the unplanned plan // sasunaru

chapter 2

1 month Prior

Naruto was in his apartment, enjoying his delicious cup noodles when a poof of smoke caught him by surprise. He fell back and out of his chair, glaring at whoever had scared him. Of course, it had to be that pervert Kakashi-Sensei.

"Kakashi-Sensei!" Yelled Naruto, getting back up and dusting himself off. "What are you doing here? You scared me!"

Kakashi simply eye-smiled and explained. "Meet up at the bridge in 5 minutes, we got assigned a mission." And with that, he poofed again, though disappearing this time. Naruto grumbled about impolite teachers as he finished his ramen and took a short-unsurprisingly cold- shower. The landlord hated him and refused to let him have any heated water.

'Stupid asshole' Thought Naruto, as he shook the water out of his hair and headed out the door.

It only took him a minute before he arrived at the bridge, meeting up with Sai, Sakura, and Sasuke.

Naruto had finally managed to bring Sasuke back from Orochimaru's clutches, though having to break his legs and drag him home. Naruto had collapsed in front of the Kanoha gates with an unconscious Sasuke on his back. He had been in a coma for a week, while Sasuke was stuck in a hospital bed for a month. Surprisingly enough, Sasuke hadn't complained about being back to Konoha, and Naruto suspected that Orochimaru had controlled him to refuse to go home, but that the 'curse' had been dispelled when he entered Konoha.

Tsunade had wanted to lock Sasuke up for at least a year, but the council had argued, happy to have their precious Uchiha back. Though the only reason Tsunade had not locked him up was because Naruto had begged her not to, and she could not refuse her blonde Gaki anything.

So Sasuke was free to become a Konoha ninja again. The rookie nine and Gai's team had been pretty cold towards the Uchiha because of his 'betrayal', but after hearing Naruto's theory and seeing the lack of refusal from the stoic raven, they had believed it.

So now team 7 had 5 members, since they didn't want to get rid of their new teammate Sai.

Naruto crossed his hands behind his head, yawning slightly and looking at his team. Sakura was trying to flirt with Sasuke - His betrayal and absence did nothing to get rid of her crush on the boy - Sai was drawing on one of his scrolls, and Sasuke was trying to ignore the constant useless chatter of Saskura –To no avail.

Naruto smirked at Sasuke's slightly frustrated look and jumped when Kakashi arrived in a puff of smoke again, his pervy orange book in hand.

Sakura immediately let go of Sasuke, pointing an accusing finger at Kakashi and yelling. "You're late!"

There was a short silence as everyone noticed that Naruto hadn't said it too. They turned around and found Naruto leaning on the bridge railing and looking off in the distance.

"Dobe." Sasuke called out. Naruto turned around slowly and grunted. "Mh? What?"

Again, there was silence. 'Who was this? This wasn't the Naruto they knew.' Naruto looked at him expectantly, and Sasuke simply muttered. "Just pay attention, Kakashi's gonna tell us about the mission.

Naruto nodded and turned around, leaning against the railing backwards and looked at Kakashi silently. 'What? No exclamation? Hm, weird.' Thought Sasuke. He also turned his attention to Kakashi, and he noticed that the others were also looking slightly confused with the blonde's behavior.

"Uh, well, we're going to have to travel to Suna, to deliver an important message to the Kazekage."

Hearing this, Naruto instantly perked up and grinned widely, shouting excitedly. "I'm gonna get to see Gaara? Awesome, I haven't seen him in so long!"

'Looks like he's back to his old self...'

Sasuke seemed to brood more than usual as he heard the blonde's excitement at seeing the red-head, and Sai frowned slightly.

"Yes Naruto, we are, so get ready, meet at Konoha's gate in five minutes, and we'll be on our way." Said Kakashi, before disappearing in a puff of smoke again.

Before anyone could move, Naruto had already run of in the direction of his apartment, radiating happiness and leaving his teammates in a warm glow from his wide smile.

Naruto rushed down the street happily, ignoring the sneers and glares directed his way, ignoring the harsh whispers about him, pretending not to care; while on the inside another piece of his soul chipped off and fell to the floor, coming one step closer to breaking.
He was like a glass bottle, bottling up all his feelings and pretending not to care, but the bottle was slowly breaking under the pressure, already cracked all over. 'I don't think I'll be able to hold on much longer'

He chased that thought out of his mind, instead thinking of how great it would be to see Gaara again. 'He had become Kazekage! How amazing was that! If he can become Kazekage, then there's no doubt I can become Hokage!'

He quickly got back to his apartment and packed, before meeting up with the others at the gate.

'Today's gonna be a great day' Thought Naruto as he and his team walked out into the forest and away from Konoha.