Alright.

Hey ya'll. I'm back for the moment. Work goes... well, it goes.

One of you readers out there suggested that working on this is a good way to break pace with neverending work. Well, you were right (you know who you are).

So here's a story that's been bouncin' around in my head for a while. This is the prologue, fyi. Enjoy

"Damn it, someone find that little bastard!"

Such were the cries overhead as a young blonde boy sat under a closed manhole in the darkness, doing his best not to snicker too loudly lest he be found. Man, he thought, first time flinging a little crème on the Hokage monument and they go nuts! I gotta remember to do it again!

After a little while, the hyperactive ten year old grew bored- Konoha's drainage system was cramped, dark, smelly and, above all, dirty. He was lucky he was small enough to crouch through most of it, but he almost regretted hiding there due to the smell and the inevitable layers of mud and muck. He could still hear frantic footsteps overhead and decided that he would be in here for a while, so he decided to make the most of it and do a little exploring. With luck, he'd find another manhole that wasn't in the middle of the street.

Let's see… he mused while crawling through the disgusting mire, This goes right, so I think I'm under a building now. He continued along his mental map in the dark, unable to see his own hands in front of him. He bumped his head a few times, but nothing he hadn't done before. After a while, a sliver of light shone around a tight corner, and he found his bearings. Bingo! Lights mean a bigger tunnel, and a bigger tunnel means I'm under a main street. Yeah, go me!

His small filthy body scampered and squirmed to the growing light, and a smile crept across his dirty face- Naruto Uzumaki, master of pranks, had successfully escaped by navigating paths no one else could.

But before his mind could declare triumph, his hand came down on something hard and sharp. "Ow!" he cried, his young voice reverberating down the stifled tunnel while he clutched his wrist in reflex. His palm felt hot and slippery- a combination that never turned out well. I'm bleeding! He knew, but that wouldn't stop him from continuing forward. With extra caution, he reached out his uninjured hand and felt the mud before him, and there it was. Some kind of cold cylinder with jagged edges was in his way. He nudged the object and it moved.

Now he was curious. What little treasure was this thing buried in mud in a cramped storm drain? Carefully, he felt his way around it so he could grasp it without cutting himself further, and after a moment he found an uncomfortable hold. With his new treasure in hand, he scooted the rest of the way through the tunnel and rounded the corner into a larger storm drain.

He stood in the larger space and unraveled his palm in the sick yellow lights, ready to examine his find. His curious blue eyes scrutinized the mud-caked object as his dirty fingers scrubbed at the grime. It was indeed a cylinder and was made of cold metal and adorned with orderly columns of spikes and jagged extrusions.

Naruto turned it over several times, his eyes adjusting to the low light to get a better look at the thing. The more he stared, the more he realized that this was a beautiful piece of work. The spikes and extrusions were smelted from perfect steel and flawless sharp grooves were carved into the cracks. It looked like a lethal weapon, but surely something so finely crafted couldn't be for combat.

The blonde ten year old smiled brightly- he liked this thing, whatever it was. He was about to pocket it when he noticed a loose slat running along one side of the cylinder. Was this here a second ago? Curiosity notwithstanding, he pulled a little on the slat and was shocked to find that it broke away, trailed by an ancient parchment adorned much like the cylinder.

It's a scroll! He did a victory dance in his head; he found a scroll- a prized possession in the ninja world. And it was all his! And it was so much cooler than any of those rolled up slips of blank paper stored in the Academy. He gazed in awe at the yellowed paper before him and noticed writing between the intricate swashes of faded ink. It was hard to make out, but he identified the characters quickly. These are names. Lots of people signed this thing… well too bad, 'cause it's mine now!

He stared at the faint names in wonder. What was this scroll? He'd never seen anything like it, especially not one with only personal names written in them. After a while, he figured they must have been the metal scroll's previous owners, and he had a sudden desire to lay official claim to this scroll. Too bad I don't have anything to write with…

As though by command, one of the jagged slats of metal on the scroll shot outward, nearly impaling his hand. He almost dropped the scroll in the grime again but caught himself when the steel spike made no further movements. He frowned and fingered the newly protruding spike- there was blood on the end. This is where I cut myself… The spike suddenly loosened and came free in his palm, and an idea struck him. He glanced back and forth between the names on the parchment and the bloody needle. "I could use this as a pen," he realized out loud, and a smile etched across his face.

Seconds later, his name was crudely scrawled next to the last name in the parchment. Naruto was now the proud owner of this beautiful sharp scroll.

Now if I could only figure out what it's for…