There had been rumors that the Sasuke Uchiha, a man whose manliness had reached the maximum limit any man could ever achieve, went to spa saloons in regular basis.

Of course, naturally people would dig it. It’s a rumor that consisted of a very popular person and a very controversial subject. The two best ingredients that anyone could think of.

However, naturally people would stop believing in it, too. New rumors would come out, and more controversial subjects would emerge. Even though it had included a famous person, people would slowly forget about it. Besides, what’s the fun on discussing about an old topic? That’s soooo outdated.

And you gotta keep updated to fit in.

“Sasuke what?”

Truth to be told, Sasuke didn’t really care about this. The rumor of him going to spa had once distressed him a few months ago. But with some helps from his friends and little workers, it had died. This month’s hot rumor was ‘Naruto getting a B’, and that had satisfied him enough.

There’s no mention of the fat, geeky girl that somehow crashed into Naruto’s party. There’s no mention of him talking with her. There’s no mention of him at all. On normal times, it would have bothered him, but for now all’s cool. That particular information was exclusive to him and Naruto and his tight circle of friends only, and Sasuke had expected to keep it that way.

He had set an image of himself as a shallow guy who was into skinny girls whose boobs were bigger than their brain. There’s no way he change it now. That would be too risky for his reputation.

And besides…

He’s not ready for anything real right now. No, not yet. Let him stay with his pseudo friends, and pseudo life, and pseudo girls and pseudo relationships for now.

Because the real one frightened him shitless.

Chapter Three – Family in Crime

There were ten of them. And nearly ten of them had surprised her with their appearance in the emergency meeting.

The first one to come was Choji. That didn’t surprise Hinata much. Choji went to the very same junior high school with her, and she remembered a younger Sasuke and his pack of friends bullying him; throwing him bags of potato chips and pinching his fat stomach.

Now, lanky and tall, Choji smiled at her and held his hand out.

“Choji, 140lbs now,” he said, the venom in his voice was unmistakable. “Here because I want him to give back my 65lbs he’s taken from me.”

She smiled back shyly and shook his hand. She stated her reason too and let him wait by the end of the ping pong table. He opened his bag and took out a bag of potato chips and started stuffing them into his mouth.

“He’s in the appearance department,” Sai whispered to her.

The sudden feel of his presence made her flinch. The last time she checked, Sai was like ten feet away from her. “What?”

“Choji’s in the appearance department,” the guy repeated. Sai took place beside her and motioned to the lanky guy. “Meaning, he’ll be the one searching for Sasuke’s flaw in his appearance. He’ll be the first to know if Sasuke develops a nasty wart. Or if he’s getting a fat stomach…” Sai instinctively placed a hand on his own (flat) stomach as he said that, like the thought of having a not-so-flat one terrified him. “Basically, he’ll convince people to think that Sasuke’s not that good-looking.”

“Oh,” was all Hinata could say. She suppressed the urge to pinch on her own stomach. Thank God her clothes were rather baggy. She’s not sure Sai would still be kind if he saw her round gut.

Not long thereafter, came the next one. Hinata checked on the clock. There was still about an hour before recess actually started. How come these people were able to skip classes that easily?

This time, it’s a girl. Finally, someone with identical hormones with her was in this room. The girl was short, but with toned, tanned, muscular arms that only avid fighters get. Her hair got pulled back into two small buns, and her accessories’ brands ranged from Puma to Reebok. Not the usual ingredients for girls who went to this school. She dropped her sports bag lazily and high-fived with Choji and the others.

“So where’s the new kid?” she said in loud, clear voice.

Hinata raised her hand.

“I’m Tenten,” she also raised her hand in a ‘Yo’ salute to her. “Here because Sasuke made my mom got fired from this school two years ago. Been starving ever since.”

She said it in a very casual tone, the same tone you used when you tell your friends that you just got bought a new soap or gets fined. Hinata was at loss at how to respond to that.

Fortunately, Tenten didn’t seem too concerned whether she replied or not. She had already busy trying to get Choji to share his chips with her, which he grudgingly did. Hinata turned to Sai and said,

“What department she’s in?”

Sai smiled. “Guess.”

“Uuugghhh… money department? She searches for proofs that Sasuke is poor?”

Sai chuckled in amusement. “You lack creativity, dear. Don’t worry, though, that’s why we’re here,” he then stared at Tenten with what Hinata considered a wistful gaze. “she’s in fist department. Which means, if somehow one of us is tired of playing dirty, she’ll be the first to come out and give him a good jab on his cheek.”

Once again Hinata was at loss of words.

“She’s the cleanest among all of us,” Sai said, before then his tone was suddenly fraught with mirth, “and here comes the dirtiest.”

Before Hinata could ask what did he meant by that, a strong, expensive smell had already filled her nose. There were a lot of girls wearing Chanel no.19 in this school, but there was only one particular person who was daring enough to combine it with Anna Sui.

Sakura Haruno was sauntering to their direction. Even in the standard school uniform, she managed to stand out. Her pink hair had drawn controversies when she first enrolled to the school, but somehow her father could talk their principal into it. She’s smiling her patented smile, a perpetual expression that she’d adopted to accompany her whenever she went.

Upon meeting her eyes, Sakura’s mouth curved up strangely. “Uuuhhh… Hyuuga, right?”

Hinata tried her best not to gulp when she nodded. They had been in the same classes before, being ‘golden’ students and all, but they never actually talked to each other. Sakura’s always covered with a lot of girls, and Hinata always sat too far from her.

“So you’re the new kid?” Sakura asked incredulously.

Truth to be told, Hinata felt that she’s supposed to be the one who ask that. Last time she checked, Sakura was in good terms with Sasuke. Sure, they had dated and they had broken up. But the rumors said that she had been the one dumping him.

“Y-Yeah… y-you’re a new kid, t-to?” Hinata found it hard not to smack herself for stuttering so stupidly. But then again, maybe most students in St. Sarutobi could relate to her situation. There was something in Sakura’s deep emerald eyes that could preclude your body from functioning properly.

Sakura let out an amused smile. She didn’t answer her immediately and instead sat on the table that was right in the middle of the room. The way she held her chin high and her back erect made Hinata thought about dominatrix queens.

“Are you kidding?” Sai whispered to her, he threw a rather lewd gaze to Sakura, ogled her for a while before he continued. “She’s the founder of ‘The Secret Army of Sasuke’s Haters’!”

The best reply Hinata could give was a series of hyperventilation.

Sakura smiled coyly at her, her long pink hair flowing on her back and her perfume making it harder to compose even one coherent sentence. Few other members barged into the room, and Hinata found herself becaming harder and harder to breathe.

Temari Sabaku, captain of the girl-laccrose team. (Sasuke’s supposedly good acquaintance and a very hotheaded girl.) Check.

Her brother Kankurou, an ultra creative artist who specialized in painting nude women and was notorious for his porn collection. There was once a rumor that Sasuke always brought this girlfriends to be painted to him. Another rumor stated that Kankurou’s girlfriends had always been Sasuke’s leftovers. Check.

Oh, and another one.

Shino Aburame, a quiet boy from her biology class. Also infamous, but that’s because nearly every girl was dying to know what’s behind his enormous glasses. Shino had a good bone structure and he got a rather honeyed voice, which made it pretty logical for Hinata. Girls always liked (beautiful) mysteries, and this guy was a walking crime novel.

Hinata had never believed that Shino Aburame, the Shino Aburame, would also enter the room and actually acted civilized with the other members here. So, Check.

“All right, not everyone’s here, but this will do,” as always, Sai acted as the coordinator. He even brought a note-pad and a pen. Hinata had a scary notion that this guy’s ultimate love was attention. And that he hated Sasuke because he stole it from him.

Nevertheless, Sai gave the spotlight to Sakura when she asked for it, though.

“Everybody met Hinata?” Sakura asked in a low, whispery diction. Like a true queen she was.

A silent roar of murmurs filled the room. That was a ‘yes’.

Sakura’s smile was slow and eerie. “Alright. We’ll start the recruitment meeting-“ her voice trailed off and she glanced at Hinata.

“After you’re able to pronounce the abbreviation of our army.”

“TSAOSH!” in unison, every single member of ‘The Secret Army of Sasuke’s Haters’ sang the word.

“…” was all Hinata could say.

How the hell she could teach her tongue to pronounce that word?!

-

-

-

“Of course there’s a reason why she wanted you to pronounce TSAOSH. For fuck’s sake, you must be able to say TSAOSH to join us.” Sai said in a ‘Duh!’ tone. They were walking to the cafeteria, their meeting postponed because Tenten insisted that she’s not going to eat for three days if she didn’t help the Chef to serve the food.

“R-Really?” Hinata’s tongue too tired to let out anything else more than that.

“We in TSAOSH are expected to be discreet and two-faced all the time, as most of us are his ‘friends’ and in need of him. And not only that, we’re supposed to be an expert gossiper, too,” Sai said all of this with neither shame nor guilt. “And to be an expert gossiper, you gotta learn to use abbreviations and whisper things clearly.”

Hinata nodded weakly. Hanabi or even Neji, her siblings, would have choked out if they heard that, but she wasn’t surprised at all. Gossipers had always been surrounding her, and for her own sake, she MUST recognize their ploys.

“So say it again,” Sai demanded.

“Tsosh.”

“Not good enough. I didn’t hear the A word and you put no pressure to the word. Come on, Hinata. You just got fucked up, you need to be angry!”

Hinata nearly rolled her eyes. Thank God it really wasn’t her thing, because had she done that, she would discourage Sai greatly. “Look, Sai.. I think..”

“You think?” Sai pressed on.

Hinata gulped and continued. “I-I think I need food.”

-

The woman behind the counter was smiling at her.

Hinata didn’t know what made that soulless thing smile at her. She had been in this school for a good 6 years now, and never had she found this thing smiling.

But now she did.

“H-Here..” she pointed at her tray. “My food..”

“My dear,” the woman’s smile got much bigger, and that almost made Hinata stumbled back. “Tenten told me to get you extra cheese and meat. She told me to get you at least 700 calories so that you can stand up straight and fight.”

The woman glanced at her tray, in which there was food nearly three times as much as most girls in this school had. “But I think you don’t need those extra cheeses.. if you want to maintain your fat level.”

Before Hinata could give a proper reaction, the woman had already shifted her attention to somebody else.

“Thanks, Marla,” Sai grinned at the woman when she sneaked a toblerone bar into his tray.

When they’re not in Marla’s earshot, Hinata whispered to the guy. “Is Marla.. one of us, too?”

“She’s a family, yes. Her husband never gets to home ever since he became the Uchiha chauffeur.”

Hinata bit on her lips. “I didn’t know that we’re s-such a big group..”

Sai bit on the toblerone and pocketed it fast. “Come on, we gotta get going. Sasuke never likes it when his friends show up late.”

“S-Sasuke?”

“We’re going to eat with him.”

“I know.. but why?”

Sai sighed, and then pointed at his own pretty face. “I’m his ‘friend’, remember? And you’re going to be my new friend, so don’t forget to act like a cool kid and stop your stammering.”

He didn’t even wait for her and just strolled away by himself. Hinata couldn’t bring her foot to move, and after a while, Sai finally stopped and turned to her. The perpetual smile still hadn’t faded, but Hinata somehow could see an impatient scowl behind it.

“What d-department are you, Sai?” she asked.

“Espionage,” he walked into her direction and took her by the elbow. “And sometimes I switch roles with Sakura and act as a mentor to n00bs like you.” He guided her to Sasuke’s table, which was placed not so far away from their place. Sai knew where her eyes were and put his tray on the table. In a fast movement, he took a necklace out from his pocket and put it on Hinata’s neck. He played with the pendant for a while and smiled at her. “So don’t worry about him.”

The smile wasn’t big, but Hinata sensed that it was genuine.

-

-

The first thing that Hinata noticed when she arrived in Sasuke’s table was:

There were a lot of pretties there. And nearly half of them belonged in the group.

Sakura was two chairs beside Sasuke, her green eyes flickered to her and she gave out a really small smile, before then she averted her gaze back and continued laughing when she heard Naruto joking. A jock Hinata presumed to be Sakura’s boyfriend wrapped his arm around her shoulder, while the other snaked much lower from her waist.

She didn’t seem to mind, though. That would be too uncool.

There was also Temari, sitting four or five chairs away from Sasuke. Beside her was Kankurou, and they lifted their brows in recognition. All happened so fast and discreet, and in a moment both of them had ignored her again.

And then there was also him. Even when surrounded with other good-looking people, he still stood out, like there was an invisible spotlight right above him. Sasuke was listening to his bestfriend Naruto, a half smile plastered on his face, as laughing was prohibited in ‘Cool Guy’ laws. His arm was on Naruto’s shoulder, and the aura of authority never seemed to cease. He wasn’t even talking, but everybody’s attention seemed to resort to him. It’s like, excluding Naruto, everybody here didn’t regard him as friend, but more to a boss.

For one millisecond, Hinata was finally able to feel pity to Sasuke and his perfect, perfect life.

Sai tapped on her shoulder reassuringly. “Behave,” he whispered, before then he lifted his hand.

“Hey, buddies.”

“Sai!!” True to his vigorous nature, Naruto was the first to respond. He quickly pointed at the second chair beside Sasuke, beside him was a gorgeous blonde girl that Hinata knew as Ino. “Your girl has been waiting for you.”

“Baby!” Ino puckered her lips, and Sai replied it by puckering his back.

“Oh, and you bring a friend?” Naruto asked.

“Yeah,” Sai replied enthusiastically, like how a true person would act when he’s introducing his bestfriend to his other friends. “This is Hinata. Tell you what, she’s just fooled Ebisu that necromancy is ‘in’ these days.”

A few whistles howled on the table. A few guys tried to high five with Hinata, and the girls winked at her. Their smiles, however, weren’t nearly as big as it’s supposed to be. Seeing that alone had made Hinata realized that they hadn’t really accepted her.

Sai seemed to realize that, too. He didn’t take an extra seat for her rightaway.” She’s going to eat here, kay?”

There, silence slowly fell. Everybody was looking at one another in silence, as if contemplating the pro and con of having her here. Sai nudged her in the elbows and mouthed ‘Neklace’. Hinata caught what he meant and pretended to fiddle with the pendant. A girl caught her doing that and another staring contest happened. Between the girls, this time. That’s when Hinata realized that most girls there, Sakura included, wore the same kind of necklace that Sai had given to her. Only the colors were different.

A smile was cracked, and another, and then another one. Hinata even could feel the happiness in Sai’s body, though the way his hand squeezed on her shoulder hurt her. Now that everybody had smiled, they only needed their boss’s confirmation.

Sasuke sighed, and then looked at her.

It was not easy to notice that he had been trying to ignore her, but once their eyes met, she somehow knew that he had. His black orbs glowed for a while, and it was very apparent to her that he felt uncomfortable looking at her. Their staring contest went on for a while, and Hinata could feel her mouth full with unspoken words that she wanted to blurt out.

Alas, she couldn’t do that. That would ruin everything.

She didn’t want to lose things again.

Hinata finally held her chin high, so that she saw him from under her nose. She tried her best to erase any other pleading words from her throat and said, “Do I pass your inspection?”

That surprised the pretties. That was supposed to be a momentum in which you’re not allowed to speak and just let the ‘God’ to determine your fate. A few turned into Sasuke, wondering what he might say to her. Sasuke had always been infamous to say hurtful things, anyway.

Surprisingly, he only said, “suit yourself.”

And it seemed that the words weren’t only directed to Hinata, as Sasuke was looking at Sai when he said that.

A guy got up and fetched an extra chair for Hinata between himself and Sai. They sat on their respective chairs and start eating. Naruto started another joke and some bored people pretended not to look bored by looking at him. Hinata could see Sakura winked at her, a ‘congrats’ mouthed to her several times by every member of the group, even from one or two guys that she didn’t recognize.

“You said you’re going to buy me that necklace, Sai,” Hinata overheard Ino protesting to her boyfriend. “I know that girl doesn’t have a boyfriend, but even she has one! And in my eye-color, too! I want my necklace..!”

“Sorry, Ino,” Sai whispered back. “I’m going to buy it today. Promise.”

Ino didn’t reply, and only pouted her mouth in childish manner.

Sai rubbed the space between his eyebrows, his exasperation was apparent. “Ino…”

“I got an extra necklace on my cabinet, by the way. My ex dumped me before I could give that to her,” out of sudden, Sasuke had already broken into their private conversation. His eyes were scarily dark as he glanced to Sai. “The color’s dark blue, but I think that would suit you better. You want it?”

Hinata instinctively grabbed at her own necklace and rubbed on it. This was supposed to dangle on Ino’s slim neck, not hers!

“Yes!” Ino sounded almost hysterical. “Yes, I’d lo-“

“I can buy it for her myself, Sasuke,” Sai cut her off. A smile was on his face, but the edges on his lips were curved in a strange way that made him looked equally as scary as Sasuke. “And I think Ino looks fantastic in sky blue.”

“Really?” Sasuke’s smile looked identical with Sai’s. He lifted his hand and stroked at Ino’s neck lightly, effectively turned Ino’s arms into an army of goosebumps. “So why is her neck still naked?”

Jerk. Hinata thought. Jerk, jerk, jerk, JERK!!

Sai couldn’t muster a reply for that question.

Later that time, Ino and Sasuke skipped class together to go to his house. Ino kissed Sai goodbye and said that it’s just to fetch the necklace fast, because she really wanted to try it now.

Sai couldn’t say anything that would make his girlfriend change her mind. Going alone with Sasuke was such a rare rare rare opportunity that nearly every girl in St. Sarutobi fantasized every night. And besides, when you get dagger glares from a guy who has black belt and could do kendo and the king of social scenes, you know that you’ve lost a fight.

“Let’s start the meeting again,” Sai hosted their meeting with smiles even though there was only she and him and Kankurou (who was sleeping with a porn magazine draped on his face) on the place. Hinata squeezed at her pendant tightly, her chest was heavy with guilt and her eyes were hot with unshed tears.

“What are you doing, fattie?” Sai said amiably, “come on, say the word again. You gotta got it right before you can get your assignments.”

“This..” Hinata bent her head down due to embarrassment. She’s very much sure that her cheeks had turned into a grotesque shade of purple. “is Ino’s right?”

“Apparently, I see you wearing it,” said Sai lightly. “So it’s yours now.”

“Why did you give it to me?!”

“Whoa,” Sai took out his notepad and wrote something there. “The second time your words aren’t all shaky and incoherent. Good job.”

Hinata grounded her teeth. “Sai!”

There was a pressured silence between the two of them. Sai turned his back to her, the sound of his pen scribbling against the paper was still heard. Hinata wanted to call his name once again, but he had spoken first.

“We’re family in crime, Hinata” he said, and for once, his words weren’t laden with playful tone. “we have to help each other.” He turned his face to her again, and now she could see the sides of his eyes crinkled as yet another smile appeared. “Come on, say it. I’m having Calculus test in the next period.”

“Oh, you jest,” Hinata’s lips were shaky, and she nearly grounded her teeth once again when she tried to fake a smile. But in the end, she managed to let the word out.

“TSAOSH!!”

Chapter Three Ended

AN
Out of all stories that I’ve made, originals included, this one is my most favorite. :D I love the theme the most (survival at its finest), and yeah, as you can see, it’s going to be rather complicated in the romance department later.

And before you ask for confirmation, yes, Sai did give the necklace to Hinata so that she can get easier access to getting accepted. As for her state now, she’s not quite a member yet. And for Sasuke, he suddenly flirts with Ino because Sai brought Hinata with him. Sai is one of the fewer people who know who Sasuke bedded with. It’s like a subtle revenge in Sasuke side.

You’ll see more Sasuke soon. I promise. Though I gotta say that I love Sai the most in this fic. At least, for now. :D

Ciao for now. Thanks for reading and wait for the next chapter to come ou..!

Archee