It has been a long while, dear readers, but I return to you with new story in hand. I cannot promise steady updates, I cannot promise frequent activity, I cannot promise much of anything, and for that I am sorry. But I can give you what I have, and hope that you like it enough to stick around until I have something else to add. This is a new start, a clean slate, and I give you a new story with the hope that you will forgive my long silences. Please enjoy, and review with kindness.
Rise, Harbinger
Prologue
Rain was a common occurrence in Mizu no Kuni, the Land of Water. However, despite popular belief, ferocious thunderstorms were a rarity. Only twice in his life had he ever witnessed such a spectacle; just his luck, he happened to be caught outside both times.
It had been windy – God, no, it had been more than that. Gale-force winds ripped at his clothes and cloak, grappling with the worn material as it billowed in the cold air, heavy with the torrents of water that poured from the sky for hours on end.
The rain applauded the ashen sky in a tremendous volley, only quitted in comparison when a roll of deafening thunder crashed through the frozen air, the sound ringing in his ears for long after, coupled with the static drum of the rain.
His waterlogged sandals clacked and splashed softly upon the path underfoot, the sky an endless whirl of shades; Prussian blue to indigo, ashen grey to black; the clouds came alive as they swelled all the more, showing no sign of letting up.
Soon, sheets of lightning dances inside clouded cages, making their stormy colours lighten momentarily, as if a great fire was lit within. Dimly, he mused, it was as if the sky had been strung with festival lanterns, their lights only showing for a millisecond. He could almost hear the old phantom bells chiming in the wind as the rain turned to laughter and ghosts of children ran through distant, long-forgotten streets paved in the sunshine's gold.
Another rumbling crack shook the air. He shivered and his mind let fade the memories of a fairer time. How fair they had been, he realised now, compared to his present.
No part of him was dry, his hair falling in dripping strands over his eyes; down the back of his neck, water droplets trickled off his sodden locks, the rain making his hair darken. His clothes stuck to his skin in places and made him shiver, while the wind still found ways to billow the garments out here and there, and crawl over his skin, setting goose-bumps trailing in its chilling wake.
Lightning hit the path. Down it shot, again and again, this time in speared forks, snapping out across the sky and down towards the ground below: the angry tongue of a deadly serpent. The path scorched beneath the crackling tendrils, the air alive with electricity. He shuddered, but this time it had nothing to do with the cold. He hunched over as he walked steadily on, a barely noticeable spike in his pace.
His hand came across to grip at the right of his chest, an old ghost of a wound set aching. Pained it was, no doubt, by a fading memory of how, almost two years to the day, those tendrils had once ripped through his skin, barely concentrated in a mass of chirping, crackling, screaming energy.
Blood had gushed steadily out, he remembered, creeping in rivulets down his side and down his limbs, dripping into the water below. He also remembered the arm, and the pale, pale skin his blood had stained a deep, crimson red. Red, like his enemy's eyes.
'Just like his eyes had been, back then…'
Suddenly, the pain shot through his whole arm, searing through his veins, and he was forced to halt in his step, lest he crumpled to his knees. Yet after another stab of pain, he crumpled anyway, his knees hitting the path hard. His breath was sharp, but shallow. His eyes were wide as he stared down at the ground, hunching over involuntarily, to try and shield himself from the pain that resided deep within him. He coughed, and his head span.
He could hear the sea.
A flash of lightning set the dark surroundings awash with white and grey, coloured splashes dancing in between, the rain merging the blurred colours together like a vast oil painting. His vision flickered dangerously black, and he retched emptily. His head felt heavy upon his sagging shoulders as he lifted his gaze to the murky horizon. A small whimper escaped pale, chapped lips.
As the rain hammered down relentlessly from an overcast sky, it seemed to his stinging eyes that sunlight shone upon a rocky shore and gentle, blue horizons. Waves crashed against rocks, and there stood a man. Untouched by the present storm, he looked out to sea, a familiar crest upon his clothed back. A shaking hand reached out through the harsh, cold rain, but the waves crashed on, and the young man on the rocks never moved a muscle.
The wind blew across the shore, and he imagined he could taste the salty air amid the hard rain, sharp against his dry tongue. His face felt flecked with warm dots of sea spray as a name slipped quietly from his lips – a whisper to the storm's glory. Lightning flashed again, and the man was gone.
The memory passed in a second, but he still tasted salt. As he slumped over dizzily, groaning, it took him a moment to realise he tasted his own smarting tears. A howling sorrow bubbled up inside his chest suddenly, and constricted around his lungs, choking him.
He hunched over, his head bowed, features twisted in a silent wail. He rocked slightly, knees sloshing in the puddle swelling beneath him, his arms wrapped around his stomach as he fought down the bile rising in his throat. He coughed violently, and the sobs forced their way out of his throat, wracking his thin frame as tears ran down his face unchecked.
His howl was torn away in the roaring wind, and hands gripped at blonde hair. He curled into a smaller ball upon the wet ground, sobbing still as his frame rocked gently back and forth, back and forth. He heard nothing but a past conversation with a passed life.
Gradually, his movements stilled and his muscles slacked; he regained his composure, just kneeling in the rain. Thunder rumbled overhead, impossibly loud within the hollow echo of his mind.
He blinked slowly, the cold of the rain fighting its way into his numb brain, and he shivered. Suddenly, he heard the soft splash of footsteps through the storm's humming battle cry, and he became acutely aware of two scruffy shoes standing inches from his nose. He paused, his breathing growing shallow, as his eyes became unfocused; it took him a few minutes to realise that shoes couldn't just walk up to him on their own. He blinked, and wearily lifted his head.
His mind protested to the sluggish movement and his vision swam crazily; his head pulsed with a migraine, and he fought the urge to throw up. He felt faint.
There, through the rain that ran in rivulets down his marred, hollow cheeks, stood a young girl. Her flaming red hair fell down about her face in wild tangles as she stared at him with shadowed, yellow-green eyes. Lightning whip-cracked again, scorching the ground close by. On the ground, he winced as another shot of pain pierced his shoulder. A spasm wracked his thin body, and he coughed wetly. Thunder stuck out, closer this time, and lightning hissed through the air. Like the weakened, fearful man he felt he had become, he flinched away – if only slightly.
The girl, however, didn't move an inch as her hair was tousled and drenched by the storm, the smell of burning reaching her nose in a pungent burst, mingling with the sharp smell of fresh rain. The lightning reflected against her eyes, making them shine, making them alive; precious jewels glinting out of a muddy, pale face.
Up until now, she had been still amid the chaos, like a statue carved from stone, but as a new, gushing sound caught her ears amid the thunder, she crouched down to the weakened man upon the ground. Her small, slender hand reached out cautiously, only to have him shake his head at her, and attempt to stand. He would walk unaided, just like he had stated back then: he would do it all himself. His trembling legs, however, refused his wishes, and buckled easily beneath him. Frowning, he hand reached out again and gripped him firmly by the hand.
Feebly, he tried to gently prise his hand free from her small, wet palm, and to clamber to his feet singlehandedly, but searing pain shot through him again, wracking his body violently and making him collapse against the child and cry in pain upon the soaking ground.
Truly, he realised as the pain subsided, he was only a shadow of the once powerful youth had proclaimed. After a small moment where his waning dizziness subsided, he went limp and allowed the girl to pull him upright with her small strength. Rain was cold upon the back of his neck.
A small hand pushed at his chin, and he meekly complied, his head tipping up to face her through the freezing storm. His head pounded anew as he tried to focus upon her; he felt sick, weak. He wondered how long she had been speaking.
"—make the river flood. Can't stay here—"
Funny. Up until that moment, he hadn't even noticed the river – the steep embankment bordered the path, with the river raging beside it, swelling up over the banks. He felt her child hands pulling at his drenched clothes, and finally allowed himself to be pulled to his wavering feet. He wandered in a pain-induced stupor as she pushed herself up to his side and supported his unhealthy weight.
When he looked back on the events that followed, all he would recall was a rush of blinding pain, soft lights and rushing warmth as he was pulled through doorway, into sanctuary. Everything else was a blur, and darkness spirited him away.
Consciousness returned to him slowly, sluggishly, and for a moment Naruto mistook his surroundings for familiar. Things were hazy and incisive; inanimate shapes blurred around him, doing nothing to refute his hopeful, half-lucid guess – but doing nothing to prove it either. Except then, one by one, dim-lit lights and a smouldering glow began to fuse together in front of his eyes, before all of a sudden everything blinked into a sharp, harsh focus. He was anywhere but somewhere familiar.
Groaning quietly, not yet feeling strong enough to worry over his dilemma, the blonde shinobi closed his eyes again. He hoped his surroundings would just go away, dissolve and disappear, if he ignored them. He couldn't remember clearly what had happened, but he had a feeling it had been something mildly unpleasant. His body ached with fatigue and dehydration, residual pain pulsing every moment or so; dimly, he remembered old wounds aching.
As Naruto lay there, feeling the ebb and flow of his body's dwindling protest, he tried to think. But he didn't want to think back on what had occurred an age ago, a long time gone; he didn't want to think of the pain and the anguish and the fighting. He didn't want to think of Sakura's bright, bright eyes – bright with tears, and with anger. With accusation. He didn't want to think of any of that.
Instead, instead of his thoughts dwelling on the past, he turned his still-hazy mind to now; to how he had arrived in this nameless place. And while he turned his thoughts to his present, his past took a chance to hastily recoil into history, out of mind and out of sight. A year had already passed since then, and it did him no good to linger.
As, gradually, his will returned, Naruto began to breathe easier, and his eyelids fluttered open again. His mind was clearing, he could feel it: like steam evaporating in a breeze, the pressure on his mind was lifting. Like jagged puzzle pieces, fragments of memory started to join together. Except, there was still the tiny, insignificant issue of not knowing where the hell he was.
He tried to sit up. Big mistake. Pain – born from pure fatigue – shot through his limbs as he tried to support himself; with a small cry, he fell back onto his pillow, feeling a rush of dizziness surge from the dark recesses of his consciousness. He felt slightly sick, and weak, and so, so helpless. His mind was suddenly, quickly dimming, and try as he might there was nothing he could do to stop it. He was still too ill. With a murmur of protest (it was all he could muster), Naruto surrendered himself to the steadily encroaching darkness.
His eyes drifted listlessly closed. Then, just before his sight left him, something threw a shadow scross the light. Through his eyelashes, Naruto glimpsed an old woman; she laid a cloth on his forehead, and he knew she wouldn't hurt him. He may have half-formed a 'thank you', but before Naruto could be certain he had spoke at all, the shilhouette put a finger to his lips, and unconsciousness – blissful, dreamless sleep – stole him back.
The next time Naruto awoke, it was to the sound of a dull clanging nearby. It was slightly muffled, or maybe just quiet, but it was annoying nonetheless. With a frown and a suffering groan, having half a mind to sock whoever was interrupting his sleep, Naruto opened his eyes, expecting to see— well. He didn't know what he expected, because a spilt second before his eyelids lifted, he remembered that anything, anyone, he had been expecting to see was long gone. There was a small pang in his chest that had nothing to do with physical pain.
The sight that greeted him was a lot clearer than his earlier awakening. It was light, for one, and his head seemed clearer than it had been, giving each object a sharper clarity and rejuvenation. He was lying on a futon in a small, stone-floored room. Below his resting hands, his blankets were a dark, dirty olive colour. Along the wall at which his feet were pointed, there was a low cabinet, stretching the whole width of the room (which wasn't much).
One of the doors in the side-board was open, Naruto noted with a delayed frown, and someone was still making that noise. Wearily, still feeling too exhausted to bother much about where he was, Naruto made to pull his pillow over his head — and heard a snort of laughter to his right. The noise stopped. Naruto cautiously, slowly, pulled the pillow from his face, and turned his head.
Naruto's eyes found the face of a boy, a child no more than eleven, kneeling a little way off to his side. On the floor next to him was a small, metal teapot, the fingers of one of his small hands still looped through its handle. The boy was grinning at him, delight spreading across his smudged face.
With another small laugh (a child's happy giggle), he exclaimed, "You're awake! 'Bout time, you lazy ass!"
Naruto's eyes, confused, roamed over the boy's features, wondering if he knew who exactly this was. The boy was still grinning, and Naruto was drawn to his smile, spying a gap in his front teeth – a missing tooth, the gap dark and hollow, giving the boy a slight whistle as he chattered. It could have fallen out by itself, Naruto supposed, but from the look of the kid and his ruffed-up appearance, it looked like someone hand punched it out instead. It gave the kid an almost comical look, combined with his big, dark eyes, all round and innocent.
In the right light, Naruto thought maybe they would be green, but to him they looked a muddy brown. With a spark of humour, the blonde realised they went with the kid's swamp-like hair – dark, matted curls handing about his face. The joy just gave him a toothy (toothless) smile, and that's when Naruto realised:
"What?" the kid egged him on. "Yeah? C'mon, speak, you know how, dun'cha?"
"…Did you just call me an ass?"
The shinobi's voice was a surprise to himself – croaky and dry with misuse. His throat hurt. The boy had collapsed in peals of laughter. Then, suddenly, he turned and yelled into the next room.
"Oi! Granny! 'E's awake!"
The old woman, who Naruto had glimpsed earlier through his blurred and obscure consciousness, was standing in the doorway of the room, quietly watching her grandson interact with the prone ninja. Her voice wobbled as she replied presently, "I'm aware of that, Keigo." Despite the aging croak of her tone, however, her words were strong and mindful. She stepped down into the room, the entrance what looked like a kitchen being on a slight ledge that could easily trip someone up; she handled the step easily, however, and knelt beside Naruto.
Her hand was aged, carved with gnarled wrinkles, as she clasped the blonde's arm with a clawed grip and with surprising strength propped him up into a sitting position. She pushed a small bowl into his hands.
"Here," she said matter-of-factly. "Tea." Naruto blinked at it for a second. "Drink," she coaxed, "you'll feel stronger."
Naruto obliged, blowing on the hot liquid before bringing it to his parched lips. He sipped it gently, revelling in the cleansing warmth as it flowed past his teeth and washed the taste of stale sleep from him mouth. After a few moments, he let the cup fall from his mouth with a refreshed gasp; the old lady took it from him and placed the china on the floor, a steady hand still at his elbow. Naruto turned to her expectantly, lifted his eyes to hers, and asked, "How did I get here?"
"You were outside in the rain, unconscious," the old woman replied. "Just dropped in the middle of the street, no doubt."
Naruto nodded. That made sense. But then, he frowned, because he couldn't remember making it to the town at all; he couldn't even remember seeing a town in the distance. What's more – "What happened… to that girl?"
The elderly woman frowned also, and opened her mouth to reply, but she was cut off by her grandson, who had been eagerly listening in from Naruto's other side.
"You had a girl with you, mister?" he grinned. "Was she gunna keep you company, huh? Lots of girls in this town do that." The boy's grin was suggestive, and he was giggling. Naruto gaped at him, because a kid as young as he couldn't seriously understand what he was implying. Naruto raised an eyebrow.
"And just how old are you?" the shinobi asked disbelievingly.
Keigo jabbed his chest proudly. "I'm almost twelve!"
"Good for you…" Naruto shook his head. "But no, this was a child, younger than you. I guess she brought me here."
"Brought you here?" the old woman repeated. "You're not the healthiest boy your age I've seen, but there's still no way a mere child, younger than my grandson, could carry you."
Naruto blinked up at her. "But I swear…" he sighed. "Never mind," he continued. "Thank you, I feel much better." He began to clamber up shakily to his feet. "I really should be going."
The old woman caught him by the arm. "Don't be ridiculous," she said, "You've only just woken up."
Naruto gave a small chuckle, the sound reverberate slightly in his still-groggy head. "Don't worry about it," he reassured her as he straightened up, spreading his arms in a gesture of invitation, letting her observe his stability. "I've always recovered quickly."
His keeper stared him up and down with unveiled suspicion in her slightly clouded eyes. Her lips were pursed in disapproval, and the lines charactering her face deepened with her frown. Naruto slowly dropped his arms to his side, his persuading grin slipping from his face. His look dropped into an almost vulnerable sincerity.
"Please," he said quietly. "I have to go."
She sighed heavily through her nose, her lips still drawn tightly into a stern line; but there was an understanding in her eyes, a leniency born of decades of existence. Behind Naruto, her grandson looked as if he were about to protest loudly, but she silence him with a single glance.
"Alright," she said finally, standing. "I hope you know what you're doing."
Naruto laughed, "Oh, I rarely ever do!" The laughter faded from his face, though, replaced with a grateful smile. He held out his hand. "Thank you, Obaasan, for your hospitality."
The old woman stood with creaking joints and a sigh of exertion. She took his young hand in her withered, learned grasp. "Good luck, shinobi-san."
The rain was still falling as Naruto set off down the street. Light pooled from windows he passed, scattering their warm light onto the sodden pavement, their shapes broken up with the pummelling of the rain. Tired of the freezing water creating pinprick splashes across his scalp, Naruto pulled the hood of his cloak up over his head. He tried to move doggedly on through the empty streets, making his way swiftly and quietly out of the town, but every few moments or so he would stop, and curse, and hunch over.
A boiling pain, one that he recognised and hated and feared beyond all else, was swarming in his navel. He clenched his fists into his skin, gritted his teeth, and tried to breathe steadily. It came in waves, and upon the crest of every new surge of pain he had to fight the urge to groan in fear – fear, because this was nothing new, and he knew what it meant. He paused in his step as a particularly sharp stab unsettled him, leaning against the wall he had been sticking to. He closed his eyes, and turned his face upwards to the rain, trying to cool his skin against the sudden feverish tinge he felt trying to claw its way through his veins.
"No…" He breathed the words out slowly, trying to establish a rhythm to counteract the waves of pain that he knew would eventually subside, as the monster's chakra healed his last weaknesses and had no choice but to ebb back into its seal: its weakening seal. A shaky sigh whistled through his teeth. "Go away."
As Naruto pushed the last of the fiery chakra back into its cage, he felt the Kyuubi stab viciously at his insides: a reminder of how close the monster was to the surface. He let his eyes flutter closed, and shoved the beast away. He let the fiend hear his thoughts loud and clear, and received a guttural growl in response, deep in the recesses of his mind.
'I'll never let you out again.'
The girl's fists were scraped and bruised, but she didn't care in the slightest. She narrowed her eyes at her prey and focused in on her prize, clutched in his hands. He was scrabbling on the damp ground. She had cornered him and his friends in an alley, and the smell of the overflowing and waterlogged trash nearby was extremely pungent in his nose, making his eyes water. The rain had stopped finally stopped, but the sun had yet to emerge in the overcast sky, and large, mud-coloured puddles swamped most of the streets.
She stepped over him, the slosh created by her soles impacting the ground splashing against his face. He blinked furiously and scrubbed at his eyes with his free hand, trying still to shuffle away on his ass. The girl grabbed him by the shirt.
"Give it here," she threatened him, pulling her free fist back. "Give me it, or I'll hurt you!"
Mutely, the boy shook his head, one of his eyes scrunched up from the muddy water. He clutched her prize closer to his dirty shirt. She growled, her eyes flashing dangerously and her hair hanging limply around her face, caked with mud and lank with lingering rainwater. She cocked her fist back further, and swung it hard at the boy's face. He squeaked with terror, and tried to squirm away.
"Yo." A foot planted itself between her small shoulder blades, and gently, but firmly, shoved her over.
The girl landed face-first in a large puddle, creating a hefty splash. She spluttered in surprise, spitting and coughing the dirty, stagnant puddle from her mouth. She sprung to her feet, scrubbing hastily at her face and yanking her hair from her eyes, but the boy was already gone with her quarry. She span on her heel.
"What the hell was that for?"
Naruto simply shrugged with a good-natured smile. He seemed oblivious to the fact that he had just kicked over a small child. Said small child looked him up and down.
"You're odd," she said dismissively, her eyes scanning over the worn cloak hanging from his shoulders, the bottom stained dark from dragging in puddles, the faded orange of his shirt and the weathered, dark shinobi trousers fastened with crisp white bandages around his calves – obviously just having been replaced. Her eyes lingered on what must be his only things of value: the large scroll fixed to his back, bound carefully and safely together with deep red rope, and the shining jewel hanging from tattered leather around his neck. His eyes were a piercing blue, staring intently at her past strands of bright blonde hair and a cunning grin. His cheeks were marred with deep, whisker-like scars, stark against his worn skin, and his forearms secured with bandages, the one on his right arm spreading down to envelop his palm. "What do you want?"
Naruto was taken aback by her abrupt manner, although he didn't show it. He would've thought someone who went out of their way to lug his unconscious weight – probably more than twice or three times her own, she was a scrawny thing – would be kinder. He didn't linger much on it, though, and instead just rolled his shoulders in another shrug.
"To… thank you?" he replied with a light, but questioning tone, because it should've been obvious. The little girl just blinked up at him through her dirty hair and her dirty clothes, her bruised knuckles hanging limply by her sides. She looked surprised, and almost annoyed.
"People don't thank me," she said shortly. "Not even strangers."
Naruto let the grin slide off his face, and a vaguely critical glint flittered through his eyes. He looked her up and down as she bent to tie her shoelace. She had certainly taken him by surprise with her attitude, but the more he looked at her, and took in her grubby appearance and her uncouth speech, the more he began to wonder.
Abruptly, he asked, "Why were you beating up that kid?"
The girl turned to look up at him with a deadpanned expression. Her lips were pursed in a rough, chapped line. For one stubborn moment, the blonde shinobi thought she wasn't going to answer. And why should she? He was just a stranger, after all – but a stranger she had saved; surely she wasn't as uncaring as she now seemed.
"You want me to say something like, I needed his food or his money?" she demanded suddenly, and Naruto had to wonder if she was reading his mind. "I didn't need it," she continued, turning out her pockets to show him – to spite him, almost – the coins that clattered out. "I've stolen enough money to give me a good week, enough to trade for food."
"Then why try and take his snack from him?" Naruto asked, intrigued despite himself. But for some reason, the girl suddenly looked away, almost embarrassed. A scowl blotched her face, trying to hide it.
"I've never tasted candy before," she said.
"Oh," Naruto said. She was suddenly squirming in her shoes, scuffing the ground. Naruto felt a small sting of pity for her. "Here," he continued, reaching into the folds of his cloak, to his pouch. He withdrew a small handful of mints. "They're a bit old, but…" he took her small hand in his, and tipped the little mints into her muddy palm.
Her eyes grew as wide as saucers, and for a moment she just stared at the plain little sweets in her hand. She glanced up at Naruto, then back at the candy. Her fist suddenly snapped tight around her new treasure, and, seemingly forgetting Naruto's bemused presence, plonked herself down on the floor right where she stood. She was sat in a puddle, the murky water immediately soaking her pants right through, but she didn't seem to care. She brought one of the mints to her mouth, and placed it delicately on her tongue; for a long moment, she sifted it slowly through her mouth. Naruto could hear it chinking against the back of her teeth as he watched her.
Suddenly, her eyes lit up as the taste hit her tongue, and she instantly piled more mints into her mouth, chomping on them happily. She was fully engrossed. With an amused chuckle, Naruto stepped forward and placed a soft hand on her head; she barely reacted.
"Thanks, kid," he said quietly. Then, he turned on his heel and began to make his way towards the street, pulling his cloak around him again as he readied to continue on his trek. His necklace jangled slightly as he swept back his hair and squinted up at the clearing sky. He sighed, feeling his stomach twinge in a phantom warning.
Suddenly, though, a tug at his cloak stopped him. He turned, and found the little girl staring up at him with a new look in her eyes. It was a hungry look, a hopeful look; she had seen something new in him, and she wanted it.
"Take me with you," she said. The tone of her voice wasn't just demanding this time, it was determined. "Wherever you're going, I want to go too."
Naruto looked down at her with a look of surprise curbing his face. He had no reason to take this kid along with him. She was stubborn and unclean, with a rough, untamed attitude and no particular manners; but she had obviously seen some sort of potential in him, because she hadn't let go of his cloak.
"Okay," he said finally, placing his hand at her back and guiding her forward. "But you always stay in front of me, alright? You try and steal from me, and I leave you behind." She nodded. "Good. Now, let's go."
Naruto (c) Kishimoto Masashi