(Hidden Leaf Village Plains)
"C'mon, you stupid jutsu! Work dammit!" Naruto Uzumaki yelled out in frustration as he attempted to focus his chakra hard enough to finally get the newest ninjutsu he'd been developing to function. "You gotta work. I trained my ass off all day today for you and this is how you repay me?!" he grunted as he sighed in frustration, unclasping his hands and letting them fall down to his sides.
After a few more hours of failure, Naruto finally collapsed into the grassy field, looking up into the sky with tired eyes. "Why doesn't anything ever work for me?" He thought to himself as he inhaled and exhaled roughly on the ground.
"Pervy sage's jutsus always work. Kakashi sensei's jutsus work… and I really hate to admit this but," he continued to think, stopping to growl at the thought of his rival. "… even Sasuke's jutsus work flawlessly… So how come this damned thing won't work for me?" Understanding his defeat for the day, Naruto rose from the ground, deciding to go home and give it another try the next day.
Upon arrival at the Hidden Leaf Village Market Place, he remembered that he needed to pick up a few groceries for his living quarters, as he had ran through his food stuffs for that week. He only seemed to pick up instant ramen packs and pouches of milk, since that's what his already messed up diet consisted of. He then went to the pharmacy of the village, looking for some medicine to help with training or at least to fix the aching in his body.
"30,000 yen for a few pills?! That's outrageous!" He yelled at the clerk, who cowered behind the counter as Naruto through his fit. He stormed out of the pharmacy, bags of groceries in hand as he mumbled incoherently to himself while he walked through the rest of the market place.
"Hey.." A young mysterious man, wearing a bamboo shade hat, said to Naruto as he walked by a fruit stand." Hey kid.."
Naruto looked at the man with a defensive face, but because of his exhaustion it was more of a weary expression that was visible. "You talking to me?" he asked to clarify.
"No, I'm talking to myself," The man retorted, looking around quickly before leaning in closely to Naruto. "Listen, you look tense and tired.. almost like you've been working too hard." He said pulling out a plastic case with three pills in it from the inside pocket of the cloak he wore. "You look like you could use these."
Naruto studied the small container, though not as meticulously as he usually would due to his exhaustion. "Wha-… yawn… What are they?" he asked the young peddler.
"These are what I call 'Lunesta Pills', they're a new kind of muscle relaxer. They're extremely strong though, so take one of these bad boys and you'll sleep like a baby almost as soon as you take it." The man explained, tapping the side of the case in an attempt to further entice Naruto. "Though I must warn you.. it's still in the trial phase and there are some pretty adverse side effects.."
Naruto contemplated the pros and cons of the pills while looking hard at them and the man. Muscle relaxing pills did sound like a dream. But then, it's too coincidental that someone would come along with exactly what Naruto needed, especially someone so shady. Naruto looked the man in his covered eyes, squinting judgmentally."How do I know you're not trying to pull a fast one on me?" Naruto asked.
"Hmm.. I see you're no fool…" The merchant said with a small smile. "Tell you what, to earn your trust as a customer, I'll give ya these, free of charge." he said as he placed the case of pills in Naruto's hand. "Just remember to be careful when taking one. Take it with a glass of water, then get in bed immediately."
After thanking the stranger and making it back to his house, Naruto entered his quarters and set his bags down. His body ached so much that he couldn't even bring himself to take a shower to wash away the filth from the day. He decided that he would just shower in the morning and walked to get a glass of water from his kitchen. Once he disrobed himself and made his way to his bedroom, he swallowed one of the pills from the plastic case, chasing it down with the water. "Whoa.." He said, immediately feeling the effects of the medicine, just as he had been warned. "That guy wasn't kidding when he said fast acting."
Naruto then crawled into his bed, not even making it up to his pillow before falling asleep. While he slept, he dreamt that the ninjutsu he had been trying to perfect earlier that day had actually worked.
When he woke up that next morning, he felt as though something was off yet he couldn't place his finger on it. Maybe he was just still groggy from the muscle relaxer, or it was one of the side effects. Shrugging it off, he struggled out of bed and walked into his bathroom. He grabbed for the hair brush on his sink counter and caught a glimpse of his hand, taking notice that his nails had grown a bit. "Hm, I need to give those a trim." As he brushed his hair, he noted that the brush took longer to go through his blonde locks.
As he put down the brush, his face twisted in confusion. "W-...why does my chest feel heavy?". He thought to himself, simply figuring it was an after effect because of all of the training he did the day before. He disrobed from his pajamas, turning the water to a warm setting for his shower. He stepped inside and let the water hit his skin, feeling ever so relieving as he further relaxed in it. It wasn't until he went to lather up his body that he let out a rather loud scream. He bursted out of the shower, body dripping wet and soapy as he stood in front of the mirror.
"W-What is this..?" he asked himself as he looked his reflection over. His body had been completely transformed into that of a young woman's. The few things he noticed earlier now had clicked in his head and made him start to hyper ventilate a bit. Reluctant enough, he stepped back in the shower and finished showering in utter bewilderment the entire time.
After he stepped out of the shower, dried off and covered his body with the towel, he charged into his bedroom to find the case of pills tangled in his blankets. His eyes scanned the front and back of the case for a label of some sort, but found nothing. To his dismay, he tossed the pills into his pillow and crossed his arms. "Well isn't this just great!" he exclaimed, not noticing that his voice had become lighter in pitch and bass. He covered his mouth in disbelief and walked cautiously back to his bathroom. He stared at himself in the mirror, looking over his apparent curves and figure.
"… wait, what if that dream last night.." He muttered as his hand rose to his tiny chin. "Did I transform into this last night.. that means it actually worked.. THAT MEANS IT ACTUALLY WORKED!" He yelled, raising his arms up triumphantly, but simultaneously dropping his towel to the floor. He squealed as he cowered down, embarrassed and blushing as he grabbed the towel. "Maybe I should go get dressed.."
Once he was dressed and finally left the house, his clothes fit his new body quite loosely. "Stupid new body.. my clothes don't even fit anymore!" he thought to himself as he made his daily rounds in the village like he normally would. As the day carried forward, he noticed that almost every man in the village was looking at him with googly eyes. "Jeez, this is too creepy.." he thought to himself. "I need to hurry up to the training field, to get away from all these eyes and hopefully to fix myself…."
It took him longer than normal,what with trying to get used to his new situation and fending off advances by strange men, but by sundown he found some sanctuary when he reached a lone cliff side high above a clear river. It's clarity seemed to make Naruto forget about his problems for just a while, even putting a smile on the young shinobi's face. But it didn't last long as Naruto heard a very strange noise come from behind a couple of trees. When he turned to look, he saw one of the many men that made a pass at him from earlier running like he had just saw death face-to-face.
"Run! It's not safe here!" the man yelled only to realize that he was too far away from Naruto to be heard. It would turn out that the man was being chased by a bounty hunter. The hunter carried six kunai knives in the gaps in his hands and he flung his left hand forward, releasing the kunai at breakneck speed. Fortunately for the man that he preyed upon, they all missed. However, though they missed their intended target, they kept flying and hit Naruto. The knives were flung so hard, they embedded themselves twice in his left arm and once in his right leg, bringing Naruto down to his knee, clasping his arm in pain.
Blood curdling screams could be heard from Naruto as the blades pierced his flesh. As he attempted to stand back up, he winced in pain and faltered backwards, pushing him closer to falling off the cliff.
"Please, stop!" The scrawny man begged with his life as he began to crawl away in terror."I-I will pay you! I just need more time! Please Raimund, don't add another murder to your already dirty conscious!"
As Raimund, the bounty hunter, began to swing his arm back to get enough momentum to end his target, he revealed a small unnerving smile to the man. "It is too late for pleading, dear brother." he told the man on the ground. Raimund then swung his arm forward with all his might, letting go of the remaining three kunai knives in his grasp and killed his brother with two.
The other one, however, flew straight towards Naruto. Purely out of total reflex, he quickly turned his head to the left, leaving the knife to graze him. In doing so, the blade made contact with him deep enough to cut from Naruto's right temple all the way across his forehead. The shock from Naruto turning to try and dodge the knife turned out to have enough force to push him back off the cliff and fall some 6 meters into the river below. The fall knocked the wind right out of him as he slipped out of consciousness. As his lifeless body floated on the river, a young, light-purple-haired, passing local walking along the road saw Naruto and shouted out to him.
"H-hey! Miss, are you alright?! Miss?! If you're trying to swim and nap at the same time, that's probably not the right way to do it!" She spouted, attempting to make light of the situation at hand. It became clear that it wasn't working.
The local then dove into the river and swam out to grab hold of Naruto's collar, pulling him along while she swam back to shore."Miss, wake up! Wake up!" The young lady shouted as she put her ear to Naruto's chest. Fortunately, she could hear his heart beat, as faint as it was.
In her panicked state, the young local remembered that there was a hospital nearby. But as her luck would have it, there was no way of getting there faster than by carrying Naruto on her back. So, she toughed it out and hiked the three miles it took to get to the hospital which was back in the Hidden Leaf Village whilst Naruto laid across her shoulders in a fireman's carry. Bursting through the doors of the giant clinic, the young lady huffed out as she collapsed to the floor with Naruto laying on her. "Help! This young lady is in need of urgent medical assistance!" She yelled, in between the breaths she took. While doctors and nurses put Naruto's body onto a gurney, Naruto stirred back into consciousness.
"It's going to be alright young lady" One of the EMT said to Naruto, who looked like he was already dead. "Just hang in there."
After an hour in the intensive care unit and being patched up, Naruto was transported to one of the regular hospital rooms where he could rest. One of the doctors came out to the waiting room, finding the local girl that had brought him in. She was told that she could see Naruto and returned to the room with the doctor. In his room was silence, only hearing noises from the heart monitor and breathing machine that Naruto was connected to. His forehead and temple had all been stitched and bandaged, his left arm in a cast and his body laying in an upright position.
"Will she be alright?" The girl asked with concern in her voice.
"Of course," The doctor reassured her. "She'll be fine as long as she gets the rest she needs. Luckily you got her here when you did, I don't think she would have made it otherwise.." As the two turned to leave, Naruto's body began to stir and he started grunting slightly as he woke up a bit, making the doctor and the local girl turn back very quickly and looked at Naruto with a smile.
"She must be awake now." He said, walking back over to the bed. "Miss, my name is doctor Kabuto.. how are you feeling?"
Just before the darkness of his mind took over, Naruto managed to smile a bit and look up at the doctor.
"It worked.. it really really worked.." Naruto said weakly before his head plopped onto the pillow, allowing himself to succumb to the sleep his body craved.
