Uchiha: Back To The Past! (Naruto)

47: Never Trust Strangers

Obito sat on the couch as the trio did whatever they wanted inside the house. He said 'rest', but it seems in the end they're all still just children playing around.

As they did that, he stared at the picture he managed to snatch somehow. It was their team picture, the one where their sensei would be behind him, Kakashi, and Rin, with Rin being in the middle of them all.

He sighed as the nostalgia started kicking in.

His fixation on the picture broke, however, when Konan addressed him.

"Obito?"

He turned around and tilted his head. The girl looked around, as if thinking about what to say.

"What are we supposed to call you?" she asked finally, as her small gaze settled firmly on Obito's.

Obito hummed, "Good point," he said. After a second of looking away from her he chuckled, "Why not just Obito? I mean, you already call me that."

She looked down. "I know. But... It's better to have a more formal name, since you're going to be teaching us now,"

Obito was starting to get her point. "Do you want to call me sensei?"

At that Yahiko's head turned towards them, same with Nagato who concealed his other Rinnegan with his hair, only showing one eye. But their expressions were enough to make Obito decipher that Konan's question was, indeed, planned.

Konan nodded, a little hesitantly, but the other two boys seemed to encourage her silently.

So they're still tense around me, Obito thought. It was natural though, as they only met about three days ago.

"Alright. Call me whatever you want." he said. Yahiko walked up to him and confidently positioned himself beside Konan while Nagato stayed behind watching.

"Then, Obito-sensei!" he saluted funnily with a determined smile, "When will we finally do the Endurance training you've been talking about?"

Obito just stared for a while, before chuckling again with a closed eye. "Maybe tomorrow."

Yahiko deflated. "Whyyy!?" he whined as Konan stepped back.

Obito shrugged, "I don't know, maybe because you've been playing and not resting, like I said?" sarcasm was clear at the base of it. Obito was messing around with them, but he meant it when he said tomorrow.

He'll teach them how to use Chakra after the endurance training, then maybe Taijutsu after, but that was reserved until they can finally catch up to his stamina.

Yahiko slouched. "Fine. Ugh..." he grumbled as he walked away, with Konan trailing after him.

Obito watched them walk back to where they were before with Chibi and Nagato, and they seemed to resume whatever they were doing before they addressed him.

Obito just sat there, and his eye went back to the picture. Those three remind me of my team.

-----

The next day, Obito woke them early and made them do push-ups.

No one was an exception, as it was like that with Minato back then, too. He was only replicating what Minato did to teach and train them as it was a working technique, whatever he used. I'm not sure, but I think he learned it from Jiraiya the Toad Sage since the Sannin used to be his sensei too.

All of them were quick to get tired, and were also quick to give up, but Obito didn't care about their complaints. Although it mostly came from Yahiko himself.

-----

"You three are quick to give up, you know? Don't you want to contribute?" Obito inquired the second one as they already wanted to rest.

The three looked up at him as he spoke down at them.

"...but, I suppose I can excuse this. This is only the second day, after all. And you've never been to an academy..." Obito trailed off. Orphans who lost their parents during war. How long have they been living off of stealing?

He shook his head, smiled, and held out his hand for Yahiko to take.

The boy hesitates slightly, and even looked up at his eye for confirmation, before finally, taking his hand and standing up.

The other two stood up as well.

It will take time for them to trust me completely, but... I'll fix that for them.

The orange-haired boy sent a half-smile towards him, as if thankful but still untrusting. It seemed giving them food and a place to live still wasn't enough for them to fully trust him.

If I set my mind to it, I won't fail to fix the problem with them.

-----

It turns out that the remaining Zetsus after Madara's fall scattered, and without a leader they no longer stuck together.

And with their cave base just as useless as the corpse of their past leader, they also no longer had a place to stay in.

With that, they all left.

And also with that, Obito doesn't know where any of them are now.

But he knew that Black Zetsu would be greatly weakened as he killed Madara himself, and it was Madara who put white Zetsu and Black Zetsu together before he died in the original, his reality, so it was not possible for Black Zetsu to still be halves with the white Zetsu if they ever finally encounter in the near-future.

So... Obito could only wait now.

Wait until he could kill the start of all this tragedy.