Cosplay Country
Chapter One: What the Hell is Naruto???
Something rough and wet began brushing against the cheek of a young girl. The sun stung her eyes as she began to open them and check her surroundings. As soon as her eyes were open she came face to face with a small dog licking her face. James let out a yelp and scurried away from the creature. 'Where am I?' she wondered. Apparently she was in a forest, but she could not remember how she got there. In fact, she could not remember much of anything aside from who she was. The dog ran up to her a bit and began barking. A moment later she could hear a voice in the distance.
"Akamaru!" someone called. "Akamaru get back here."
James saw a boy wearing a grey jacket heading her way. He had brown hair and red marks on his cheeks. The dog ran up to him and the boy picked it up to hoist it on his shoulder. "Who are you?" the boy asked, "I've never seen you around before."
She stood up and brushed off her jeans. "My name is James." She said, "Who are you? Can you tell me where I am?"
The boy looked a bit confused. "You're in the Village of Konoha." He answered, "I'm the designated Kiba in this area."
"…the 'designated Kiba'?" James repeated.
"Yeah. What's with your clothes? Are you from the central area or something? You shouldn't be here dressed like that." he told her.
James began feeling her head for any strange bumps that might explain why she was so confused when another voice called out. "Hey Kiba, aren't you guy's done yet, it's our turn to get this area." A boy with spiky blonde hair wearing and orange outfit was walking there way, followed by another boy with black hair, and a girl…with pink hair! James rubbed her eyes and looked again. Sure enough, the girl's hair was pink. 'What the hell is going on here?' James asked herself.
"We're leaving; I just needed to get Akamaru. He keeps running off."
"You should chain him to your shoulder or something."
"No way!"
The blonde boy glanced over at James. "Who's the girl?" he asked, "She's not from here." Kiba shrugged. The blonde boy looked closer at her. "Shouldn't you be in the central area or something?"
"That's what I said." Kiba told him. "Well we're leaving; the area's all yours Naruto."
"See ya." Naruto called out.
"What kind of a name is Naruto?" James questioned.
"Hey, I happen to like my name." Naruto defended. "Just who are you anyway?"
"My name is James, and I would like to get the hell out of here."
"Well I suggest you do," said the pink haired girl, "Cause there are going to be a bunch of ninja swarming this place in about two minutes."
"Huh?!"
"Just follow that path over there." Said Naruto, pointing into the forest, "It'll take you to the centre of the village. You can get out through the gate on the other side."
James had no idea what he was talking about, but she went to look for the path anyway. It was a better idea than just staying where she was. After a moment of wandering through trees and shrubbery, James finally made her way out of the forest and into what looked like an old world village. People walked in and out of small shops, and most of them were wearing headbands with symbols on them. James was able to count at least five different symbols, and most of the people wearing them walked around in groups of three.
"I've died and landed in the twilight zone." She muttered as she wandered around trying to find the 'gate' that Naruto boy had told her about. After walking around for awhile (and getting even more lost than she was before) James finally went up to someone and asked for directions towards the gate.
"Oh, the gate to central." said girl she ran into, "Um...oh, I always loose my place here, I know it's in-between the Hidden Leaf Village and the Hidden Village of Mist." She looked around and her face lit up. "Sasuke! Sasuke-kun, can you help us over here?"
James glanced in the direction she was looking in to see the same blonde boy with the other two following. No, wait, it was a different group of people, but they were dressed the same way as the others. "Hey, hey! I can help way better than Sasuke can!" yelled the blonde boy.
"As if Naruto!" the pink-haired girl shouted, "Sasuke-kun is the best, way better than you."
"Hey Sasuke, can you tell this girl where the gate to central is?" asked the girl James was talking with.
"Wait a minute, wait a minute, wait a minute!!!" James yelled in frustration, "How can you be Naruto? I saw a Naruto ten minutes ago, and he was not you."
"That's cause I am the designated Naruto of this side of Konoha, and the better one if I may add."
"Another designated character?"
"The gate," Sasuke continued, disregarding James' question, "Is right around the corner." He motioned in a direction for James to follow.
"I think I might get lost again." said James.
"No way," said the pink-haired girl, "It's huge, you can't miss it. Now come on you guys, we are supposed to meet up with Kakashi-sensei." she grabbed Naruto and Sasuke's arms and began to head off.
James groaned and sighed while she followed in the direction Sasuke was pointing towards. She turned the corner and came face to face with an enormous gate. Although the gate was huge, there was a smaller door for people to walk through. She pushed the gate open, happy to be leaving the freaky ninja town, and hoping that whoever was on the other side of that gate could be of better use to her. James left the Hidden Village of Konoha and entered an area that looked a bit more modern. The people walking around wore clothes like hers, jeans, skirts, sneakers, and not a headband in sight. She wandered around for a while, feeling like she was finally in a normal place, but as she walked, she noticed that most of the roads and paths lead towards the same place, a large luxurious school surrounded by other large gates like the one she went through.
James let out a groan, "Damn it all." She muttered. "What have I gotten myself into?"
