As the four members of Team 7 wended their way westwards through the Land of Fire, Yamato quickly came to understand one simple truth about the team he was leading: without exception, all three shinobi under his command were problem children of the highest order— a stark contrast to the well-oiled human machines he had grown accustomed to working with in the ANBU.
To him, they all seemed like miniature versions of their respective teachers— which, to the outside eye, might have seemed like a compliment, given the respect commanded by Jiraiya and Tsunade of the Sannin, and Kakashi of the Sharingan. But in truth, it was anything but.
For one, Naruto, Sakura and Sasuke were each incredibly wilful, which did not make them especially easy to command. Then again, perhaps that was for the best, given they were now being groomed as the village's next generation of leaders. Good soldiers, after all, were expected to follow orders without question… but great commanders needed something more: the ability to think for themselves and to read between the lines.
"So, think you'll manage to beat him this time?" Naruto asked Sasuke, as he strolled down the road, arms folded lazily behind his head. "Neji thrashed you last time, and he'll only have grown stronger after training with Orochimaru, you know…"
Yamato let out an exasperated sigh. The whole trip had been like this.
Never mind what he'd said before— these three were hopeless. Without Sakura acting as the glue holding the team together, Team 7 would have fallen apart years ago. That said, she was also the source of plenty of friction between Naruto and Sasuke— which wouldn't have been so bad if she could perhaps stop deliberately throwing oil on the fire, that kingdom-toppling beauty of a vixen…
"The Hyūga clan is no match for the might of the Uchiha," Sasuke replied coldly. "At our height, we had over forty clan members with fully matured Sharingan— each one the equivalent of a Jōnin. That's eight times as many Jōnin-level shinobi as the Hyūga, the next noble clan in the Jōnin rankings."
Incidentally, with Sakura and Sasuke both now promoted, there were two Uchiha Jōnin to the Hyūga's five— Hiashi, the clan elder, along with Kō, Iroha, and Hoheto. The proportions were rather embarrassing, considering the Hyūga were the most populous clan in the village.
"You know," said Sakura thoughtfully, "I heard somewhere that the Sharingan originates from the Hyūga clan's Byakugan."
Sasuke scoffed.
"What does Kakashi know about the Sharingan? He's just a poser," he said coolly, recalling the source of the information Sakura had just mentioned. "Besides, even if that were true, that would just mean they're unevolved compared to us."
'What does Kakashi of the Sharingan know about the Sharingan?' Sakura inwardly lampooned. 'Hmm, I do wonder what might have led people to give him that title...'
In any case, the rumours about the Sharingan's origins were sort of true… in a rather roundabout sort of way.
The Byakugan was the default Dōjutsu of the Ōtsutsuki clan and could evolve into a limitless number of new Dōjutsu, including various forms of the Rinnegan. But the Sharingan itself truly originated from the Rinne Sharingan— a unique Dōjutsu birthed by the shinobi world itself. It existed solely because of the Rabbit Goddess's consumption of the chakra fruit, combining transcendent Ōtsutsuki DNA with the genetic information of all living species on this planet.
(Which was why, no matter how much you crossbred Uchiha with Senju, they would never produce the Rinnegan specific to the Sage of Six Paths— the final hidden fragments of genetic information were concealed within the chakra of Indra's and Ashura's incarnations.)
So, the Sharingan and Byakugan were second cousins, at best.
"Bad-mouthing Kakashi-sensei, are you?" Naruto snapped, rounding on Sasuke. "You should be more grateful for everything he's done for you, you know!"
"Who are you to tell me I'm not grateful enough?" Sasuke growled. "You're the one who bad-mouths him the most— always moaning that he's not motivated enough or that he keeps turning up late!"
Flustered, Naruto mumbled some excuse, but Yamato had heard enough. He clasped his hands together, channelling chakra into the ground beneath Naruto's and Sasuke's feet. The earth split between them— forcing both to leap back— and from the crack, wood surged upward, blooming into a mid-sized tree.
"Are you almost done?" Yamato said, his voice as cold as ice.
Sasuke's eyes widened in shock, but Naruto looked distinctly unimpressed. As for Sakura, she'd already practised her surprised face in the mirror before leaving just in case this happened, so she put a hand to her mouth and let out a small gasp.
Omg, it's Wood Style! How very exotic!
"Now, you've got two choices," Yamato went on, moulding his tree into a wooden cage. "Either you spend the rest of the day reacquainting yourselves with the true meaning of teamwork, or you enjoy a night at a comfortable ryokan with relaxing hot springs."
If Naruto were being perfectly honest, being trapped inside a wooden cage didn't sound all that bad… so long as Sakura was in it with him. He opened his mouth to argue further, but Sakura— whose shoulders were very, very sore— shot him a glare, so he decided that being a contrarian was perhaps not quite as brilliant an idea as he'd previously thought.
"…all expenses paid? We won't have to pay a single ryō?" asked Naruto suspiciously. "Because, with Pervy Sage, ya know..."
Naruto couldn't help but remember how many nights he'd spent sleeping under the stars during his two-year training trip, all because Jiraiya had blown their entire budget on pricey inns and high-class prostitutes— which was all the more infuriating, given that a large portion of the trip had been financed with his savings, and that he hadn't even been allowed into the damn hotel room while Jiraiya was 'using' it!
"…Naturally," said Yamato bitterly. "It's the superior's duty to treat his subordinates."
"That's strange," said Sasuke sarcastically. "I could've sworn it was the opposite."
Yamato and Sasuke couldn't help but recall how many times Kakashi-senpai had left them with the restaurant bill. It was the one part of the old-school, hierarchical nature of Japanese society that was supposed to work in the younger generation's favour— but instead, they always ended up being the ones picking up the tab.
"Er…" said Sakura, who didn't want to be left out of the pity party. "Lady Tsunade often gets drunk and throws things at me when she's frustrated with work. Oh, and she always has me give her massages when her shoulders get stiff. And then she does mine. That's kind of… unusual, isn't it?"
Naruto, Sasuke and Yamato stared at Sakura with dead-fish eyes. Could you really call physical contact between employer and employee inappropriate or sexual harassment if both parties agreed to it and enjoyed it? Very much so?
"What?" said Sakura defensively. "I'll have you know that looking pretty for you boys all the time takes a lot of effort! This isn't exactly easy on the upper back area! You know, I could always use the Transformation Jutsu to go down a few sizes… 78 cm sounds reasonable for a kunoichi, don't you think?"
Naruto violently shook his head.
If he'd learned anything from his time with Jiraiya, it was how to eyeball women's three sizes. If Sakura decided to flatten herself down to 78 cm, she'd be left with AA-cups— which is to say, absolutely nothing!