FLAMING MAELSTROMS.

Three Idiots and a Fox

Mud sloshed beneath their feet, soaked and slippery from the ongoing flood from the skies. It was like the heavens themselves were mourning which, admittedly, was hardly surprising. The world as they'd known it was gone, corpses littering the ground around the three of them as they just stood there. Everything they knew was gone – friends, teachers, allies... The shinobi alliance had succeeded, but that didn't really matter. Not when they were all dead.

Dirt covered their once vibrant clothes, all the world awash in muted colours, alliance headbands scattered on the ground – slightly scratched and very much forgotten. It was over. Everything was over, and that was a bit of a big problem.

Sakura chuckled mirthlessly to herself, staring up at the sky. "Well, that didn't go as planned," she remarked, a scowl twitching at her face in the next second as Sasuke snorted derisively. Well, at least that hadn't changed, she mused, curling her hand into a fist. Though it certainly didn't make her want to punch him any less for all the heartache and headaches he'd caused her over the years.

"No kidding," Sasuke drawled.

"Sasuke!" Naruto yelled, leaping over so he was standing in front of them rather than at their cold, dead sensei's side. "I see those years under Orochimaru didn't do much for your socialisation skills..."

"It's no wonder Orochimaru didn't let him out all that often," Sakura grumbled, glaring down at a pale blonde, blue-eyed body like it offended her.

It did, but that was hardly the point.

"You aren't seriously talking about me like I'm a dog, are you?" he ground out, glaring menacingly between the pair of them. "Besides... what do socialisation skills matter when we're the last people living on this entire planet, dobe. A lot of fucking good that did us."

Sighing, Sakura raised her hands, coming between the pair before things could go any further downhill. "Chill with the swearwords. They aren't gonna get us anywhere – except even more riled up, and that's the last thing we need right now."

"Hn."

Sakura felt her face twitch. "Speak in actual words we can understand, please, Sasuke. Shockingly enough, not all of us speak Uchiha." Her fingers twitched at the answering Hn. She really wanted to do something... express her rage and sadness, but she didn't want to punch anything. In fact, she rather wanted to set things on fire, but she wasn't a fire element and she didn't want to waste chakra. "I said, speak in words we can understand, dumbass," she muttered, uncaring of her once-upon-a-time crush on the boy.

Sasuke scowled at her, glaring at her menacingly.

Sakura didn't back down. "You wanna die, shithead?" she hissed, ignoring the small part of her which screeched at the insult she'd thrown his way. He was always staring, sneering, and she wanted nothing more than to wipe the look from his face. Ino was dead. Her crush didn't matter.

He answered her stance and words with his own, each just as filthy as the last. "You really want to test me, hypocritical bitch?"

Naruto stepped in between them then. And wasn't that surprising... usually it was her stepping between the two idiots... but they weren't those same children anymore. "Come on, you two..." he said, and Sakura felt a flush of shame run through her. "There's no need to fight."

"We're literally the last living people on this entire planet," she said, staring at him blankly. "We can do whatever the hell we want." Her eyes narrowed on Sasuke. "Punch whoever we want." She wasn't the weak little girl he had left behind.

"What about Team Seven Unity?" Naruto offered, a trembling smile testing his lips. "Konoha Solidarity – that's a thing, right?"

Sasuke snorted. "Fuck no, I defected in case you forgot," he muttered snidely.