Overburn

Just a month left to graduation.

And somehow the list of things I wanted to do before then didn't seem to be growing any shorter. Point of fact, it only seemed to grow.

Learning the Body Flicker jutsu might have been a mistake, because it opened up far too many avenues of training that I hadn't considered before. Already my focus was fraying when I had to train something more basic. It was just too good to pass up on as a base concept, to the point where I had even started to play hooky from the Academy, knowing that it was all repetition for the genin exams at this point.

My grades might suffer a bit, but given how I could now perform all of the basic three jutsu with a single half-tiger seal, I found it rather difficult to care.

Or half-ram, since I had first become able to use them with merely a single ram seal. But the literature and scrolls seemed to refer to it as a half-tiger seal, probably because it was most often used by ninja who were trying to bridge the gap from using a tiger handseal to sealless Body Flickers, rather than people trying to master the Academy jutsu which used the ram seal. Tiger and ram when used alone, without other seals, were pretty similar anyhow. An expansion of otherwise unmodified chakra outside your body, which could be then shaped and controlled and manipulated.

Like the chakra construct in the basic jutsu or the bubble in the Flicker.

I was starting to finally see patterns in how certain jutsu worked, which was a pretty satisfying feeling.

The half-tiger seal, done with only one hand, was a little different from the tiger and ram seals, lying somewhere in between. But it wasn't a simple two-dimensional left-right tiger-ram axis where you could just say it was closer to one more than the other, but rather it felt like it was also doing something a little different which the other two two-hand handseals didn't do.

Like it was also on a second, up-down axis as well. So yeah, adding dimensions of difficulty.

But that was what chakra control exercises and simple repetition were for: learning how to compensate for the slight deviations and doing more with less.

Today had seemed no different from any other day as I tried to work out the kinks of Flickering atop water. It was like trying to jump on top of a trampoline, except that I couldn't even get out nearly as much energy as I put into it. The liquid stubbornly continued to just absorb all the chakra and kinetic energy I pushed into it, sapping most of the Body Flicker's forward momentum.

But even so, I was getting better at it.

Especially at forming the elongated teardrop arrow-shaped chakra layer. Not enough to get rid of the smoke and the pop, but I was starting to get funny ideas about those as well. If only I had more time. But as it was, I needed to start getting ready for the start of canon. I had been training my physique conservatively, ensuring that I wasn't stunting my growth or harming myself through overwork.

But with the fight against Kakashi coming up, I needed to kick it up a notch. Like a professional fighter, I was now entering fight season.

I wouldn't be able to achieve any kind of technique by then that could match Hatake Kakashi, but that was fine since instead I could preempt myself and lay the groundwork, doing the reverse of canon Sasuke. He had copied Lee and then spent a month training himself to be able to handle the level of movement, but I instead would do the reverse, and...

"Uchiha Sasuke."

I looked up from the water's surface, spotting Shino standing on the nearest edge. And judging by his body language, it actually was Shino this time around.

"Yo, what brings you here. Something happen at the Academy?" I asked, walking over to him.

He adjusted his glasses. "Indeed. Your continued absence has begun to be noted. I suspect that soon it might begin to reflect upon your record and thought it prudent to inform you."

"Huh... The fangirls' or the teachers'?" I asked with wry amusement.

The Aburame didn't deign the question with an answer, merely continuing his silent staring.

"Alright, alright. I forgot how serious you could be about this stuff."

"The genin exams are no trivial matter and it behooves us to take them seriously," he replied and it was the closest thing I had heard to actual annoyance from him until now.

I shrugged. "Tell me, have you gone through anything actually useful in the last two weeks? Or have you just been repeating the same stuff we've gone over years ago? Because..." I raised two fingers in the half-tiger seal and flexed my chakra, causing four clones to appear beside me without so much as a pop or whiff of smoke.

Shino blinked.

The Clone jutsu was the hardest of the three and my level of control was definitely above and beyond what was necessary for passing any exam involving it. Still, I could tell he wasn't completely mollified. Maybe he just missed me?

I sighed, getting my feet back above dry land.

Since I was planning on failing Kakashi's bell test and enlisting in the genin corps—jounin-senseiless common mooks as they were commonly thought off, ignored and left alone for the most part until they proved themselves somehow—then I would have plenty of time in the future to continue training as I wished.

My real deadline was the Chuunin Exams, still some seven months away.

I could waste the last few weeks I had in the Academy in the actual Academy; it wouldn't hurt anything.

"But fine, I'll start coming back tomorrow. That good with you?" I asked, raising a brow at him.

The insect user nodded stiffly.

"What's up otherwise? Confident you're gonna pass?"

He adjusted his glasses again. "I am quite certain that I will pass the Academy's test. Why? Our combined training has put my mastery of the common techniques at a level above what I suspect is expected of even the most advanced of genin." Even when he was boasting, he sounded detached and clinical. "But you have advanced even beyond that, again. It is almost disheartening."

"Genius Uchiha, remember?" I smirked cockily, before letting it fade away. "What about that disguised clone variation you were working on? Did you get it to work yet?"

Shino had been trying to use a form of the Clone jutsu on his bugs, hoping to disguise them as harmless animals that would pass rudimentary notice. Alone, a few of them were pretty easy to miss, but in such numbers they were also pretty useless. To really be effective in a fight he needed a decent-sized swarm to get on his opponent.

But that required positioning and luck, unless he could lure them into attacking one of his insect clones. So taking a cue from my Midnight Nameless jutsu, he had tried to teach his insects to transform into birds to have them swoop in from above unexpectedly, faster than his insects could usually move.

Shino shook his head.

"Mimicking the movements of birds appears to be a realm beyond my current means."

A small swarm buzzed out of his sleeve, landing on the ground and shifting into another form as a shell of chakra formed around them.

"A squirrel?"

Looking up, the insect clone appeared to notice me and then hastily beat a retreat for the trees far to my left. It was pretty fast, too, even if its movements looked a little jerky. If I didn't know what it was I would probably overlook it. Until it tried to jump me, anyhow.

"That's not bad. Do you have other forms as well? In the forest it'd be great, but in a field something like a mouse or a rabbit would probably work better."

"Indeed. But..." Shino did not move for a moment, his brows furrowed before he finally nodded, more to himself than me. "Uchiha Sasuke. I do not wish to reveal them so easily to you."

I raised a brow at that. Was he saying what I think he was saying?

"Therefore, would you consider sparring with me so that I may properly put my techniques—and myself as well—to the test?"

I licked my lips; this was the first real fight in this world I was getting into. Taijutsu sparring in the Academy just didn't count. "Hmm... Sure. But what level are we willing to take it to. Can I use my fire jutsu against your insects?"

"My swarm will recover in time, so long as you do not grievously wound my person. I shall not drain your chakra in turn, if their reaching of your person will be considered my victory. Are those terms agreeable?" Shino suggested.

"That sounds fine. I can make a small fireball in the place of a real one; it won't even burn your coat. And if you cover, let's say a quarter of my body, with insects, I'll consider that a loss. Fair?"

He nodded and raised a hand in the seal of confrontation.

I grinned, matching the gesture; it was also a half-tiger seal, now that I thought about it.

Shino moved first.

Or rather, the insect clone he had sent scurrying off into the woods did, burrowing out of the ground beneath me and vigorously attacking my foot. But I had already moved the instant they had broken the surface, leaving behind only an insubstantial clone, moving perfectly behind it so my silhouette remained in his blind spot.

I hadn't brought with me any shuriken or kunai from the house, so the first thing I needed to do was acquire some ammunition. I had jumped back to the lake, going around and picking up and filling my pockets with stones to use.

Stones weren't anywhere near as effective with throwing techniques as kunai or shuriken were, but I had worked something out with chakra threads, that would mostly negate their inferiority. Except... One night not work and the other isn't exactly something I can use in sparring.

Chakra Sling would probably have to wait on the bench until Kakashi, then. But the Bola...

My hand flashed three times, sending three stones flying at Shino.

He drew a kunai and deflected all three, dashing forward as his swarm began to mobilize, buzzing out in great black waves from his sleeves. A long-range match wasn't in his favor since I had better aim, but it wasn't particularly good for me either, since he could make any number of insect clones and start setting up multiple fronts against me along with other traps and snares.

I threw another two rocks before bringing my hands together—serpent, ram, monkey, boar, horse, tiger: the Great Fireball jutsu's handseals flashed by in a second as I inhaled, blasting out a wave of fire that completely broke off Shino's line of sight and kept his kikaichu from advancing.

Feeling a bit unfair, I brought my hands together for the tiger seal again and Flickered diagonally off to the side, towards the copse of trees. The trunk of one particularly handsome specimen hid my appearing out of the high-speed jutsu, as I pressed my back against it on a sturdy branch halfway up its total length.

Looking around, I spotted Shino just as the flames died out.

He was looking left and right, having realized I had moved. Then, as if having realized something, he started looking up and into the air, trying to find any birds of ill omen. It was exactly what I would have done if I hadn't learned the Body Flicker jutsu. Or the Earth Swim, though I didn't like using that, doubly so against Shino's insects which could also burrow through the ground.

The black swarm around Shino dispersed, the many insects scattering all around him as he tried to find me. This is when he'll make the switch, setting an ambush for when I attack him.

I considered turning on the Sharingan, but decided not to—it wasn't necessary at this level.

Grabbing one stone from my pocket, I exhaled slowly and infused it with chakra, willing it to act a certain way. So far it had only worked for a few meters and on objects I held in my hand, but that should be enough. Peeking around the trunk of the tree I loosed the stone with a toss that pretty much made it explode from my hand, and immediately switched to a half-tiger seal for a Clone jutsu.

The elongated teardrop-shaped bubble around the stone allowed it to cross the distance between Shino and me in an instant, soundlessly and unnoticed, but without chakra of its own, the bubble crumbled before it could reach him. Meaning my Flicker Throw too was still a work in progress. It was harder to apply a Body Flicker to a foreign object then it might sound. The sudden return of its regular air resistance profile robbed it of most of its incredible speed and would give Shino just enough of a warning that he could turn around and raise his kunai to ward it off.

Which was why the Clone appeared over the stone at that moment, overlain just so that the illusionary kunai in its hand was where the cast stone met Shino's kunai parry, appearing as if I had flickered into existence to attack him.

Shino wavered and fell apart into a cloud of insects as all the swarms converged on my illusion before it could escape, revealing the real Shino who had been crouched inside one of the smaller swarms by the side.

I exploded off the branch, not quite flickering but close to it, as I rushed around the swarms that were only just now realizing their mistake. Six stones flashed forward from my hand, forcing the real Shino to dodge and parry the projectiles, moving him further away from the swarm as he sought to buy time and distance.

I could see the grim realization in his eyes as he dug his feet into the ground, intending to meet me in taijutsu, hoping to stall me for long enough that his swarm could get me from behind, effectively pincering me. Which he might have managed, normally, if not for the last pair of stones in my hand.

Chakra strings could be used in many ways, not just to connect my finger to something else, like for example to connect two objects together—into a Chakra Bola.

I threw the two stones a second before we met each other in taijutsu and he predictably ignored them, unable to see the chakra string connecting them and dismissing the too-wide shots as just a distraction. The stones harmlessly passed him by like speeding bullets at knee-level, only for the string between them to go taught and suddenly curve their course and entangle Shino's feet.

Like a real bola.

His eyes went wide as suddenly he couldn't use his feet at all, his attention ripped away from me just long enough for me to snatch the kunai from his hand and put it to his throat in a reverse grip.

A second later the roaring of hundreds of insects enveloped me, dispersing only a few moments later.

Shino was staring up at me as I held him by the front of his jacket with one hand and with the kunai near his face in the other. He frowned, adjusting his glasses as I pulled him up, carefully checking that his feet were no longer entangled as he collected himself.

"...It is your victory, Uchiha Sasuke."

I could have just left the kunai in his throat and avoided the swarm by moving on if I had wanted to, after all.

"Good fight," I said and offered the seal of tree-hugging reconciliation and he accepted it without hesitation.

"I am disappointed by the result, yet even so, I feel that I have learned much," Shino nodded, adjusting his glasses.

"You need a way to put pressure on your opponent at long-range to lure them in, still," I repeated. It was something I had observed before. "But ninjutsu is probably too chakra intensive for that, since you'd not only run the risk of getting too low for your insects, but also catching them in your own attack if you're not careful..."

Again, nothing that hadn't passed between us before. So maybe I could finally offer the thought I had had a while back, but held back until now, as graduation was nearing. Given who his sensei would be, then, the obvious choice was...

"Have you thought about genjutsu?"

He looked startled at that. As startled as an Aburame could, really.

"Low chakra expenditure, no risk of crossfire, you might be able to apply some touch-based advanced genjutsu with a single bug if you don't have a large enough swarm to drain them... Think about it."

Shino nodded slowly.

Whether or not Kurenai would teach him something like that was still up in the air, but at least I had planted the seeds for it now. Because just imagine an illusion of swarms of bugs suddenly crawling out from your every orifice when you knew you were fighting a bug user. Mix in some of the scarabs from The Mummy eating your from the inside and oof.

Fuck. That. Shit.

"...I shall. It has not been a conventional route among my clan, but... you do raise very salient points, Uchiha Sasuke. Thank you." He said and I just shrugged. "Returning to our fight, I wish to confirm a number of points: I had dispersed my swarm to avoid your fire release jutsu, but it would appear I spread myself too thin. I must ask—how you sprung my trap so convincingly? Have you developed a more advanced form of clone since we last met?"

I shook my head.

"I threw a stone and overlaid the clone on it. Like a Replacement, just... not. You saw, felt, and heard it, so I figured it might trip you up. A trap that's too sensitive is easy to spring."

Shino nodded. "Resourceful. I shall remember that."

"Wanna go again, or do you wanna go grab a bite to eat?" I asked.

He considered it seriously, before deciding with a resolute nod.

"Once more, if you will allow it."

When Naruto showed up to team assignments with a wide grin and a Konoha hitai-ate, I didn't quite let out a breath of relief.

But it was a close thing.

Sitting by the Uchiha compound and listening to the village suddenly get kicked into an alarmed uproar, I had more or less known exactly what was going on. Especially as I had been following along Mizuki's mood swings in the last month of the Academy after Shino had dragged me back there.

Even so, it had been challenging to simply sit by and wait for things to play out on their own. Because for all that it could go perfectly right it could just as well all go completely wrong.

But here we were, all genin and waiting for Iruka to show up and deliver the team assignments.

Suddenly I smelled the ramen broth scent I knew all too well right in front of me and I opened my eyes to see Naruto squatting on the desk in front of me. Ah, shit. Yeah, nah. Not dealing with this.

It wasn't even the incoming smooch, either. His body odor was still just plain offensive to me.

And I didn't hate ramen, not like Mizuki apparently did—and wasn't that just the saddest of character traits to have? To hate ramen?—but that didn't mean I liked it. It reminded me of when I had worked as security at a McDonalds in my youth. The same cheap smell of fast food. It reminded me of just how greasy the floors had been in the back of that place and of just how poor the quality of ingredients was...

Maybe Ichiraku was better, but the association was already there in my mind and I didn't like it.

"Get off the desk, broth brain."

"Huh, what'd you... Huh, what did you call me?"

Naruto seemed more puzzled by the insult—no doubt seeing all things ramen as good and holy - to actually get worked up. So when the guy sitting in front of me knocked into him, I barely had the time to raise a protective hand up to keep the orange menace from falling on top of me.

Good, ramen-flavored smooch averted.

Shoving him aside back onto the floor, I growled. "Get off the desk, you idiot."

He huffed and looked offended, even as he realized he had been in the wrong there, and then got hopeful and crushed again as Sakura started shouting at him. I just... closed my eyes and let all the noise wash over me, counting the seconds in my head until I would never again have to step into these classrooms.

"...team 7: Haruno Sakura,"

Ah, here we go...

I hadn't even noticed Iruka coming in, too focused on just running through mental lists of things I was still working on and on my breathing.

"Uchiha Sasuke,"

One whoop of joy, one depressed groan.

"and Uzumaki Naruto under Hatake Kakashi's leadership."

One depressed groan, one whoop of joy.

I didn't bother reacting, since things were still more or less according to canon. I did give Shino a nod once his team was announced and while he didn't look thrilled, he didn't look unappreciative either. I had no problem with team 8, Kurenai maybe aside. All I remembered about her was that she had tried to use a genjutsu on a known master of the Sharingan, so it was difficult to think too highly of her.

Well, okay Kiba was Kiba, but Akamaru was also Akamaru, so they balanced out in the final tally.

So far nothing I had done had apparently really changed anything, but that was fine. It kept things predictable until I could steal Naruto's favorite jutsu and I could get to flex myself against Kakashi and see just how far I had really come.

After that, once we flunked as a team, I could approach Naruto and see if he wanted to work together. Teams weren't as strictly regulated in the genin corps, so we could easily make a two-man cell and work our way from there. With a little bit of spit and polish, I could turn Naruto into a force of nature and focus on my own goals all the while.

No Sakura. No Kakashi. Just one useful if slightly dim-witted Ninja Jesus.

But, well, for now I could only wait. And wait. And wait.

Fucking hell, this is why I refuse to work with you, Kakashi.

"The last among your team is Uchiha Sasuke," the Third Hokage explained as they arrived at the Uchiha compound.

"Hmm..." Hatake Kakashi intoned, lazily following along. "The last scion of the Uchiha, was it? Something of a prodigy, as well..."

Hiruzen did not speak, allowing Kakashi to process it at his own leisure as they looked around the neat—if rather spartan room.

"Is he to be my charge due to the Sharingan, then?"

"That has been a part of the consideration, yes. His bloodline limit awakened at the night of the Uchiha's downfall, though they remain immature to this day, and since then he has been very much alone, with few friends..." Hiruzen explained, not looking at the gray-haired ninja even as he knew the parallels to be rather striking. "Lately it seems as if young Sasuke has grown disillusioned with how far ahead of his peers he is, something which even his Academy instructors have had a difficult time finding fault with, given just how advanced he appears in class. His father was a very strict man, and he was once your charge as well, so I am sure you understand something like that quite well..."

Noting the melancholy mood, the aged Hokage chose to say no more.

"Well, then, shall we take a break outside... Your team will not be expecting you still for another few hours, will they?" he asked, instead, with light amusement. "I believe I saw a vending machine just around the corner with that one brand of peach ice tea..."

Ramen, ramen, Hokage, ramen. Sasuke-kun, Sasuke-kun, Kyaaa, Sasuke-kun, I summarized the two previous introductions, scoffing under my breath again at how little had changed.

"I am Uchiha Sasuke," and then I hesitated.

Did I want to play a part to fit the scene or just be honest...? Well, I didn't exactly remember how Sasuke's lines went, so might as well be myself. It wasn't like any of this really mattered.

"I dislike a lot of things, hate some. I like flying. As for dreams... Ambition is perhaps a more fitting term, as I intend to achieve them or die trying, but I intend to restore my clan and to kill my brother."

Now that I thought about it, much hadn't changed after all. As I said my introductions I realized that I wasn't too far off from the original. I mean, I just liked flying compared to Sasuke's plain I have no real likes. What a boring person I am. But at least I wasn't Kakashi, who had told us literally nothing we didn't already know.

Oh, right, everyone was staring at me.

Kakashi shrugged my introduction aside, not particularly impressed by the looks of things, which I supposed was only to be expected. Child prodigy, war veteran, ANBU captain, and all that...

"Huh," I realized then, still only half listening to Kakashi talking about breakfast. "Sensei, a question if I may...?"

He gave a placid smile at me, as if talking to a particularly slow child. "Sasuke-kun, if you have questions about the exercise, I'll be sure to answer them tomorrow."

"It's not about that. There's something I forgot, since your introduction was so very... thorough."

Maybe it was the sarcasm, maybe he was just humoring me, but he wasn't leaving.

"Between you and Itachi, who is stronger?"

Now his expression did reveal just how little he thought of me. "Maa, well, you'll find out tomorrow."

And with that he left with a casual Body Flicker. Which annoyed me quite a bit; not that he had dismissed me, but that I hadn't thought to keep my Sharingan active and steal his technique. It was bound to be among the best in the world.

Well, there was always tomorrow.

"Sasuke-kun, why don't we..."

Whatever she had been about to suggest, I didn't hear, forming the tiger handseal and Body Flickering away from the roof as I did. I had a survival exercise to prepare for. Or rather, I was going to war.

Shadow Clone jutsu, get.

With that, all the conditions for today had been cleared.

The hand seal was actually turned 90 degrees from what I remembered; it was the left hand's fingers pointing up, rather than horizontal. Still, a good jutsu, I noted as I used it quietly.

Naruto flailed about, getting ensnared in a trap as he had tried to grab a bell on the ground, and I set about getting ready to engage Kakashi. And then I remembered it as he Body Flickered away and replaced himself with a log. Huh, right, Sasuke had sent shuriken and then gotten spooked by the log.

I had intended to start the same way, since it was so textbook that it would set the pace, but with my Sharingan still active from stealing Naruto's jutsu I had ended up—barely—catching Kakashi replacing himself with that log, now taunting the still swinging and shouting Naruto with his chakra construct.

Hatake Kakashi, huh.

Looks like jounin weren't push-overs. I'd be having a field day picking apart that sealless Body Flicker jutsu later. But it wasn't as if my own improvements on the jutsu were for naught, given how different his approach was to the technique. I definitely could work with that, integrate it into my own, and then make it even better.

And the day's just getting started.

I jumped down from my hiding spot, lazily walking over to substitute-Kakashi with my hands in my pockets, mirroring its relaxed body language completely until we were both under Naruto. Then, as if only just noticing me, it gave me a curious look when it became obvious I was just ignoring the bait.

"Man, dead last, that was just sad."

"Wha—! You bastard! Come up here and say that again!"

I smirked, still ignoring the substitute-Kakashi beside me. Was the real one going after Sakura, or was he waiting for me to attack the Replacement jutsu?

"How about you come down instead?"

"I'm going to punch that smug smirk right off your face, Sasuke!" Naruto shouted, cutting himself loose aaand... getting ensnared right away in the second snare trap left behind by Kakashi.

I couldn't help it, I laughed at him, holding my belly and bending over backwards.

And Kakashi moved, having had enough of my messing around and ignoring his bait. I wouldn't have stood a chance alone; he came from my perfect blind spot, completely soundless and presenceless.

But I wasn't alone; not anymore.

The supersonic kunai slammed into his hastily drawn weapon with a loud screech, giving me just enough time to jump out of the way and turn around to face my would-be sensei, his wide-eyed surprise at the kunai-from-nowhere eliciting a smirk from me.

"My turn...!" I exhaled, excited beyond measure, and exploded forward eyes ablaze and drawing a red trail.

Kunai met as Kakashi easily regained his posture, only being matched by me because he was still warily keeping an eye out for other thrown kunai by my Shadow Clone in hiding. Though he didn't know that. For all he knew it was Sakura giving me back up from hiding.

Thrust, thrust, thrust, swipe, bat away, cut and thrust.

All batted aside with easy, instinctive moves by the jounin as he gave ground.

It was why I didn't find the weapon particularly impressive. Even in the hands of a master there was only so much you could do with a kunai in hand. But that was perfectly fine; there was still more to be drawn out from this man in regards to weapon's handling.

When no other supersonic projectiles were forthcoming, Kakashi's full attention finally returned to me. And as he met my blazing eyes and grin, he must have realized that I had been greedily stealing his moves for nearly a full minute now, throwing out every variation of attack I could imagine with full confidence that he wouldn't retaliate.

Allowing me to just drink in his years and years of hard work.

"You..."

But now he was cottoning on to it. And I wouldn't last.

I had trained myself optimally for years now, knowing that the Sharingan picked up all the slack for me when it came to technique and execution. But it just wasn't enough when faced with an adult ninja with a bigger, stronger, faster, and more precise body.

Even with my Sharingan picking up the slack, the one tomoe copy wheel eyes weren't enough to bridge that gap.

Kakashi hadn't even lifted his own headband yet. So I need to kick it up a notch before he overwhelms me!

As if on cue, three more supersonic projectiles suddenly shot from the foliage, this time as perfectly soundless Flicker Thrown kunai. Yet somehow Kakashi managed to react, dodging to the side at the last moment as they whizzed past me. Ah, he read it from my eyes. My anticipation was too obvious.

Or maybe more properly recognized, my bloodlust was too strong.

Even so, I couldn't let up, dashing after him as another hail from the side harried him, forcing him to defend against attacks from two fronts, over seventy degrees apart. Even a jounin would feel pressure under such conditions.

I stumbled in my next step, the sudden rush on incoming memories catching me off-guard. My first Shadow Clone ever had just died... and with it came a sudden clarity and realization. I looked up to see Kakashi eyeing me, not quite wary but definitely with a heightened threat level, as he kept his distance scanning for other clones.

"I didn't even see you throw that kunai. Amazing, Kakashi." I grinned. I wanted to laugh, I wanted to dance.

My body felt like it was aflame, like I was touching a livewire but instead of getting stuck in a shocked rigor of uselessness, my limbs were just moving on their own before I even thought about it, far beyond anything I had ever before managed. It was amazing!

"But I think you just made a massive mistake."

"Oh...?"

"See, I didn't know that Shadow Clone memories returned to you once they, ah, popped," I explained, smirk growing. "And I hadn't realized just how damned good your technique was. From this point of view, I barely caught a third of what you had been doing. But over there..." I continued and nudged to where the clone had been hiding. "I could see so much more clearly how to do it. It's something like this, right?"

I tried it out, the kunai barely whispering as it cut through the air like a snake, the motion starting from the core—no, no, from the ground itself, working its way up like a whip uncurling itself until it broke the sound barrier with its tip.

It was what he hadn't done, but could have. Eyes of insight that stole techniques, not just the movements, but seeing the application and extrapolating the true meaning from that. Seeing underneath the underneath, to borrow my opponent's yet unsaid words. He had just been warding me off, but the firing nerves and muscles had not lied about what he had wanted to do; a treacherous thrust. Invisible until it drew blood and all too lethal by then. A killer technique, honed over decades with blood, sweat, and tears to perfection.

Kakashi had been holding back so much just now it wasn't even funny. But I had stolen all of that now, which actually kind of was funny.

Which was why I was laughing so happily now.

"Ah, sorry, sorry, sensei. You just said we should come at you with the intent to kill. Meaning that I should treat you as an enemy. So, you have to know, right? It's been pretty hard all these years. You must know, right? To hold back from stealing everyone's jutsu just because you can, because that's such a dick move. But you're my enemy now, right? Right?"

I was totally in the zone right now. I had never gotten this damn excited in my life before; this or the previous.

"So. So! I'm free to do whatever I could ever want with, right? Against you? Right?"

Was this was cocaine felt like? I bet this was exactly what crack-fucking-cocaine felt like.

Kakashi was about to say something, that offensively lazy drawl of his obvious even before he opened his mouth. So fuck whatever he was about to say.

"Oh, and I forgot to mention..." I now know your sealless Body Flicker jutsu too, motherfucker!

I Flickered forward with full power, spinning in the air as I slammed a dropkick into his raised arms; the kind of sucker punch move that only worked so long as the opponent didn't think you know how to do it. And he had already discarded the kunai and he still didn't think that he should rethink his position against me meaning, meaning. I should push.

Push so fucking hard that he has to raise that fucking headband of his!

Oh boy, was it just me or was it getting hot out here?

Kakashi backflipped with the force of the impact, forcing me to kick off of him lest I get caught within his longer reach in mid-air. In practically perfect synchronization we each reached for shuriken and let rip, the air transforming into a hailstorm of screeching and shattering steel in a second before both managed to get feet on the ground again and decided to call it quits.

Ah, he's getting into it now. Into the mood. The rhythm, the boogie, the swing...

"Maa, what was it that I forgot, Sasuke?"

I blinked.

What was it? Ah, fuck.

"Sorry, I forgot what I wanted to say. Having way too much fun here."

"Maa, maa, I can understand being excited, but—"

"Not until I force you to use your Sharingan," I interrupted him. "So excuse me while I kick it up another notch." Shadow Clone jutsu, this time two. I felt light-headed, but not in a bad way. I still had plenty of chakra and I intended to keep this too quick for fancy ninjutsu or genjutsu tricks.

"Here I come, sensei..."

Six hands flashed, sending another hail of shuriken flying, and this time Kakashi thought better than to match blows with me, his own technique now working against him. I made chase as the two solid clones broke away to prepare more intricate stratagems and to support me at range since I couldn't waste them on brainless bull-rushing as Naruto would.

Kakashi matched me in taijutsu, keeping all three of us in view with superior footwork as he stubbornly refused to raise his headband.

I went for a front kick, feinting low at his knee as his lone eye went to clone number one, so I turned the raised leg into a spring forward by way of a superman punch, very nearly socking Kakashi in his stupid face on his blind side but for his hand, which somehow got a hold of my punch before it landed. His grip was like steel and for a second I nearly panicked, but I pushed outward with chakra control, using the Chakra Propulsion method to blow his grab clean off my wrist to free myself.

Three shurikens whizzed past my head close enough to clip hairs, forcing an off-balance Kakashi to lose a few hairs of his own to the projectiles as I continued to make chase.

My strategy was fundamentally unchanged from when I had had just the one clone giving me support from the trees.

I couldn't face him head-on as an equal, so I had to distract and threaten him at his corners, keeping him from giving his all at the front. I had initially thought of it like fraying a fabric at the edges; pulling apart their weave to disrupt their preferred technique or messing their rhythm, when I couldn't break through their center—forcing them to get out of their comfort zone and widen their focus into other areas, where they were weaker and then using that to leverage my advantages and win—when I had discovered it myself, back before what already felt like a lifetime ago.

It was what I later identified as Miyamoto Musashi's cutting the corners, or what in kendo was known as the second of the sansappo; the killing of the opponent's technique. Normally this was the kind of thing you did one-on-one...

But against someone of Kakashi's caliber, there was no way I could do that alone.

Not yet, at least.

He ducked under my projectiles and rushed low at me, going for something like a double-leg takedown as he intended to use me as a shield against my clones, while at the same time negating the Sharingan by getting in too close. So I stuck my feet to the ground and went for a guillotine around his neck, turning off the Sharingan to conserve chakra. If he wanted to wrestle, then I could wrestle long enough for a clone to come and kick him in the kidney from behind.

Realizing that I wasn't budging at all because my feet were solidly one with the ground, he did something, sending me flying over his shoulder into a tree. As a clone popped a second later, I realized that he had done with his neck and shoulder what I had done with my wrist against his hold. Chakra Propulsion. Or repulsion in this case. Huh, wrestling really doesn't work on ninja, does it?

And there was more as the clone's memories filtered in; a cold, detached analysis so far-removed from my own red-hot high. He's buying time now, showing me as little as possible while playing for the alarm to save him. Lazy fucking shit.

But the clones had countered that already, taking the first opportunity to split its own chakra into another Shadow Clone that had gone to turn off the alarm. Kakashi wouldn't know when the time was up, so eventually, he would have to start getting proactive again and show me the good stuff. That was if I didn't coax it out of him first. The second clone popped, giving me another few additional realizations about Kakashi's fighting style and defensive footwork - all worth their weight in absolute gold, but hardly relevant right now.

I got up, facing Kakashi as he too turned around, now finished with mopping up my clones. Except for the one that had gone for the clock that he didn't know about. And as our eyes met, I realized he was not happy with me.

He raised his left hand up to his headband with a weary sigh. "You wished to face my Sharingan? Very well, then. But you should know that your brother's eyes far exceed mine. So your humiliation here will be all the more for it."

I didn't care about any of that.

Itachi would die in due time, of that, I had no doubt. Right now, I was facing Copy-Ninja Kakashi, a legend in his own right and while I wasn't winning, I was more than holding my own. He's switching up. I've been chasing him until now, so he'll turn it around and take me out in one move to break my pride or something like that.

So my Sharingan blazed back to life and I turned my back to him, even as the fucking pressure in the air exploded into something tangible and tangy, like blood on the tip of your tongue, viscera splattered on your skin, sticky on your fingers and cold in your heart like a knife between the ribs at mid-winter.

Killing intent, huh. Gooood shit!

I exploded into a Body Flicker, crossing the open clearing and landing next to a tree, Kakashi a third of a second behind me as I flickered again, this time a mere two meters since the dense foliage of the forest prevented longer jumps. He was right on my trail, a hunting hound out for blood.

Body Flickers in fights were suicide, I had realized since I had started training with them.

Not only was it too fast for you to properly react in, much like the flaw in Kakashi's Chidori originally, but it also kept you from recovering your breath as you kept moving. And once you got locked into a Flicker-chase, I had theorized that there was pretty much nothing you could do, except keep running and hope you outlasted whoever was chasing you.

I flickered again, this time a bare five meters. I could practically feel Kakashi behind me, breathing down on my neck.

Because to Flicker somewhere you had to move and stop in a straight line, so it left you incredibly predictable. So much so that anyone on your tail could always foresee any tricks you could pull off. And you couldn't really do it backwards to try and meet them head-on, either. So if someone was following in your wake they would always have your back. And in the time it took you to turn around, they could already have stuck a kunai through your skull, back and butthole if they really wanted to.

Another flicker, this time two meters again. Just one more and I was out of the woods and in the bigger clearing again...!

But that was just me and my theories.

Maybe other ninja knew something more or had learned better tricks. Maybe a high-level Sharingan allowed you to keep awareness enough to fight in that mode or maybe you could just cultivate innate instincts so you could operate at superliminal velocities. Maybe you could bleed out the momentum somehow, turn into another direction in a way I hadn't figured yet out.

But as I said, I hadn't figured out how anybody else would do it.

One flicker, I was home-free to the clearing!

So, of course in recognizing the shortcoming, I had gone and figured out how I could reverse obvious weakness into a strength. Into a trap.

Tiger seal—Ram seal. For this, I couldn't afford to mess up by trying to fuck around with half-seals!

I Body Flickered forward, the straight line like always. But then at the 'end' I changed tack. I didn't slow down, I didn't stop. Instead, I transformed using my Midnight Nameless jutsu into a raven, my feet coming straight off the ground still at supersonic velocities and I turned the line into a curve, banking 90 degrees through the air so fast that I almost blacked out from the g-forces, despite the chakra in my body.

And then transformed back still in mid-air, hands reaching for shuriken as reality bled back into my awareness, the blurring world coming back into focus.

Kakashi had just flickered after me, arriving where I should have landed, one step behind me in the chase his metaphorical teeth still at my neck. Except he couldn't see me. He had lost my trail. And in this one moment, even an elite jounin could be completely and utterly flapping as the unturnable tables had somehow been turned.

Chakra Bola, don't fail me now!

Sixteen shuriken; eight stringed pairs loosed from my two hands the second before my feet hit the ground and I had to use the tree walking exercise to stop my movement, ending the curved Body Flicker.

Kakashi—decades of hones instincts instantly homing in on the sound of my feet against the ground—turned, his scarlet left eye blazing. And I swear I could see his eyes widen as he realized he was already out of step and behind the curve.

Fuck!

I didn't do anything, merely standing still as I struggled to catch my breath and look on as to how he handled it. And good-fucking-god it was a thing of beauty as he did some kind of spinning pirouette breakdance move in the air that I couldn't have dreamed of on my best days.

He knew exactly which shuriken to dodge, which to deflect with the steel plates on the back of his fingerless gloves, and which he had to take head-on and where, the shuriken drawing thin lines of blood but little more.

Even so, two pairs of Chakra Strings entangled his feet. This was my best chance!

I debated another Flicker Dropkick like I had done once already.

But it was too risky with his Sharingan now in play. The bubble of chakra was way too obvious—probably even to non-Sharingan users, once you got experienced enough to sense the build-up.

Instead, I drew my last kunai and connected it to my right hand with a chakra string. No time for a Flicker Throw, takes too long to infuse the chakra into the unresponsive steel. Just a regular Chakra Sling will have to do...

The kunai dropped from my right hand, held aloft by the chakra string. I raised my hand and began to spin it, getting the kunai to rotate with a deep thrum-thrum, just like a bullroarer, with just two rotations. I loosened the string, giving it more slack as the rotation speed picked up, and then reeled it all in as I swung my arm forward, transforming the kunai's rotational speed into linea speed before I severed the string, sending it flying at supersonic speed towards the still-entangled jounin.

And again, he had to be too good for me, pulling a freaking backflip so that the kunai severed the chakra strings entangling his feet and leaving him unharmed and free again, landing in a three-point stance. So fucking cool.

"Fuuuuck..." I whispered, already feeling the exhaustion settling in.

I had trained a month in preparation for stealing Kakashi's moves, ensuring that my body would be able to keep up, and so far I had been doing pretty good. But I had used several Shadow Clones and he hadn't. And he had been in better physical shape from the beginning, so this really was the obvious and only result that could follow this kind of battle.

Still, his sick moves were now my sick fucking moves.

I had months' worth of material here. All completely fucking worth it. Especially since I could see a weary wariness finally in his eyes as he stared at me. Just as annoyed as I was with just how bullshit he was, he too was getting a little bit tired of all the shit I was seemingly pulling out of my ass to fuck with him at every turn.

He glanced the way we had come, a slight frown obvious even from where I was standing.

He's wondering about the clock, suspecting something. And he's looking to end this already... Ah, but I don't want to stop just yet... The overclocked heat of my brain didn't know the meaning of quitting—I knew I could still keep going, my muscles were only just starting to get warmed up and my chakra was still fine.

But what to do...?

"Aho—! Aho—! Aho—!"

I looked up, seeing the blackbird calling us idiots, and I realized just who it was. I still did have one more good move to play, didn't I?

"Hey, Kakashi. I am going to throw a Great Fireball at you now," I said, hands going for the serpent seal.

"Hmm? Is that so? Well, I suppose I can oblige one last ploy from you after all this stupidity."

He honestly seemed sick of me already, which only made me grin wider as I went through the remaining seals—ram, monkey, boar, horse—as he answered with a jutsu of his own. The bird in the sky, far above Kakashi canceled his Midnight Nameless jutsu, returning into my shape as he pulled out the dust scroll.

My already manic grin practically split my face as Kakashi lazily called out his jutsu:

"Earth Release: Earth-Style Wall."

A massive fortification of packed earth burst from the ground. No matter how powerful, a mere Fire Release technique on the level of the Great Fireball would never so much as shake it. But, well, the Uchiha signature technique was just the primer here.

The scroll was unsealed in the air as my last Shadow Clone popped from the effort, expending all of his chakra to release the mountain of sawdust into the air. It fell like snow, a curtain of small, dry, and free-floating particles through the air. Harmless, right?

Well, fun fact: the most dangerous profession in the middle ages outside of war, as I recalled, had been that of the humble miller grinding wheat into flour. Because dust explosions are fucking dangerous. Of course, this wasn't indoors, so it would just be a big-ass fire that would spread everywhere as a deflagration.

No need to kill him with overpressure.

I have no idea if Kakashi realized the danger in time—wall and all, y'know? Ugh, was I picking up Naruto-isms?—but as soon as the memories popped into my mind and the dust began to fall, I finished the last tiger seal and spat the lance of fire at the ominously descending cloud of death.

And then?

Then I fucking Body Flickered right the fuck out of there, hoping to outrun the pillar of fire spreading everywhere.

Spoiler alert: I didn't.

Because it exploded. And deflagrations aren't supposed to explode!

I woke up in the evening in a tree, some two hundred meters away from the training ground. And that was judging by the blast crater, not by any actual knowledge as to how the fuck far I had flown. Oh, and my eardrums had ruptured and had been bleeding from the shockwave, but had dried by the time I woke up. I still couldn't walk and had to drag myself back to Konoha proper, deaf and half-dead.

So, of course, the ANBU chose right then to pick me up and haul me off.

But hey, at least I didn't have to crawl any further - it's the little things in life, don't you know?