The Meeting

Fourteen-year-old John Tonova, a normal, average teenager with an obsession for video games and comics—nothing out of the ordinary for someone his age—was browsing through the local bookstore one day; his generous Grandmother had given him a twenty dollar gift card, and he dared not wait until it expired.

Daydreaming, he wandered to the manga section, the unofficial hangout for him and his friends after school. He couldn't wait to spend those twenty bucks on a book to add to his vast collection.

He fingered through the various titles, each more interesting than the one previous, and each one screaming for him to buy. When John thought that he had confirmed his decision, something unusual caught his eye.

"What is this?" John wondered, as he looked at the bookshelf of his favorite series, Naruto, to a book that seemed different in color than the rest around it.

"Strange," he thought, "this store is usually so tidy; someone must have put this book out of place… idiots…"

He plucked the unique book from its place, and stared at it. He had started to examine the strange book, it had no title, and the front was a complete crimson red, no picture. He touched the book, when the cover seemed to glow for a moment. At that second an illusionary-looking face with an evil grin stared him in the eyes, as if it knew him and his every thought.

"Wh-what?" John could not believe his eyes, the face before him replicated that of the Kyuubi, the nine-tailed demon fox!

He stood there, transfixed by the hellish sight in front of him. He did not know how much time passed before he was shaken out of his stupor by a thin shop worker.

"Uh, sir? You've been standing there for an hour, staring at that book. Is anything wrong?" The worker bore a befuddled look on his face, almost as if he was afraid to speak to this man.

"An hour? I've only been here a couple of minutes at most!" He answered the man, but the worker responded "No sir, when you arrived it was 2:05, now it's 3:11."

John paused for a moment, contemplating what had just happened. "Well no, nothing's the matter. But I have one question; why is this manga different from the res……" His voice trailed off as he glanced at the book in his hands, it now bore a completely normal countenance, with the familiar white coloring and image of team seven on the cover.

"Sir?" The worker questioned, while at the same time pondering this mans sanity.

John stared at the worker, then at the book, then proceeded to put it away. Whatever had just happened, he certainly didn't want it to happen again!

"I'm sorry for troubling you, sir." The worker scurried away from this teen, not wanting to meet him again anytime soon.

Replacing the book where he had discovered it, he proceeded to get out of that store, when he felt a force, unknown to him, draw him back to the very place he had first touched that weird book. Something about that manga wanted him to buy it, something unusual, something eerie. He argued with himself for a few seconds:

*That books dangerous; don't get it!*

*Aww, come on, don't you like adventure? Besides, what harm can it do?*

*Tons! You saw that image, that evil grin! No good can come of it…*

*Oh, come off it, you don't even know the definition of the word excitement!*

Eventually, the side of him that wanted to buy the book took over; he grabbed the book, expecting something scary to happen. When nothing out of the ordinary went on, he walked over to the cash register to purchase the manga.

"Did you find everything you needed today, sir?" The cashier asked.

"Sort of." Was John's cryptic answer, causing the cashier to raise an eyebrow in confusion.

"What do you mean by that, sir?"

"To tell you the truth, I really don't know myself."

The cashier saw something out of the corner of his eye, the same worker that had helped, or attempted to help, John earlier. He mouthed something, but the cashier didn't catch it.

"What?" The already-confused cashier responded silently.

"Skip the conversation-just sell the darn thing!"

Fortunately, John didn't notice the muted conversation, and brought out his gift card he had oh-so-carefully hidden in his pocket.

Not exactly realizing what the worker meant, the cashier swiped the card, handed John the receipt, quickly mumbled "Thank you, have a nice day" and immediately shouted "Next!"

John stood there for a second or two, thinking to himself, "What happened to the polite, patient demeanor?" and walked out the door.

His home was conveniently located two blocks away from the bookstore, very good walking distance. As his footsteps resounded on the near-empty sidewalk nearing his house, he pondered the unique book in his hands, the strange face, and the way time seemed to warp drastically when he stared at it.

"I could have sworn I only spent a minute or two looking at that face." The more he thought about it, however, the more he began to think that he had just been seeing things.

But this unexplainable occurrence could wait; he couldn't wait to start reading his new book!

He arrived home, plopped down on the couch, pulled out his newly bought book, and stared at the cover. The same crimson red color that had covered the book when he first noticed it had appeared again!

"AUGH!" He hurled the book to the floor with an audible "Bang!" causing his mother to rush in the room with a look on her face that said "Okay, what'd you do now?"

"M-m-m-om…" John stuttered, pointing at the mysterious book. "L-l-ook…"

"John, what are you pointing at? Do you want to return that book?" John looked at the book, and gaped in shock; the cover was back to normal.

"B-b-but, th-th-the c-cover was r-r-ed…"

John's mom threw her hands in the air and marched out of the room, muttering under her breath: "I swear, one day that kid will drive me crazy."

John picked up the book in a cold sweat, and pondered the day's activities. He had noticed the weird cover for the first time in the store, but when someone else looked at it, it was gone. Then it happened again, this time at his house. When his mom looked at the book, the ghostly red color had vanished. Then, there was always that face that had appeared in the store…

His hands moist, he gripped the pages of the book, and felt his lungs contract. He exhaled, not realizing that he had held his breath.

He flipped the book open, and the room around him immediately darkened. "Wh-wh-what?" He couldn't believe his eyes, there, in front of him, as real as life, floated the face of the nine-tailed fox.

"Boy, I've been watching you."

John rubbed his eyes in disbelief, he could have sworn the fox had just spoken to him. "This can't be happening… I must be having a bad dream… Yeah, that's it, a dream."

He pinched himself, expecting to wake up to his comfy beige bed with his tv on, but was sorely disappointed.

"I assure you, I am quite real. Now listen to me. I've been humored by the way you buy all these scrolls, not thinking if the stories they tell are real. You assume them to be fake, however you cannot even grasp the falsity of that assumption. I'm interested in your fascination with my world. So, I'll give you a chance to come to my world, the same way I've come to yours."

"W-w-wait a second," John stuttered, sure that he was still dreaming. "How can you do that? I mean stuff like chakra and jutsu and all that stuff don't actually exist, do they?"

"WRONG! Now hear me: I can easily transport you into my world, but you will have to do something for me."

Growing a little bolder, John inquired "Well, what is it?"

"In time, boy, in time. But you have to give me an answer now. Do you, or do you not, want to travel to my world?"

"The world of Naruto?"

"That's what they call my vessel. Now, what is your answer?"

"Wait, I'm still in school, you can't expect me to just disappear, can you? What's going to happen to my parents? My teachers? My girlfriend?

"Look outside."

If John was befuddled before, his confusion increased tenfold when he peered outside. Absolutely nothing was moving; not the cars, the birds, even that fish in the lake was frozen in mid-jump.

"What's going on?" John wondered to himself.

As if the Kyuubi could read his thoughts, it answered "I have stopped all time in this world for the duration of your leave. I ask you one final time, what is your answer?"

With the knowledge that the Kyuubi could warp time under his belt, John now knew why an hour had passed in the shop while it seemed only a few minutes. It made sense that if he could control time, then he had the power to warp him to the world in the manga. Once again, the two sides of his conscience argued.

*Don't do it! You can't trust this fox!*

*Oh, you coward! Where's your guts? Be brave, like me!*

*You're not brave, you're just foolish!*

*I'm braver than you'll ever be!*

John pondered both sides for quite a while. The fox waiting in front of him was somewhat patient, thankfully. Years spent in a cage had chilled his temper a bit.

Then John smiled. He looked up at the fox, with no sign of fear whatsoever in his eyes.

"Well?"

His heart racing with adrenaline, the adolescent stared the fox straight in the eyes and voiced three simple words.

"I'll do it."