The Way Through Stone Village (Naruto)

79: PR with Sasuke and Suigetsu

[OP: "The Truth is a Cave"--The Oh Hellos]

Shine took Sasuke and Suigetsu to the last place you'd expect: the abandoned factory that Temari and Shikamaru had been told about.

As it turned out, plenty of people were there now, training. But the training seemed more like a  brawl.

Nearly all of the people were young, teens or twenty-something's, maybe a few were on the upward end of that. In Rain Village, most people older than that were too tired and blue to bother to fight if they didn't have to.

But with so much rain and so little resources, the young people got restless when they weren't sick and wanted to take it out on each other.

They also had been the only ones thus far to avoid any of the things that Team Zoe had done, save for maybe a couple who'd shown up, but those weren't the ones here.

When they saw three newcomers enter, they all stopped and shot them wary looks.

"This was not a good idea," Suigetsu told Sasuke. "And how did she think we'd help with this?"

Sasuke didn't bother to answer him.

"Hi, everybody," Shine said cheerfully, though she looked a little nervous. "I'm Shine. I'm with the Kazekage's team here. I'm sure you've heard of us."

"What of it?" one girl asked. She sounded annoyed.

"We're just here to make sure you all got our invitation to our celebration this week," Shine said. "We wanted to show Rain Village a good time before we have to go, and we hear that some people might be worried that they aren't actually invited, so we wanted to make sure you knew everyone was welcome."

The group stared at her skeptically.

A few of them did look a bit more intrigued, but most of them were suspicious.

"How did you know to find us here?" one boy asked, not very nicely.

"I heard that you meet here," Shine shrugged. "Am I not welcome?"

That took some gall to say. Clearly they weren't welcome.

"Hey, I know who that one is," one person said, pointing at Sasuke.

For a second, Sasuke thought he'd finally been recognized, and that was a much worse thought than he expected, but instead the boy started to chuckle in a kind of dry way. "That was one of the ones who scrapped for a bit outside the Village, by the lake. Him and one other guy--not the one with the sword, the idiot with the two-toned hair."

"Oh, that was them?" said one of the girls, as if she was mildly impressed. "Tore up the lakeside. You guys have some real jutsus, huh?"

Shine smiled as if this was exactly what she'd planned--but Sasuke didn't give her that much credit. He was starting to think Shine's main skill was playing off whatever happened, not always that she knew what each outcome would be before she started--though, in the end, it was nearly the same thing.

"Hey, that's no fair," Suigetsu said. "Why are they impressed by you doing something stupid? I have a big, legendary sword."

But that just got a laugh from the crowd. 

"Oh, don't feel so bad, shrimp," said one--who was thinner than either of them were, so it was ironic that he called him that. "You can have your turn. Want to go with one of us right now? We don't get new faces around here often."

More laughs because that was an understatement.

"Well, I would," Suigetsu said, "but I'm sure she won't let me." With a look at Shine.