#i guess this is sort of the boruto dynamic? idk don't watch that

[squirrelwrangler]

Sasuke

In a slight divergence of canon- or maybe in a world where canon diverged wildly, perhaps one where in a cave-in south of Kanabi Bridge a boy named Uchiha Obito was too slow to reach a stumbling Hatake Kakashi and wept over the dying body of his rival and best friend, oblivious to how his eyes were pinwheeling into a forbidden shape- Sasuke notices what he did not before. 

He notices the distrustful eyes that stare at the uchiwa on the back of his clothes. He sees how the clan has been shunted off away from the rest of the village. He picks up that the clan is lying about all this not being a big deal. His clan is being watched by authorities. His brother makes it into ANBU and the pipeline to the village- Sasuke understands this now. Itachi is supposed to help their clan regain trust they have falsely lost. (The kyuubi and the sharingan, he learns. No Uchiha that the clan knew controlled the nine-tails that night. Madara the traitor once did, long ago. Someone has framed them, or there is a traitor. Or Madara’s ghost, still angry at the clan that rebuffed him.) But Itachi isn’t doing what he’s supposed to? Sasuke wonders. His big brother is so smart and skilled and why not?

In this slight offset to canon, Sasuke figures out that his family was under suspicion of a coup. He does not believe that his clan was disloyal. He does not believe that Itachi was ordered to murder them. He has the trust that any reasonable person, and any reasonable child, would have. But he does believe that the mistrust was partly to blame for what made Itachi snap. Or maybe Itachi was bad all along? Sasuke cries because even in this universe he still does not know or understand why. He knows the clan history and stories around Madara, Madara who took his brother’s eyes for power (here’s the stone beneath the shrine that tells him), Madara who helped to build Kohana but then betrayed it, left it, left his clan -no, the Uchiha clan stayed loyal and ousted Madara, rejected Madara and his kin-killing eyes, rejected his warmongering, together they were stronger and loyal. Itachi is another Madara, another stain on Clan Uchiha who had once been its brightest hope. Sasuke will prove that he is not Madara. Konoha will not doubt him or his loyalty. He must be perfect - but not snap. And put his teammates and village above power. (and maybe some of this aversion to betraying the village is a subliminal imprint from Itachi’s Tsukuyomi, unintentional or not).

Sasuke dislikes Naruto because he sees a boy in a similar position, dangerously on the outs with the rest of the village, an orphan without support or safety net and no friends- and one recklessly aggravating everyone around him and breaking rules. He is afraid for Naruto, wants to shake some sense into the other boy, if he dared approach. Team Seven is a blessing in a way. He will knock some self-preservation into the blonde idiot if it’s the last thing he does.

Perhaps this universe is also the one where a young Sasuke has a pretty girl with cherry-pink hair shily mention that she likes him, and he goes home excited to his mom because he doesn’t know what to do with that but it’s nice and he gets teased by her and it puffs up his ego for a day - but only for a day. Because the next day at school the same girl comes up and shouts that she’s changed her mind and no longer likes him, and Sasuke is sad and confused. He attributes it to the dark cloud of distrust and animosity of his clan, not realizing that the issue is more personal, that the pink-haired girl had mentioned her confession to her best friend. That Sakura having learned that her first friend Ino also liked Sasuke, instead makes the choice to outwardly disavow ehr feelings rather than lose her first friend and protector (to be fair, Ino also decides to be fair and also disavow her crush, loudly proclaiming that she too dislikes Sasuke. The squashing of infatuation is more genuine on Ino’s part, and part of the motivation is for Ino to prove that she is superior and independent to other girls. The schoolyard war among the girls becomes this, with lines drawn. Hinata unexpectedly finds herself with two proclaimed friend/allies.

Sasuke pretends that he doesn’t care about if any girl likes him or not (secretly he thinks Sakura is pretty and blushes at the idea of one day reclaiming her affection. One day he will be so impressive that she’ll change her mind back and like him once more.).

While we are here, this might also be the universe where Uzumaki Naruto switches his goal from what he proclaimed it to be: become Hokage, to what he really meant by it: to be treated as a person of worth and not a monster. This change happens somewhere after having ramen and a heart-to-heart with Iruka, discovering the truth of his status as host of a tailed beast, and learning that such jinchuuriki were to be the last defenses and ultimate weapons of their respective villages and often closely tied to the Kages, but not Kages themselves. Naruto thinks that his status as jinchuuriki is insurmountable for that first goal- but that means he will just try harder with his second, which is to make everyone see only him and not the tailed beast. Here is where smart, kind Sakura, who loves her two teammates and has learned their secrets and their fears tied to internal village politics (and Danzo, oh how even early on she hates Danzo and everything his point-of-view represents), makes a vow. She cries when a ninja is not supposed to, because her sensei reminds her that ninja are not emotionless tools. She admires the Third Hokage, Sarutobi famous for learning hundreds and thousands of skills, the Professor who is feared for his brains. Haruno Sakura takes up that discharged dream to become Hokage. Her forehead scrunched in righteous angry determination, she tells her teammates that she will become the next Sarutobi (and the next Tsunade at least for using perfect chakra control to pulverize mountains with one punch). She will become Hokage, and when she is Hokage, the Kyuubi jinchuuriki will not be treated as a tool to be feared or controlled, but only as the Hokage’s teammate Uzumaki Naruto. And that the same goes for Uchiha Sasuke. When the Hokage’s right hand is Uchiha, there will be no second-class citizenship, no state-sanctioned doubt of their loyalty and sacrifice. And Sasuke and Naruto know that they won’t earn Konoha’s trust like she can, but their strength can support her- and she, kind and loyal and fierce, will fight and scheme to give them that chance at happiness. Inner Sasuke, romantic, fantasies about being the Hokage’s shadow bodyguard/knight/husband, the Stern General to her Beautiful and Powerful Empress. Naruto can be their Court Fool.

#it's been years since i read naruto or fic for it so forgive mistakes and vagueness #i have my id candy and you can see in on display here #i guess this is sort of the boruto dynamic? idk don't watch that #meme replies #more meta than three sentence fic #Anonymous