Chapter Text
Obito carries around a small bag of leaves now, because he’s vigilant like that. More than one person has given him the side eye when he’s ventured out into the streets to snoop around, presumably because it looks like he’s carrying around knockoff weed, but he’s committed to the bit and no amount of outside judgment will get him to back down.
Kakashi carries literal erotica around, for Doug’s sake. He thinks he can walk around with a hidden bag of leaves.
But needless to say, if he ever sees Gaara and his siblings again, he will be prepared.
When they’re alone, that is. Currently, he’s a few branches above them, hanging out in the same tree as Gaara. The reasoning for which, by the way, he cannot discern. The redhead had been walking down the street normally, only to suddenly decide to become one with nature.
Maybe he wanted some alone time; maybe he’s trying to discreetly scope out anyone nearby; maybe he’s a dramatic bitch and, upon sensing Team 7 coming their way, decided that he was going to terrify the living daylights out of them. The world may never know.
Whatever it is, it was unexpected. Not him being in the tree, because he does remember Gaara popping up out of nowhere to greet Team 7, but him deciding to hop into the same tree that Obito had been loitering around before he’d been forced to quickly hide himself. He’s really beginning to wonder if he’s a trouble magnet, or if recognizable characters are inexplicably drawn to him due to some bullshit universal laws.
Obito remains silent as he watches the interaction between the teams, twitching slightly when Gaara releases a burst of killing intent. It’s loose and uncontrolled, though filled with a restless sort of malice. Quite honestly, he doesn’t know why it doesn’t affect him as much as it should, but if he had to guess, he’d say that it’s a combination of him (probably) having died before and the lingering influence of OGbito’s vague memories.
Anyway, he doesn’t need to change anything here; nothing particularly awful happens to either party, and it makes sure that Team 7 has at least an inkling of what Gaara is capable of.
(Not that it’d deter them for long. They are the Main Characters™, after all.)
He could, however, do without the weird-ass declaration from Gaara to Sasuke. He’s trying to prevent him from losing his marbles, damn it, and Gaara’s supposed to be on his team, even if he doesn’t know that. It’s a betrayal of the highest order, he thinks.
Obito watches the group split off with a slight grimace, only allowing himself to move when everyone is out of sight. With that interaction done, the chunin exams arc has truly begun.
Wonderful.
Obito really fucking hates Kabuto.
The guy has a sad backstory, is unsure of his identity, yatta yatta, he gets it, he does, but—
Well, the guy doesn’t really try to make himself very likable, does he? Or maybe the problem is that he tries too hard. At least other villains have sympathetic traits or clearly have reasons for their actions, no matter how backwards they are, but Kabuto’s whole schtick always felt so flimsy.
He’s just a slimy character. Probably the slimiest, which is impressive considering all of his former and existing masters.
Whatever, point is, Obito doesn’t like the guy. Maybe that’ll change, or he’ll at least try to give the guy a chance later on. He thinks it worked out in Boruto, in the end, but that’s a distant hope considering the fact that he’s already irreversibly fucked up the timeline just by kamui-ing off the grid.
So he may or may not feel the tiniest bit of smug satisfaction when he sees Kabuto get launched backwards by a member of the Sound team, even if he knows full well that the guy could’ve dodged it, and will undoubtedly heal himself as soon as he knows that nobody’s looking.
Unfortunately, he can’t really stick around after that. It’s easy to hide in a large room full of disorganized genin, though that difficulty would ramp way up if he tried to get into the exam room. Not only would he obviously not have a team, but he wouldn’t even have a seat since he hadn’t actually been entered in as an examinee.
He could’ve probably disguised himself as a proctor had he thought about it sooner, but it’s a little too late for that, so he settles for brief peeks through kamui. He’ll definitely sing its praises, but it’s not very good for long-term spying since it makes the air ripple, which is pretty obvious if you’re looking for it. In other situations it’s usually fine, because he tends to have something else to use as cover or he’s just somewhere where something like that would be hard to notice, but in a room filled with people who’s literal jobs are to spectate, trying to keep up kamui is a pretty terrible idea.
Not that he actually needs to look in on the writing portion of the exam. Nothing interesting happens as far as he remembers, aside from Naruto giving his speech about he’s never gonna give up, let anyone down, or run around and desert them, ‘ttebayo.
The extra time also gives him an excuse to continue looking around the Forest of Death. He’s already been through most of the area, but it wouldn’t hurt to find some alternate paths to the tower, or to scope out some nooks and crannies he hadn’t had the chance to look into before.
It’s harder without knowing which entrance Team 7 will be assigned to, but at least this way he won’t go in completely blind. It’s also like, his only plan aside from just teleporting them all the fuck out of the area. A tempting solution, but something that would undoubtedly cause several problems, which leaves it as more of a last resort kind of scenario.
In other words, he’s throwing his half-trained self into a situation where he could very likely die if even one thing goes wrong, all for a group of dumbass kids who don’t even know he exists.
Ugh, the things he does for others. Kakashi will so owe him after this.