Naruto, the 4th member of Team 7

Zabuza returns

It's been a while since I last stepped foot out of the house so I took a few deep breaths to really enjoy the fresh air. I looked towards Sasuke and noticed that he had a frown on his face.

"What are you worried about?" It wasn't a question, I've known him long enough to know what that look means, so I said it in a "You can't lie to me, might as well tell me" tone.

"I'm not-" Sasuke started but stopped once he noticed the look I was giving him. He sighed "I'm just thinking about the tree climbing training, Naruto's been catching up to me fast and-"

"And you don't want to lose to him."

"......Yeah." He really was thinking hard about his situation because I could see the wrinkles between his eyebrows. Smiling to myself, I brought up my left hand and tried to smooth out the wrinkles in between his eyebrows with my thumb. I couldn't do it with both hands because I was holding Naruto's breakfast so doing it with one hand was pretty tough.

Sasuke stopped walking and looked up at me, slightly taken aback by my gesture. It had been some time since we did this to each other. We used to do this to each other frequently when we were kids, whenever we frowned because we were unhappy about something, we would cheer the other person up by attempting to smooth out the wrinkles in between our eyebrows.

"Don't stress yourself out so much, well it's good that you're taking this to push yourself to reach your goal." I pulled my hand away from his forehead and smiled softly at him "I'm sure you'll achieve it soon. It's not a competition and Naruto's our friend right? Would it be that bad if he did do better than you?"

I thought about how the boys had been competing against each other, they clearly see each others as rivals. I immediately know how Sasuke would respond to what I said, "I take it back, don't answer it. Just don't think too much about it and just do your best."

"....Hmph, don't need you to tell me twice. Don't worry at least I definitely won't end up using all of my chakra and passing out like somebody." Sasuke smirked as he continued walking, teasing me.

"Will you stop bringing that up?!"

We bickered for a while more as we approached the training site and stopped when we saw someone walking towards us.

It was a girl? I think? It must be, the person had a beautiful face with long black hair and was wearing a pink sleeveless kimono with a simple white obi on her waist. She even had a black choker around her neck. She was carrying a basket too, maybe she was collecting some flowers? Or herbs?

We continued walking until she passed us before Sasuke looked back at her, clearly thinking about something or watching her.

Naruto was sitting cross-legged on the ground with both hands folded across his chest, he seemed to be in deep thought too.

"Why? That's strange. This world is full of mystery..." he was muttering to himself, oblivious to our presence.

Sasuke walked up to him and whacked him on the top of his head, "Ow!! Hey! What are you doing?!"

"Did you forget about breakfast, baka?" Sasuke crossed his arms over his chest with an unamused look.

But instead of retorting back, Naruto merely chuckled and gave him a cheeky grin. "Tch."

"Naruto, your breakfast." I walked up to him and handed the bento to him.

"Oh Akiko-chan! You're here! How are you feeling? Are you okay enough to come outside?"

I sat down next to him in a huff "I'm fine, I'm fine. Kakashi sensei didn't stop me from leaving just now, so he agrees that I'm fine. Eat your breakfast, you should be thankful it's me and not Sakura. She would beat you to death."