next few years training himself to become strong enough to kill his brother! Why was he feeling this now for Naruto? The blond was still alive and someone would be along shorty and find him and give him the medial care he needs, why was he feeling like this? Sasuke could feel not just the rain running down his face but his own tears as well, what the hell was happening to him?! He had always found Naruto annoying, the blond always infuriated him, eventually he came to respect him as Naruto had proven that he was more than just a dumb, blond knuckle-head. Eventually he had become resentful of Naruto as he had become so strong... that was what had pushed Sasuke to join Orochimaru in his search for power. He had been willing to cast aside everything, his friends, the village, he had even been willing to kill Naruto but now his heart ached as he looked down at Naruto's still bondy, the only sign of life was the weak rise and fall of his chest. Sasuke couldn't tear himself away... he used to feel like this when... was that it? Did he love Naruto?

************