Things Change Over Time
(I don't own Naruto or any of the characters. NO COPY RIGHT INTENDED.)
Ages: Naruto-17 Sakura-16
One day Naruto had asked Sakura if she would want to go on a walk with him. She said yes but Naruto could tell it was kind of hesitant and unsure; he decided to go with it knowing the truth would come out soon.
They had walked a while in the park and Naruto and Sakura had taken a break and were sitting together under the nice, cool shade of the tree. They didn't talk much, until Naruto heard small little sobs coming from someone nearby.
Naruto looked all around and didn't find anyone crying until he saw the slow moving tears drip, slowly, off of Sakura's face. Naruto, said, with a hint of worry, "Sakura, are you ok?" She only responded a small whisper, "Why?"
At this point Naruto, being Naruto was a little bit confused. He asked, sounding dumb founded, "Why what?" She didn't bother to look at him and instead turned the other way and said, "Why… Why haven't you kept your promise? The one you said that no matter what you would bring Sasuke back? You told me to believe and I did, and still do but… it's not completed yet… it's been over three years and… he's not back."
Naruto looked at her shocked she brought this up of all times. He said, "Hold on one second. When I promised that, there was no time limit. Besides you have no idea how much I work my ass of training to get him back. Every chance I can get to get him back, you and I both know, I try my very hardest to get him back and go after him. It's just that the time hasn't come yet. Plus I made the promise and you know I always keep my promises… no matter what!"
Sakura felt the power and meaning in his voice and she knew everything he said was true…but she couldn't help but feel doubtful that it would never happen. That it was just too far out of reach. That it was the impossible request someone made for another. She couldn't bring herself to argue with Naruto about how it may never happen; she just replied with a simple, "Hn."
The day went pretty slow for both of them. After about thirty minutes Naruto said goodbye and went home. Sakura stayed there for a little bit feeling strange warmth disappear as Naruto got farther and farther away. She soon left as the warmth that was present was completely gone.
When she got home she went straight to bed, still in her clothes from the day. She didn't eat, not brush her hair or teeth, or even take a shower, just went straight to her bed. Her mind replayed Naruto's words over and over again till she fell asleep… 'I always keep my promises… no matter what!'
"Ugh! I can't sleep!" the blond haired shinobi yelled. He laid there in his bed while being tormented by Sakura's words 'it's been over three years and… he's not back.' He stared at the ceiling when doubt crossed his mind. "May be Sakuras right… may be I can't do it, not strong enough to do it, not trying hard enough…" He debated this all night to himself when finally sleep over took him.
The next morning when Naruto woke up he went straight back to debating inside his mind when all of the sudden an ANBU officer poofed into view. "AH!" Naruto screeched, "HOW THE HELL DID YOU GET IN HERE? WHAT DO YOU WANT?" The ANBU said, after to a long confusing pause, "Tsunade-sama wishes to speak you as soon as possible. She says it's very important." After his last words, the officer just poofed out of existence. Naruto just stared at where the officer was sitting and said, "Huh? I wonder what grandma wants."
He got dressed and made himself look presentable and had some ramen. A long walk after word Shizune knocked and went inside and said, "Tsunade-sama, Naruto is here." Tsunade just waved here off as Naruto walked inside. "Hello grandma!" Naruto said with a bright smile. She just glared at him, and he felt the anger radiating off of her; he just slouched down.
Tsunade cleared her throat and said, "Naruto I have important news for you. We have located Sasuke's hiding spot and we have granted you permission to retrieve him." Naruto stared at her in shock and excitement, finally got the words and said, "Really? Wait… Am I going alone?" She shrugged.
"Well kind of." An unfamiliar female voice said. He looked in the direction and what he saw surprised him. A woman with red hair, similar to his mothers, ocean blue eyes, and large but not too large breasts, all dressed in a black semi-showy hooded V-neck shirt. The black sleeves went down just an inch or two below the elbow and had a white line going horizontal bordering the end of the sleeve. On the right arm there was a pure white Uzimaki clan symbol, which was questioning to him. The hood was bigger than what was enough but it gave the women a mysteriously hot look too her. The shirt fit loosely on the small frame of her body. From about the rib above the bottom rib there was a hole, on both sides, that went down to about two inches below her belly button. The holes were wide and expanded from about an inch from the center of her abdominal muscles to about an inch from her spinal cord.
The bottom border of the shirt was white. Under the black shirt there was a white muscle tee-shirt that ended below the ribcage. She had black tight spandex shorts on, covered up with a white four cut skirt (just like Sakura's in Naruto: Shippuden {I don't own that either}) she had black ninja shoes like Naruto's but more of a solid black. On her back she had two oversized shuriken and a medium sized expertly crafted sword going vertical down the middle, on the very outside of the two shuriken. And on her right butt she had a hand-held weapon holding pouch, in black. She wasn't emo or goth Naruto could tell; the color just was a sexy combination. She was skinny but muscular; it was easy to see the four packs. She was only about fifteen and a half or sixteen.
After a while of examining her, Naruto looked back at her face, blushing strongly. To him she was very beautiful. She was staring at him with one eyebrow cocked up with a look that said 'Why the hell are you staring at me like that?' She ignored that fact and held up a hand and said, "My name is Lauren, yours?" He swallowed hard and shook her hand and replied, "Na-Naruto." Lauren smiled sweetly and said, "Nice to meet you. I will be accompanying you to get Sasuke back."
Tsunade spoke up and said, "Naruto, Lauren is new here but she has the power of every single ninja and hokage. Currently she is a Jonnin rank. Lauren, Sasuke is very important to Naruto but may be stronger than him. I'm ensured that you will heal Naruto of wounds if so happens. Whatever it may come to Lauren control yourself and Naruto to not go as far as killing him, we need him back for interrogation. You have three days to complete the mission, and you leave tomorrow morning." The teens both replied, "Hn."
They were about to leave when Tsunade stopped them and said, "Oh and one more thing! Naruto, Lauren is a jinjuriki just like you; only she is the legendary tenth tailed wolf, the Schiebi." She smiled at him and nodded. They were about to leave again when Tsunade said, "Oh yeah! You two are brother and sisters."
Lauren smiled brightly and said, "Awesome!" Meanwhile Naruto was caught off balance. That last comment threw him off. 'WAIT A SEC. THAT CHICK IS MY SISTER?' He thought. He was one the ground frozen in shock, twitching every now and then. 'AH! I HAD A CRUSH ON MY SISTER? Well at least that sorts out the Uzimaki symbol…' He mentally smacked himself while the inner Naruto was nagging on him about how that was just sick and wrong.
Lauren stared at him the just left. 'He's kind of weird…' After about ten minutes Naruto regained himself and went home to pack. He was still kind of struck that she was his sister…
He woke up earlier than he needed to, but better early than late. He collected his backpack and set it by his kitchen table and got a shower and got dressed. When he came down he made himself a nice bowl of ramen. When he figured it was time to go he went out the door, locked it up, and walked down to the doors where we were meeting. "Naruto!" he looked to where he heard his voice and saw Lauren waving to get his attention. He walked over to her and they started off chakra sprinting. After ten hours of it Naruto almost collapsed from exhaustion.
"I'm guessing this would be a good time to camp out for the night." Lauren said with a cocked eyebrow. He responded, panting between almost every word, "How… are… you not… sweating… aren't… you … tired at… all?" She simply replied, "Nope!" He stared at her in disbelief. She sighed and said, "Well while I'm cooking dinner I guess I could explain to you… Well one reason is that I'm lighter and more nimble than you. Another reason is that I have more chakra in my body and to sum it up with this last reason, I can control the Schiebi's chakra to do what I want with it, still in control, and not hurting anyone.
He just stared at her wanting to know more. "Well the way I control her, Schiebi's, chakra is that she knows that if I die she will die, so why wouldn't she protect me to protect herself? She and I are on good relations too; we don't hate each other, we're just good friends. I guess she kind of looks out for me; so doing that she allows me to be in control and still use all of her chakra that I need. You should work out something with the Kyuubi; it would help you out a lot." Lauren stated. Naruto just nodded in agreement. She knew at that moment he had left her and went into his mind to form an alliance with the Kyuubi inside of him.
She gave it a couple of minutes, but after a while she got up and shook him a bit to bring him back to earth. He opened his eyes and just simply said, "He agreed." Lauren smiled and said, "Try it out. Just focus all of your chakra where you want it, like normal. He nodded and sprinted a mile away and was back in no more than two seconds. Lauren smiled in a "good job" way.
They both went to bed in their (separate) sleeping bags, and fell asleep almost instantaneous. Lauren got up first and woke Naruto up. He got up slow, very slow, until he heard a giant BANG in the distance. Lauren quickly packed everything up, and put her hands together in concentration; no more than a minute, her eyes shot open and said, "It's him." She threw his bang at him, which he caught promptly, and they both started to demon chakra run to him.
"Naruto!" Lauren called out to him, while running. He looked at her and she threw him an orange and black pill. "It's a chakra pill! Eat it! It gives you about ten times more power than normal!" Lauren shouted. He saw her swallow a black and white one, and swallowed his. After that he thought, 'How ironic, my pill was orange and black and hers was black and white... that's funny.' "Naruto!... Naruto!... NARUTO!" He came out of his little trance when someone's hand hit his chest. He flew back and hit a tree. "Damn it." He murmured. He now noticed that he was in a big giant open space and got slammed into a tree by whom? Him, Sasuke. In a flash Lauren was in front of him, protecting him. She looked completely relaxed, like this was nothing. "Ha. You have a little friend here don't you Naruto- idiot?" Sasuke said with a grim smirk. "Don't underestimate me." Lauren said with force. Sasuke laughed.
The raven haired boy said, "Ha! A little girl like you… beat me?" Sasuke up roared with laughter. "Come at me… I dare you bitch." Lauren said with a smile. Sasuke smiled grunted and in seconds Lauren was flipped up in the air and slammed down with Sasuke's sword through her hands. Naruto screamed, "NO!" he tried to get up he couldn't find the power to. 'Damn. Sasuke must've hurt my back with that last blow." Sasuke readied a chidori to kill Lauren. "Die hoe." And with that he stabbed it through Lauren's back. "NO!" Naruto screamed. There was a terrifying screech and then small little feminine laughs, to Sasuke and Naruto's surprise. Laurens bloody fingers rapped themselves around the sword going through her hands. She got up normally, no hesitation, like nothing ever happened, and pulled the sword out with her. Lauren laughs and says, "You actually thought I was about to die? Haha! That's hilarious! Boy I was just playing with you!" and in a millisecond Sasuke was laying on the ground knocked out.
"Lauren, you idiot! You had me scared to death thinking that you died!" Naruto yelled across the field. Lauren ran to him in seconds, put one arm over her neck and pulled him into the woods to a good location for to camp, said, "You're the one who didn't listen to my calls and instead just runs out to the middle of the battle field, almost getting you killed. And I'm the idiot." She rolled her eyes, as she set Naruto against the tree. Afterwards, she did a series of hands signs and said Crystal Style: Crystal Cocoon! (It's pretty bad I know just bear with me.) She stuck her hand out and crystals poured out of it and covered Sasuke, so that he was immobile, and brought him to her. "Wait, I thought that jutsu didn't exist? And will that kill him?" Naruto said with worry and fright. Lauren smiled, "No it will not kill him just insure immobilization. And yeah most people think that jutsu is fake but it's not; it's just that only two people know how to use it, me and the women who created it."
Meanwhile at the Hokage tower…
Sakura hadn't seen Naruto after their "fight", and was starting to get a little worried. She went to the Hokage tower in hope Tsunade knew where he might be. "Tsunade-sama, Sakura is here to see you." Shizune said. Tsunade nodded and Sakura came in. Sakura asked, "Have you seen Naruto? I haven't seen him in a couple of days." Tsunade replied, without looking up from her papers, "He's going after Sasuke. He should be back tomorrow. I have work to do, leave." Sakura started to cry a little. Tsunade heard the cries and looked at her and said, "What's wrong?" Sakura said, "We got into a little fight a while ago and he left. What if Sasuke kills him? He's all alone out there, probably getting hurt, all because… I pushed him to do so." Tsunade took a breath and replied, "He may be hurt but he's not going to get killed. Just relax he'll be here tomorrow." Sakura nodded and walked off.
Back with Naruto and Lauren…
Lauren cooked up some ramen to go, which was also her favorite food, and fed it to Naruto being that he was immobile, and rolled him over when they were done. She pulled the shirt up so that she could see his back to heal it. "This may feel weird but just chill out; it's the easiest way to heal your back." Lauren said. He nodded and she straddled his lower back, and smoothed her hands over his back in order to find where his back was injured. He blushed but let her continue. Lauren, hand with chakra, jabbed his back in a certain spot and a crack was heard. She continued until his entire spine was a lined. She finished with healing chakra, just to fix anything she missed.
When she was done, she got off and went to her bag so she could sleep. His back felt great. It was amazing what Lauren could do. He sat up easily got in his bag but said, "Wait you haven't healed yourself. Don't you have a giant hole in your hands and something wrong with your back?" She said, "Yeah, for the hands, but that'll heal on its own. As for the chidori, it doesn't work on me." Naruto nodded an ok but still said, "But the hole in your hands looks too big to heal on its own." She sighed and said, "It's not but if it makes you happy than ill heal it." In a couple of minutes she was done and went to sleep.
They started to head back when they were both well rested. They walked slowly since they were in no rush. Lauren made a clone that picked up the crystal covered Sasuke and carried it the way there. They arrived in the village in the evening. They reported their mission a success, and dropped of Sasuke. Naruto trying to be kind asked if he could take her out for ramen, just as thanks for healing and saving him. She said yes and they were off. Being related they, kind of ironically, ordered pork ramen, shouted thanks, and ate like pigs; though Lauren had much better manners. Afterwards, Naruto, trying to be gentlemen-like, walked Lauren home. He found out it was right next to Sakura's. 'I'll tell her the news when I drop Lauren off. Then she'll love me forever, and we could live happily ever after.' Naruto thought with a smile.
On their way Naruto spotted Sakura walking. He shouted, with a smile, "Sakura! Come here I have to tell you exciting news!" She smiled at him and nodded a yes but then noticed the pretty little lady next to him, and got very jealous, thinking that they were together. When they met up Naruto started out with the wrong words, to Sakura, "Sakura, we" pointing to her and him, "got…" Smack! He was struck against the face by Sakura. "Naruto you idiot!" Sakura shouted. She was about to punch him when her fist was caught midair by the girl next to him. Lauren had her eye brows cocked up and said, "Whoa, chill out there! We're not together! Hahaha! Were just brother and sister. He's just being nice and walking me home." She laughed, and Naruto nodded.
Sakura sighed of relief. She asked, "Sorry, heh, so what were you going to say?" Naruto replied, "We got Sasuke back." Sakura's eyes lighted up and she said, "Where is he?" "I'm not sure, ask grandma." Naruto replied simply. She hugged him quickly and started to run towards the Hokage tower as she called out, "I owe you!" Naruto was in shock and sadness, staring at her as she disappeared. Lauren saw the sadness and said, "I ensure you she will come back to you, things change over time. You just have to wait for it." She tried to sound comforting as she gave him a hug. She whispered a goodbye as she entered her apartment. He walked away slowly and sadly. It had started to rain, and he was now drenched and cold. When he got home he went straight to sleep.
As time passed, Sakura and Sasuke started dating. Naruto was crushed. It had gone the opposite way he hoped. Every day he thought 'That should be me holding Sakura's hand, taking her out to dinner, giving her my love.' He knew he may have a chance, but not soon. Hinata had confessed her feelings for Naruto and asked if they could go on a date, and he said yes. He didn't see Sakura a lot, though he knew she was with Sasuke. Even though Naruto loved Hinata, he couldn't help but feel sorry for Sakura. He knew Sasuke was using her, he cheated on her, never loved her. He was also scared she was being used as a sex-slave. He also found out that Lauren got mad that Sakura just ditched Naruto, and smashed a gigantic hole through the wall, connecting her apartment and hers. Sakura was terrified but and offered to connect the rooms and become friends. Lauren agreed and was now on good terms with Sakura.
One day he saw Sakura alone and found out it was a good way to confess the things he knew. He pulled her off to the side and said, "I'm sorry but I have to tell you something. It may hurt but it's the truth. Sasuke's cheating on you. I know because one night when Hinata and I were leaving a restaurant we heard grunts, turned the corner and saw your man having sex with a brunette slut. Honestly I don't think he loves you." She gasped, and Naruto asked a question, "You're not being used as a sex-slave right?" She nodded a no, but then said, "That's not true Sasuke loves me and would never do that! You're lying just because you're jealous." "How am I jealous when I'm in love with Hinata?" She just turned around and walked away. Naruto felt relieved that she wasn't being used, but was sad that she didn't believe him.
Sakura was walking to her boyfriend's house, but couldn't help but think if Naruto was right, and for some strange reason jealousy struck her as she replayed the last part again 'How am I jealous when I'm in love with Hinata?' A week or so had passed and Hinata said that her feelings had changed and was in love with Kiba; so she broke up with him. Naruto felt ok about it but was still sad. He went over to hang out with Lauren.
Meanwhile with Sakura…
"Hey, I have to go to the bathroom, be right back." Sasuke assured Sakura, who nodded an ok. It had been about six minutes and Sasuke still wasn't back. She got up to check on him when she heard loud grunts and a women say, "Faster, harder, Sasuke ohhh!" Sakura started to cry. 'Naruto was right…' Sakura screamed, "You bastard!" and stormed out the door. She ran home, and knocked on the door being that it was locked and she knew Lauren was inside. To her surprise, and luck, Naruto opened the door and said, "Sakura, whoa! Is everything alright? Wait… you found out didn't you?" She nodded yes and threw herself into his arms and sobbed, "I can't believe him! I'm so sorry Naruto for not believing you! I'm so sorry!" He rubbed her back comforting. To his surprise she started to kiss him passionately. He felt the love she wanted to bring. He went back to her bed and laid them down, not stopping the kiss at all. When they separated for breath he said, "Does this mean we're together? But I thought you didn't like me." She smiled kissed his jaw and said, "Things change over time." She kissed him again. He smiled brightly and said, somewhat perverted, "So you wanna, you know…" He wiggled his eyebrows. She laughed and said sure.
"Oh hell no you don't! Um excuse me, but boy you have your own apartment. Use it and make me an aunt there but not when I'm right here the WHOLE TIME." A familiar voice called. He laughed, he had forgotten all about Lauren being right there the whole time. He nodded, picked up Sakura, bridal style, and went to his apartment. She laughed and said, "God he's an idiot, ahaha!"