Au where the Uchiha policemen were actually pretty great to naru as a kid.
Stepping between her and angry villagers. Acting as the silent but visible threat that dissuaded anyone from trying anything as blatant as throwing things, screaming at her, or kicking her out of stores. One or two of them routinely looking at her with comically serious faces as they hand over a piece of candy or send her on her way with a light pat on her head.
She feels a little part of her crumble when she realizes the policeman that always walked through the market on saturdays and gave her reassuring nods (a silent “I’ll have your back") when people started to get upset with her was dead. That the policeman who patrolled the park and gave bullies such unimpressed looks they would start spluttering was gone forever.
She can’t do anything for them, but there’s one Uchiha left she can help.
She owes them that.
Ok… so this got stuck in my head enough to overcome the anxiety. Please be gentle…
The news doesn’t arrive all at once. It leaks. A whisper at the edge of a conversation. A shopkeeper closing early with shaking hands. The absence of uniforms that had once been as constant as the walls themselves.
Naruto notices the absence first.
She’s good at that—at noticing what isn’t there. You learn to, when people pretend not to see you. When doors close a second too soon, when voices drop just before you pass, when something shifts and you’re expected to act like it didn’t.
The market feels wrong. Quieter, but not in a peaceful way. The kind of quiet that presses in, that waits.
Naruto stands near the edge of a produce stall, fingers hovering over a bruised tomato she knows she can probably haggle down to half price. The vendor doesn’t look at her. That’s normal.
What isn’t normal is what’s missing behind him. No dark uniform stationed at the corner. No sharp, watchful eyes scanning the crowd. No silent presence that said, without words: behave.
“…they say it was all of them.”
Naruto doesn’t turn her head. She doesn’t have to. She’s learned how to listen without being seen doing it.
“All of them? That’s—”
“An entire clan? The Uchiha? Just like that? In one night?”
The words land heavy. Naruto’s breath catches, just a little. No, she thinks immediately. No, it’s not possible — But the market feels like it does after a storm. Not during. Not before. After. When everything important has already been broken.
Her gaze drifts, unthinking, to the path that cuts through the center of the stalls. Saturday. It’s Saturday. There should be…There was always… A man with a straight back and a face too serious for the way he handed out candy. He’d never smiled. Not really. Just held out a small wrapped sweet like it was an official transaction, like he was fulfilling some duty no one had assigned him. Naruto had taken it every time. She never said thank you out loud. You don’t draw attention to things like that. But she’d nodded and smiled as real as she could. He’d nodded back. That had been enough.
Her throat feels tight.
“…heard a kid’s alive,” someone mutters. “The youngest of the clan head.”
“Barely counts. Doesn’t matter. Clan’s gone.”
Naruto exhales slowly through her nose. Gone. Her eyes move again, scanning the edges of the market. There should be another one near the fish stalls—taller, broader, the kind who didn’t have to say anything at all. People just… adjusted around him. Voices softened. Hands stayed to themselves.
Naruto remembers the way he’d looked at a group of older boys once—just a look—and they’d scattered like they’d been burned. She remembers standing there afterward, not moving, not speaking, just… waiting. He’d glanced down at her, given a small, almost imperceptible nod a silent “I’ll have your back”.
Her chest aches. She presses the heel of her hand against it like she can push the feeling down, like it’s something physical she can force back into place. She can’t do anything for them.
The thought comes sharp and clean. They’re gone. Whatever happened it’s already over. Too late to step in, too late to fix, too late to… Naruto’s gaze drops to the tomato still sitting in her palm. She sets it back.
There’s one left.
The thought comes quieter this time. Not loud like the others. Not panicked or sharp. Just… there. Naruto turns and doesn’t think about it too hard. If she does, she might stop. Might second-guess. Might decide it’s not her place, that she doesn’t owe—but she does. Not because they asked. Because they didn’t. Because they never made a big deal out of it. Never demanded gratitude. Never even acknowledged it, really. They just… stood there.And made things a little safer, a little better.
Naruto knows what it’s like to have no one. Knows what it’s like to be too small in a space that doesn’t want you. Knows how long it takes to figure out things no one bothers to teach you. How to stretch food. How to fix things just enough they don’t fall apart completely. How to exist in a place that would rather you didn’t.
She can’t bring back the men who stood at the market corners. But she can do something.
Her steps pick up. Out of the market. Past the main streets. Toward the quieter parts of the village where the buildings grow wider, emptier.
The Uchiha district sits like a wound. Open. No guards at the entrance now. Naruto slows as she crosses the threshold. Reverent and respectful in a way she normally sees no need for. It feels wrong to walk in. Not forbidden, no one’s there to forbid it, but like stepping into a space that remembers what it used to be. Houses line the street, doors closed, windows dark. The air feels… still. Heavy. Naruto swallows.
“Okay,” she mutters under her breath. “Okay. It’s fine.”
She moves forward, and it doesn’t take long to find him. He’s not hiding. Just… there. Sitting on the edge of a wooden walkway outside one of the larger houses, back straight, hands resting on his knees like he doesn’t know what else to do with them. Sasuke Uchiha looks smaller than he ever did at the academy.
Naruto stops a few steps away. He doesn’t look up. For a second, she just… stands there. She didn’t have a plan. Everything up until now had momentum. Movement. A direction. Now she’s here, and she has to actually say something. Her fingers curl against her sides. He’s alone. The thought settles, solid and undeniable. Not just right now. Well and truly on his own.
She steps forward, stop when she’s close enough that he should definitely notice her. He does. Slowly, Sasuke lifts his head. His eyes are sharp but flat, empty. They land on her like a blade. Naruto doesn’t flinch. She’s had worse looks. This one… isn’t even aimed at her, really. It just hits everything in front of him. She shifts her weight, suddenly aware of how this must look. Just her, coming here out of nowhere, but she came here for a reason.
Naruto lifts her chin a little, trying to look more certain than she feels.“I—” she starts, then stops, tries again.
“I heard,” she says, because there’s no point pretending she didn’t.
His expression sharpens a bit. Naruto presses on.
“They used to—” She gestures vaguely, back toward the village. “The police I mean…In the market.”
Nothing. No reaction. Her hand drops. The silence stretches. Naruto can feel it, thick and uncomfortable, but she doesn’t look away. She takes a breath.
Then, because overthinking this will only make it worse, she says, “I can show you how to do laundry.”
It sounds stupid the second it leaves her mouth. Too small. Too normal. Sasuke just stares at her. Naruto feels heat creep up the back of her neck.
“Or—” she adds quickly, words picking up speed now that they’ve started. “Or other stuff. Like—cleaning. And food. And—uh—”
She makes a vague motion with her hands, as if that explains anything at all. She exhales, “It’s hard at first. Figuring it out. By yourself.”
Her voice steadies.“I know how,” she says.
She doesn’t say you don’t. She doesn’t say you’ll need it. Just, I know how. Another pause, longer this time. Sasuke’s gaze flickers so slightly Naruto almost misses it. Then it’s gone again, shuttered behind that same flat, sharp look.
“no,” he says.
And Naruto doesn’t push just says an ok and leaves the offer open and a week and a half later Sasuke approaches her after class…
