First class trip

It came easy to Cole, falling back into a familiar rythm. It may be gruelling, thankless work, training from morning 'till late noon, but the palpable gains were a sort of motivation he had never felt before. Also, having an order to things is quite helpful in a time of uncertainty, and Cole never felt as uncertain as he was now. He was getting powerful, but just not quick enough. Passing through the brothels Janaka recommended and healing the people there was well and good, liberating stuff for the soul, but he was nowhere closer to actual strength. Though he managed to increase Aeon's level.

A week of sparring was necessary until the recalcitrant ability awarded him with a single, piddly level. And the prep time made it wholly unsuitable for battle, he just hoped handleability came with increased usage.

The one time he catched Yuya off-guard with it, was when she went in for a body-check, as the brutish girl was wont to do. Cole focused, impelling the energy lying dormant within his heart to empower him with his call. He wasn't all too surprised when the impact rattled him to the bone, through Aeon's passive and active, and he landed flat on his ass. On the other end of his suddenly increased defense, Yuya looked at him spitefully, a bleeding split running along her lip. That afternoon ended badly for him.

Cole sat in the common room of The Dancing Cherry Blossom, a familiar sight to the strumpets and doxies after a week of prolonged stay, waiting, as he did the last few days. With the truly massive favor he had done for Janaka, he managed to persuade her into buying off some cheap lookouts - really just squirts from the orphanages that needed a bit of chump-change. In exchange, they would keep an eye out for a certain, conspicuous group of people and an old man that should arrive any day now. He didn't wait for too long.

Janaka walked through, vampish as always and looking delicious in her tight pseudo-nightie. She snaked up behind him and draped her arms over his shoulders, whispering into his ear like a vixen: "Your Sugar Momma got something for you." Cole always laughed at her new title. Funny little story that one.

Every evening after training he and Yuya grabbed a bite at some random foodstall. They could have gotten something more extravagant, but Cole was still feeling stingy with his money. Janaka, kind as she was, had filled up the little funds he had mooched from the Hokage nicely. In passing he had quipped what a sweet Sugar Mama she was. He hadn't realised the term wasn't known in this world, and at her verbal nudging he explained, deeply embarassed. Janaka absolutely loved it and took to the term like a fish in water. Male prostitution was a fairly niché subject, one she found novel and intriguing. Now, whenever they tussled, she played the role of busty dominatrix or forlorn and repressed housewife that had to pay off a strapping young man to soothe her aches. Honestly, it was great.

Cole pulled himself away from the sexy tangent and back to the present.

"Your little friends have been spotted at the gates. A group of nine, including that old man... What's his name again?"

"Tazuna, a bridge builder from the Land of Waves.", he replied with an absent mind. "Nine people? Are you sure? Did you get a... description of them?" That couldn't be possible.

"Yep, absolutely sure. Got confirmation by multiple sources. Two genin squads, lead by Kakashi of the Sharingan and Might Guy the Green Beast. Uhm..." She hummed softly into his cheek. "There was the Nine-Tails kid, Naruto; a boy with thick - they really emphasized that point -, really thick eyebrows; two super broody ones, should have been the Uchiha and Hyūga prodigies respectively; and two girls. One with buns, the other just pink through and through. That last one would make a perfect poster girl. Anyway, a bit of overkill for an escort mission, if you ask me." He could feel her staring into the side of his face as he felt himself growing pale. "Something wrong?"

'Fuck. How did that happen?' It made no sense to him. No one had cared about the Land of Waves and its rampant criminal gangs for at least a few years, in the series at least. But apparently something had tipped them off to the actual danger of the mission. Now, two of Konoha's strongest ninjas had been sent out. And the consequences kept cycling through his mind.

What if Orochimaru used the breach in defenses to prematurely attack Konoha, without allying himself with Suna. Was the potential vessel he saw in Sasuke more important than Konoha's destruction? How would the battle with Zabuza go? He would never remain in a fight against two jōnin that potentially outclassed him. What would happen if he fled with his Hidden Mist techniques? "Ahhh...." Cole groaned into his hands, that would be the worst possible outcome. An on-the-loose master assassin with a grudge? No, thank you.

He turned towards Janaka as she rubbed his back. And he smiled his warmest smile.

"Wanna travel to the Land of Waves with me?"

-------------

Reality returned in a haze. It always did, since he could rarely sleep without the gnawing nightmares and those red, red eyes, always watching him, waiting for him.

Sasuke's head swam as he levered himself upright in his bedroll, inside a tiny tent filled by the ceaseless snoring of both Lee and Naruto. He felt the faint itch to kick both of them out, but then he'd have to contest with Neji. He hadn't given the Hyūga clan much thought in his early childhood - he didn't want to give his childhood much thought at all -, but it was fair to say the no non-sense adling was the only other compentent person in the team. Tenten had a fair bit of talent in weapon-handling, though nothing to fancy. Wholly incapable of nin- and genjutsu and entirely too empty-headed, Lee was ostensibly a worse case than Naruto, how the flashy fool became a genin was a mystery. Although sensei Guy might have a part to play in that.

Speaking of Naruto, Sasuke had to admit, the dumbass was good for some things. Was the thing in question his ability to pester sensei Kakashi and the Hokage until they reluctantly gave them a mission that suited their ability? Perhaps. Would he ever tell him? No. Did it surmount to an empty gesture anyway. Yes.

It rankled him to no end that their first C-rank mission had been hijacked and turned into a joint effort with Team Guy. Was it because Kakashi didn't trust them yet, or something else entirely? Did it have anything to do with Naruto's attitude at the Evaluation?

Sasuke scoffed, it mattered little to him anyway. If they wanted to stand in his way, fine, he'd just walk over them all the same.

He slipped out of the tent, into the glade they broke camp at, a place with little sunlight and swaddled by trees from all sides. The air was thick with moisture and a thin fog was beginning to settle around them. Sasuke clicked his tongue. He hated places like these, barely any visibility and too many avenues of attack should they get ambushed. Would they get ambushed? The extra supervision by a second jōnin and his gut instinct told him: yes, most definitely.

More people woke up and Sasuke kept watching the treeline, a futile effort when sensei Kakashi and sensei Guy were posted as sentries, however, Sasuke just felt it was right to do it himself. He felt someone settle down beside him and turned. Neji sat apart from him, deeply in meditation. Sasuke felt a tense moment pass, and he let it, before the Hyūga broke the silence first.

"Would you like to join me for some light exercise?" Though Neji said it with the same curt tone as when they first met and he stopped Lee from getting his ass kicked, Sasuke noticed how his pale-white eyes shone alongside his question. He could understand Neji, in that the last few, uneventful days with the old man had been a strain on his patience as well.

"Sure." Neji looked capable and Sasuke wanted to know if the same held true for his skill.

At this point Naruto and Lee had both emptied out of the tent in a bundle of idiocy and sat waiting as he and Neji walked away from each other. Tenten and Sakura had joined from their own tents, drawn by the commotion.

Sasuke disliked gawking crowds like these, but all the better if they all realised at once how much superior he was.

Neji took a stance, admittedly form-perfect. "Are you ready, Sasuke?" It was spoken lightly and carried to his ears with the wind.

In response he took his own stance. "Always ready."

No signal was needed, both in tacit agreement of: first come, first serve. Sasuke clenched his fists tighter, chakra roaring in his veins, his calves bunched and he gripped the earth with the soles of his boots. Neji settled deeper into his stance, farther onto his back-leg, chakra aggregating on his palms.

In that moment sensei Kakashi appeared, a hand over Sasuke's fist before he could react, sensei Guy with a hand on Neji's shoulder. "We got company." He said and suddenly Sasuke registered the voices that closed in.

The old bridge builder peeked through a slit in his tent, morose just as they had met him. "What is all this commotion about?!" Though he spoke harshly he quickly noticed the laden atmosphere and joined their group.

Sasuke strained his ears, everyone else trying the same.

Faintly he heard something.

"-od I hate this place. It's so fucking humid." A man spoke.

"Could you stop grousing like a bitch for 2 seconds? You are what, twenty? And you can't handle a bit of humidity?" A girl answered, very irritated if he judged by the tone of her voice.

"What can I say, unlike you, chrome dome, I have this long and luscious and gorgeously curled hair and all this moisture is killing my style." It wasn't long before he heard dull thwacks and the man shout in pain. "OW! OW! I'm sorry!"

"Call me that one more time and I'll beat your ass black and blue."

Sasuke felt a bit of disappointement. What would he care about two unknown travelers? He was about to tune the newcomers out when he noticed that Naruto seemed a bit out of it, looking back and forth between sensei Kakashi, Tenten of all things and then the forest.

"Is that... Cole?", Naruto asked and Kakashi nodded.

"That is indeed Mr. Marin."

"Why is he here?" Tenten asked the group, or rather, Kakashi.

Sasuke was relieved that everyone else looked just as clueless as he felt.

(New chapter. Don't know how I feel about this one either. I can't make any promises that I'll post a chapter tomorrow, full-time work is draining me right now and I don't want writing to become a chore, or that my chapters suffer for it.

But hey, first major change in the cannon story, can you guess why?)