Necklace

Chapter one: the myth of the necklace

A young girl stood outside of her lonely temporary house covered in her own sweat and blood. She panted heavily as she looked at her swollen and torn up knuckles. "Just 10 more minutes…" she mumbled to herself looking up to a tree that was in front of her. She ran at the tree with her fist raised and rammed her knuckles into it making little chips of the bark fly off. She panted backing away from it and running at it again, repeating her movements.

"She's gonna kill herself," a boy said from the kitchen window while watching the girl slam her fist into the tree. A different boy with brown hair stood up from the table to look out the window at the girl. He sighed and opened the window to holler out from it.

"Suki come in already! You've been out there for hours! You can train more after you eat something!" he shouted to "Suki" has she was now known as. "Not yet! I'm not done!" Suki insisted hitting the tree again. "Suki…" the boy said in a serious voice."No, Kane!" she said looking at the boy. He just sighed again closing the window…

15 minutes had passed and Suki had returned to the house and joined the 2 boys at the table. There was a long silence between the 3 has they ate they're lunch.

As Suki got up to put her plate in the sink the boy Suki had called "Kane" spoke. "Why do you always train yourself until you can barely walk like that?" he asked. Suki just stopped for a second and then continued for the sink putting her dish in it then said with her back still turned to Kane, "You wouldn't understand," and began to walk away from the 2 boys. "Yes we would," the other boy without a name so far said. "Yukie, you have, and never will understand me so don't offer your fake sympathy, it's the last thing I need," Suki replied in a cold voice and walked back to the table where she picked a backpack up off the floor.

"I'm leaving. Don't count on me to come back," she said walking out of the house and into the forest until Kane and Yukie couldn't see her anymore.

"How did she find out?" Kane asked in an angry voice while death glaring Yukie. "I have no idea, I didn't tell her!" Yukie exclaimed. "Well someone had to of!" Kane yelled back. "Ok, listen to me. That girl is far from our grasp. And so is that necklace she holds. And we aren't going to get past her defenses as long as she has it, so we need to find a way to get it away from her…" he said calmly.

Suki walked until she came to a clearing in the forest and then sat down leaning her back on a tree then sighed. She looked down at her chest to see a silver chain necklace with a heart pendant hanging from him. She grasped the pendant and closed her eyes. "How did this all start to happen?..." she mumbled as a tear came to her eye, but it was quickly wiped away by her hand.

"There's no time for this, Suki. You have to find a ninja village," Suki told herself pulling her body off the ground to continue to walk.

After several hours she finally came to what looked like gates to a ninja village. A small smile formed on her face as she walked to the shinobi guarding it. Once she got to the men she stopped to talk.

"I'm looking for a home. My name is Suki Hinote," she said in an emotionless voice. The guards who were obviously ninja looked at each other then let Suki through the gates. She nodded in thankfulness. She began to walk through but was stopped by one of the guards voices.

"Go to the Hokage's office. He'll tell you where to get an apartment. Welcome to Konohagakure village," he told her. She glanced back at him with a small smile. "Thanks," she said and continued walking.

Once she had gotten into the busier part of the village she noticed people staring at her new face. The glances made her nervous so she pulled the hood of her jacket over her head and kept her face looking towards the ground. She only glanced up to see if she saw anything that resembled a Kage's office.

After a while of walking she realized she had no idea where she was or where she was going, but she noticed a ramen shop and decided to stop for a bowl and ask for directions. She sat down at the bar and pulled the hood off from over her head.

"How can I help you, Miss?" the ramen shop owner asked her. "I'll have one bowl of ramen," she said in a shy voice. The owner just nodded and started to make the order.

Suki noticed a boy a few years younger then her with blonde spiky hair and an orange jumpsuit on sitting beside her, waiting for his order as well. "You new here?" he asked her examining the part of her face that he could see. Suki turned her head to look at him but shyly looked down after seeing his face. "Um, yeah," she answered a little hesitantly. "I stopped here for directions," she added glancing up at him.

"Well I'm Naruto Uzumaki. Where do you need directions too?" he asked her. "The Hokage's office," she answered a little more quickly this time. "I'll show you where that is when we're done with our ramen if you want me to," he offered. "Ok, thanks," Suki replied with somewhat of a smile finally looking up at him.

"What's your name anyway?" Naruto asked Suki in a curious voice. "Suki Hinote," she told him looking back into the kitchen of the ramen shop to see if the cook was almost done.

"Hey I think I've heard that name before," Naruto said, out of somewhat excitement. "Probably have…" Suki said a little disappointed glancing down to her necklace. "Yeah I have! Aren't you that girl with a magic necklace?" he said definitely excited now. "It's not "magic"," she replied correcting him. "Well isn't it supposed to like give you strength and extra chakra and stuff?" he asked. "To tell you the honest truth…I have no idea how that rumor came to be. My brother gave it to me when I was a little girl and suddenly everyone kept saying that it made me strong. At the time I thought it might have been true since I was so young so I never took it off. When I got older and decided to see if it really did, I couldn't get it to un-hinge. I would have been damned to break it just to test whether or not it gave me power, so I told myself that a necklace couldn't possibly do something like that to a person and tossed that worry aside. But when I turned 11 people started chasing me for it so I haven't really had a home since then. I was still afraid to break it off, so I trained myself to defeat whoever tried to take it from me. But the men sent just kept getting stronger and stronger so I decided to come here and train to be a ninja, since I'm still to chicken shit to break it off," Suki explained to Naruto, leaving him somewhat in awe.

"Oh…why are you scared to break it? The chain could be easily replaced you know," Naruto suggested. "Well I haven't seen my brother since he gave it to me. We were separated so it's all that I have left of him and I want the chain that he gave me," Suki said looking down. Naruto just looked at her as if he didn't know what to say, thank God the ramen had finished.

"Here you go the both of you," the ramen shop owner said setting one bowl down in front of Suki and 3 in front of Naruto. They both ate quickly but Suki was done before Naruto, being that she only had one bowl.

Once they were both finished Suki paid for hers while Naruto looked desperately for his money. "I know I had enough to buy at least 4 bowls!" he exclaimed searching his pockets. Suki sighed. "Here," she said laying money out on the counter. "Let's go," she insisted walking away from the shop.

"Hey wait up!" Naruto called to her, jogging to catch up. "Thanks for paying for me," he said once he was walking side-by-side with her. "No problem," she answered smiling a little.

"I don't get this girl…one minute she's all distant and the next she smiles at you and acts so nice" Naruto thought while looking at Suki with an eye brow raised as she looked at the ground.

"So how old are you?" Naruto asked trying to start a conversation."14, you?" she replied. "12," Naruto told her. "You know, the teams of genin just got picked 2 days ago. If you're as good as you say you are the Hokage might squeeze you into a cell," he added. "Ok, I'll talk to him about that," Suki said with a smile looking up for a moment.

After a few more minutes Naruto and Suki had arrived at the Hokage's office. "Ok, well this is it. I'm heading home but you can ask me if you need anything else," Naruto said. "Ok, arigato," Suki thanked him and walked into the office.

"Can I help you with something, miss?" a girl that seemed nice asked Suki when she walked through the door. "The guard at the gate told me to come here for an apartment," Suki said shyly looking down somewhat. "Oh ok, come this way," the girl told Suki walking down a hall.