#ok time for me to actually get offa tumblr for the moment so i can now focus on my Billy Boy one last time :]

[xiakeik]

What if... these two met? Draw them in your style Thanks~!

"Sir, we found a platypus roaming around in our ventilation system can you please take it back with you..."

[fourangers]

Rite of passage - ch 2

Rating: M

Summary:  Every day, he faced the same rhythm, the same pace that lulled his body to join all that dull reality in this life. In a sudden drastic decision, Sasuke decided to travel, meeting someone that would change his life.

AO3 link | FFnet link

Tumblr masterpost

–.–

Chapter 01

–.–

Itinerary 2

"Are you fucking crazy?! Slow the fuck down!"Sasuke gripped tightly the car rail to hold onto his dear life.

"You know I can't! I have to increase the speed or we won't get out of this mud road!" Naruto shouted, trying to rear the car in control.

"You have to go slower or we'll end up crashing on some sugar cane plantation, stop right now!" Sasuke growled, his hand reaching on the steering wheel, attempting to turn right.

"Hey! Get your hands offa here, you're going to cause an accident!" Naruto slapped the pale hand away.

"If you continue to drive like a maniac, I'm sure you are going to cause an accident you dumbass!" His blood ran cold when the car suddenly jumped till Sasuke felt his backside floating above his seat for long seconds before crashing back again.

"Will you quit being so melodramatic asshole?! Everything will be fine, just trust me!"Naruto roared.

"No, stop it. Stop it! Dumbass, stop it right now!" Sasuke shouted alarmed as they were getting closer and closer to some wooden fence. He propelled his body forward with zealous determination to stop this nonsense at once.

"Hey! You're blocking my visio─!" An insistent noise of car wheeling halted their skirmish as they widened their eyes.

Their car got stuck in the mud.

Naruto closed his eyes, turning it off. Then he twisted the key again as he dug on the accelerator pedal without any avail. He tried to shift the car left and right as he resumed step on the pedal as far as he could, but nothing happened aside the car careening a little from the spot.

He threw his hands on the air. "Oh great! We're stuck!" He turned to make an disbelieving frown towards Sasuke, but the dark haired man merely ran his hand on his face, pensive.

"Congratulations Naruto. For a few seconds, you almost made me wish believing in God once again." He deadpanned.

"Oh shut up. Let's see what happened." Naruto went outside the car, as did Sasuke, both men appraised the current predicament, from the wheels were completely lathered with mud, the once silver colored car was now painted with brown to the obvious fact that the whole vehicle had sunk down and it wasn't going to move any time soon.

They stared in silence before Naruto smacked his lips, rubbing the back of his neck. "Let's try again?"

Rolling his eyes, Sasuke went back to the car, waiting patiently as Naruto did the same.

When Naruto turned on the key, with a deep intake of air, Sasuke held onto the car rail.

"…will you quit squinting your eyes. It's not like you're going to die soon."Naruto grumbled.

"Could have fooled me."

Observing the blond man rolling his eyes, Sasuke almost began reconsidering the moment he offered to travel alongside Naruto.

–.–

(3 days ago…)

"Uh…exploring? Sure, I guess…I think." Naruto mumbled, caught off-guard from this sudden proposal.

Sasuke nodded, munching an apple.

"Let me think about it and then we'll talk?"  Naruto said.

"Sure." Sasuke finished his breakfast, picking up some clothes.

"And where exactly you're planning to go afterwards?" Naruto questioned, waiting as Sasuke went to the bathroom to change. "Rio de Janeiro?"

"Not Rio." Was the muffled answer from behind the door.

"Uh…São Paulo then? Salvador?"

"Neither of these, at least not for now." Sasuke emerged from the bathroom with a towel in his hands. "I don't want to go any typical tourist attraction people would go whenever they visit a country. I don't want to be part of anything regular, that everybody had gone. I want to find any place undiscovered, unique that makes it worthwhile the experience."

Sasuke stared confused when he only met an inquisitive silence in return. Nevertheless, he eyed back evenly, lifting his chin.

Naruto chuckled. "Alright, I'm in."

"What?"

"Yeah, I'm in. I'm joining your merry entourage or whatever you name it." Naruto widened his arms with a dramatic flair.

Taking few more seconds to let those words sink in, Sasuke blurted out. "Already? I hope I'm not creating any misunderstanding but I'm not pressuring you, you can consider my idea for as long as you'd like."

"Nah, I made up my mind, I'm in." Naruto grinned. "I was actually dreading that you wanted to go to some typical touristic places that well…I already went before but I feel like you're off for some great adventures. It's gonna be great!"

"I didn't plan anything, so I don't know if whatever we do will really be on par with your expectations." Sasuke warned.

"It's ok, as long as you're open to new things and so far you don't seem to have any problem with it." Naruto replied. "So, how are you going to decide where to go next?"

Thinning his lips, black eyes stared back before flickering towards the bedroom door. Naruto cocked his head to one side, following behind.

Sasuke muttered. "Let's decide where we should go today and we'll come up with some plan for whatever is later afterwards."

Rubbing the back of his head, Naruto shrugged. "Sure. We can finish exploring Ouro Preto and maybe try touring a neighbor town called Mariana. There's another option though, go to a town called Tiradentes but it'll take roughly 3 hours by car. It's worthwhile though."

It's still 6 hours being wasted though; Sasuke mulled, shaking his head. "Ouro Preto is fine. Maybe we can try going to the other town tomorrow if it's en route."

Thus, they spent the rest of the day visiting museums and admiring handcrafts. As dark eyes were perusing some souvenirs in the street vendors, Naruto came to the realization how easy Sasuke was to tag along. He appeared to be in top physical condition, being able to walk all day, up and down everywhere without any complaint. He was not an exceedingly picky person, trying out new things and different spices. And even though Sasuke preferred a certain level of cleanliness and hygiene, under dire circumstances he wouldn't mind going to a dirtier bathroom or even to a hidden shrub to do his business. After meeting many people that were too naggy or too immature, overall too bothersome that almost made Naruto put off with traveling with anyone, this time he was looking forward to have Sasuke as his travel companion.

And ok, he's not going to lie, it didn't hurt the fact that Sasuke was nice on the eyes. Tall lean body, a striking contrast between pale skin with black hair and obsidian eyes, Naruto had to sometimes police himself to avoid staring him for too long.

"Can you wait for me a little, I'm going to buy a map of Brazil." Sasuke declared when they passed through a newstand.

Bewildered, Naruto obeyed, and later on they went to a nearby restaurant for dinner. Sasuke actually ordered another shot of cachaça, downing in a single gulp despite all protests coming from the blond man.

"I'm not going to carry you all the way back again when you pass out bastard." Naruto shook his head, a smile playing on his lips.

Sasuke answered with a snort, ordering another shot and placing it in front of Naruto. Undaunted by the silent challenge, he also finished the drink quickly, earning a raise of eyebrow coming from the brunet.

Hours passed fleeting by as their bantering resonated throughout the dinner, their conversation went on even after they had paid the bill, walking back to the hostel. Naruto still had an eye on the rolled paper being held securely on Sasuke's hand, curious unbeknownst himself about why he'd want to have a printed map of Brazil.

Once they were in the hostel's living room, Sasuke picked all the objects on the table and set aside, opening his map and grabbed a coin from his wallet.

"Let's let the fate decide our destiny."

"Huh?" Naruto slackened his jaw.

"I'm going to flip the coin and whatever state it'll drop on, is going to be our next destination. What do you think?"

Naruto studied Sasuke's expression for a while and muttered. "Hm, call me crazy if I'm wrong, but for some reason I never saw you as a person who would let any decision being taken out of your control." When he noticed the thin lips being pursed, Naruto hastened to add. "But hey, I like this idea. Let's do it, it's gonna be fun."

Narrowing his eyes, Sasuke trained his vision back to the single coin laying on his palm. He closed to a fist, shutting his pale eyelids and flipped the coin, ascending and quickly descending on the wooden table. It twirled for a while, circling around the big map as blue and black eyes watched in trepidation, speed slowing within each spin until took a halt.

Sasuke squinted his eyes. "Mato…Grosso."

"Mato Grosso." Naruto reconfirmed.

"Ever went there?"

Naruto shook his head. "Any idea where to go first?"

"No…what about you?"

"We could search for ideas…" Naruto muttered. "I'm gonna grab my laptop and will be right back."

Sasuke acknowledged with a grunt, also following behind to pick his iPad. "You know Portuguese right?" He asked while they were turning on their devices.

With a raised eyebrow, Naruto answered with a nod. "Yeah, why?"

"Feel like native people will have more interesting spots to go considering they know their country better than us, so it's interesting to read their suggestions. You can look in Portuguese while I search in the tripadvisor or something like that."

"Ok, sounds fair." Naruto began typing and soon enough there was an excited shout. "Hey hey Sasuke, look at this!"

The other young man approached with narrowed eyes not before he raised his eyebrows impressed by the pretty photos.

As Naruto was scrolling down the website, he said. "Looks like Mato Grosso has a lot of waterfalls. Maybe we should choose one?"

"Well…maybe we should search the one who has a great varieties of activities to do. It'll get boring if we only go to waterfalls and nothing else right."

"Hm…" A silence fell in between as their eyes were focused on the screen, punctuated with noises of clicking and typing. "It says here that the most famous sightseeing in this state are Chapada dos Guimarães, Pantanal and Nobres. Chapada dos Guimarães above all. It's a national park."

"Hn."

"They have waterfalls, caves and whoa." Naruto clicked more. "There's even an archeological site. That doesn't sound bad."

"Agreed. But how far is this place from here?" Sasuke clicked on the google maps and typed the aforementioned places.

"HOLY FUCK, 21 hours by car!" Naruto dropped his jaw.

Sasuke thinned his lips, wordlessly agreeing to this outburst. Nevertheless, he wasn't going to back down. "We are passing through two states after all. Anywhere else it's nearer?"

"Hmmmm…" Naruto began clicking every link possible, comparing their distances but unfortunately, it kept broadening even further. 22 hours, 24 hours…there was even one that would demand 27 hours of driving.

Sasuke huffed. "Feels like it's a waste of time, maybe we should decide this Chapada already since it's the best choice. I guess we have to face the fact that we'll use roughly this many hours to go there. Maybe we can rest in one city in the middle of the road and sightsee there while we're there."

"I'll see if there's something interesting in Goiás then." Naruto scratched his head. "Brasília, capital of Brazil, what about it?" Naruto grinned, staring the way the dark eyes narrowed back. "No? Not at all?"

"Not interested." Sasuke muttered nonchalantly."Anywhere else?"

"Well guess what. They have another Chapada, named Chapada dos Veadeiros."

"Pass."

"Uuuuuuuh…Caldas Novas, considered to be the largest hydro-thermal in the world."

"Hn." Sasuke checked and thankfully it was more or less within the path they wanted. "I'll see whatever hostel is available. You're ok if we share the room right?"

Naruto blinked. "Yeah sure, whatever. I mean, we've been sharing a room for two days and so far 's been good right? We should split all fares too." Naruto let his index finger scratch his jaw, embarrassed. "I'm not good with numbers though."

Sasuke lifted a crooked smirk. "Alright, I'll do it. You have to give me all the bills to me though. Like car rental, gasoline, highway tolls and all that."

Naruto sighed in relief. "Great! I'll be in your care then hah."

They began deciding which places they should visit, as Sasuke began preparing his luggage, knowing they would need to wake up really early.

Naruto suddenly exclaimed. "Oh oh oh! I found an awesome video! Look at this!"

Approaching, Sasuke stared and then glared. "That sounds like a terrible idea."

Naruto ignored the jab, his smile widening as the men in the video were jumping on a waterfall. "And it's only four hours by car from Chapada dos Guimarães."

"Only?" Sasuke did not bother to refrain his sarcasm.

"Well, we're going to travel almost 21 hours to get there so yeah. It's only 4 hours in comparison to that." Naruto grumbled.

"…we'll think about that."Sasuke muttered, noticing that despite the low quality of the video, the distance between the tip of the waterfall to the lake was rather far. He glowered from the victorious grin coming from the blond man, and returned to fold his clothes.

Even despite the possible difficulties lying ahead, his heart quickened with anticipation. It's going to be an exciting adventure for sure.

─.─.─.─.

(Now back to…yep)

"…"

"…"

"We're not moving." Naruto grumbled.

"I see that."

"We're fucking stuck."

"I also see that." Sasuke drawled out.

Naruto gave him a dry look. "I don't think I need your sarcasm right now."

A black eyebrow was raised back.

The blond man sighed. "Alright, take the wheel."

"…why?" Sasuke muttered.

"Well, drive while I'll try to push the car forward. I guess it's the only way out." Naruto opened the door and went outside.

"You’re going to get all your clothes dirty, are you sure?"

Naruto shrugged. "'s not like we have any other choice right?" Sasuke turned his head to look as the blond man positioned behind the car, hands placing at the back of the trunk. "Ready?"

With a swift nod, Sasuke turned the car on, ready to put the foot down on the accelerator until he heard a warning scream.

"Wait!"

Sasuke stopped at once, opening the car door. "What happened?"

Naruto was waving his arms energetically and said. "I think that guy wants to talk with us!"

Sasuke stared right ahead, noticing now an old man waving them back while he was driving a tractor. Before he could voice anything, Naruto went there and began chatting with that stranger, as Sasuke went back to his seat observing the unfolding situation, with a tinge of envy and admiration. Naruto had an ease with talking to anyone at any moment, letting their guards down with his bubbly personality. He, on the other hand, would always struggle to initiate any kind of communication, partially for his own reservations.

Therefore, Sasuke opted to observe how they were gesticulating wildly, the old man patted Naruto's back and went back to his tractor. Naruto approached grinning as he said. "Hey, that guy said he's gonna help us out. 'm gonna chain our car to his tractor."

Their car soon got dragged out of the mud much to their relief, as Naruto and Sasuke went to thank him once it was over. Naruto did most of the talking since he spoke the native language, with Sasuke standing next to him.

Suddenly, the stranger said something that made Naruto blush to the tip of his hair, spluttering a reply. The old man just laughed and patted his arm, Naruto held Sasuke's arm to drag him few steps away.

"What happened?" Sasuke craned his head backwards as emphasis to the question.

"Huh? Nothing!" Naruto answered way too quicker to his tastes. "Hey, that guy is called Fernando and he invited us to spend a day in his farm with his family. You wanna go?"

Sasuke frowned, studying the old man. He didn't appear to be anyone suspicious nor dangerous but still…The brunet attempted a more diplomatic approach. "I thought we were first going to that archeological site since it was on the way?"

"Yeah, I told him so, but he said it's ok whatever day we choose."

"And you don't mind? Going to a completely stranger's house?"

Naruto scratched the back of his head. "Uuuuuh…I guess I always have the habit of trusting people pretty easily. And well, I've been traveling for so long that I kind of have an intuition which is fine which is not. We can ask later the landlady of the hostel we're going if they are really ok. I mean, if you're interested."

Sasuke grunted. In regular situations, there was no way he was going to accept this idea, but the whole idea of this trip was to do something he wouldn't do on regular days. "Sounds like a plan. I think I won't mind going if it's safe."

He also tried to tamp down the fluffy feeling squirming in his heart when he received a grateful smile coming from Naruto. He went to talk with the old man as they exchanged phone numbers and parted ways.

The road was full of holes and sinuous curves, it was a wonder Sasuke didn't have any motion sickness. They both sighed in relief once they arrived at the destination, noticing a good number of native aborigines living there, the cavern had a historical and mystical significance for them.

Unfortunately before the cavern was protected by the government, many had degraded the place with graffiti. Sasuke huffed seeing remaining scribbles, whilst admiring primitive drawings. "Don't you wonder sometimes, did they draw these expecting the next generation would study them or they simply drew for no specific reason?" Those words were uttered without much of a thought.

Sasuke glanced backwards to see if any shock or confusion within that pair of blue eyes, but Naruto merely stared back impressed. He shrugged. "Yeah, that's a good question right? I mean, we don't know how advanced were our brains and that time they were still living in rudimental conditions. The fact that drawings still exist after thousands of years is still pretty impressive anyways." He took a photograph from a particular drawing and said. "It's crazy how far we have gone though. I mean, even this is eons old, you can still pretty much understand that they were drawing something about how they were hunting an animal. It's a fucking comic book."

"From drawing on caverns to draw in an iPad. Humanity can be really impressive sometimes. As well as destructive." Sasuke muttered, staring at some badly drawn graffiti below the ancient drawings.

The sun was beginning to set in the horizon when they bid their farewell and hurried to drive to their hostel. They settled with a quick snack at the nearest gas station, while rechecking the directions, arriving at the hostel at last at night.

It was getting increasingly more comfortable to share a room with Naruto as they didn't need to ask for permission for any little thing, tiptoeing around to avoid invading the other one's personal space. That also meant that Naruto was so carefree around him that he simply began changing his clothes while Sasuke was on the same room. Sasuke had to recheck himself not to ogle that attractive torso for too long.

"Oh yeah Sasuke!"

Sasuke blinked, definitely not focused in staring that defined sun-kissed biceps. "Hn, what?"

"You know something that Fernando told me while he was helping us getting our car out of the mud? That there is a waterfall in Chapada dos Guimarães that you can jump to dive just like the video we saw few days ago!" Naruto beamed, putting his t-shirt on.

"You still haven't given up about that waterfall?"Sasuke said in mild exasperation.

"Of course not! Just you wait, you're gonna love it. The waterfall he told me is so cool that only people who live in the town know about it. It's in the national park so it's even closer and we won't need to travel those four hours to get there. Also…" He approached Sasuke with a conspiratory smirk and declared. "It's taller than the other waterfall."

Sasuke shook his head. "I feel like we better go or you'll nag me this entire trip."

"I'll take this as a yes. I'll even drive and prepare some snacks on the way. We better wake up early tomorrow!" Naruto chirped.

─.─.─.─.─

AN: So I made the huge mistake of forgetting that the event that occurred last chapter happens around April and Sasuke's birthday is in July. Let's forget for a second this small detail mmkay?

--.--

Chapter 03