Everything in my past life seemed far away, like trying to watch a video on a phone from a five foot distance. I could remember it, but it was vague and blurry at best. My first moments in my new life were filled with sharp confusion and debilitating fear. Despite my wails and cries, I was cuddled by my mother as soon as whoever helped to deliver me handed me over. Since my eyesight was horrendous and my hearing wasn't much better, I was left to make leaps in logic. There was another bundle close to me, a blue one, I assumed this to be my twin brother. I myself seemed to be wrapped in pink. My wails calmed and subsided as I was gently hushed, before being passed on to a person with a masculine tone, my father. His blob was a light yellow and something silver on his forehead. I was brought up to be held to his chest and rocked. I fell asleep soon after.
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It took a few weeks to diagnose my hearing as accurate, and that the people around me were just speaking a completely different language. The next few months were layered with practicing syllables with my brother. He was the only social interaction I had outside of my parents. Time passed quickly, in between sleeping and incomprehensible baby talk. I think it was a few weeks later that my eyes cleared up, and I could clearly see my brother. Before, we had clumsily clung to each other, blindly seeking out comfort. But now I could see him. He was blonde, and chubby, and had the bluest eyes ever. Once I processed that my vision was accurate. I promptly rolled over, as that was the only mode of transportation I had mastered, and curled into his side before passing out happily.
Mom came in later, jostling me awake as she picked my brother and I up. She had beautiful, long red hair, and immediately after acknowledging this fact, I latched onto it. The same thing happened with my poor father at the end of the day when he came home from wherever he was. He had blonde hair, and while it wasn't as soft as Mom's, it was still nice to hold onto.
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"Twins, what did I tell you about sneaking cookies?" Mom asked, in a mockingly sweet voice. Naruto and I paused our munching to stare at our mother, who had a dark shadow over her face.
"Not to…" We answered in unison, placing the half-eaten cookies back in the jar and setting it on the counter.
Now that Naruto and I were four we had the ability to walk and run, which meant we also had the skills to try and eat cookies when Mom was busy doing something else. Of course, she always caught us, and we've tried everything short of setting fire to the drapes to divert her attention. One time Naruto feigned being hurt while I tried to hoard the cookies when Mom was taking care of him. It would have worked, had Dad not been in the kitchen doing paperwork. After that fiasco Mom gave us a reason actually be hurt with the training exercises we had to do as punishment.
Mom lunged at us, her hair turning into snakes. Naruto and I split up, I headed for the front door while he aimed for the back. Because Naruto had better evasion skills than I did, she went for him first giving me time to book it out of there. I ran for a few minutes, dodging the evening crowd by taking a back alley, further away from the rush of people. The sun was an hour or two away from setting, giving me some time before I absolutely had to head home. I veered off into a park, which was a safe ten minutes away from my house, to hide out until I felt like Mom's rage had died down.
As I was weaving through the trees, trying to choose a hiding spot, I tripped over something. Catching myself, I turned to see that I had tripped over a boy, my age. He appeared to have been napping at the base of the tree before I stumbled upon him. His hair was pulled into a pony tail, causing his brown hair to spike up. His brown eyes looked at me with an unamused glint.
"Sorry," I apologized. "I'm hiding from my mom. She's angry with me," I told him.
"Me, too. What a drag," he grumbled.
I shyly sat next to him, curious about why he was hiding. When I asked he shrugged, "Mom was nagging me."
I nodded, understandingly. "Mine was angry that Naruto and I were eating cookies. I got away because she went for Naruto first."
"Sounds like mine, except I don't have a sibling to help me get away."
We sat quietly for a few minutes, before all the birds and crickets in the park silenced. I tensed, I knew exactly who had caused that. We looked wide eyed at each other.
"That's my mom," we said in unison.
We paused, feeling the tension in the air grow thicker. "Wanna run?" I suggested.
He nodded, and we were off. As fast as we could go, we booked it in the opposite direction of human life, on the off hope that our mothers were part of that human life as well, and we were getting further away from their wrath. We ran for as long as we could, deep into the training grounds, and past that, even, for good measure. We collapsed into the grass of a tiny clearing, breathing heavily.
"My name's Narumi, Uzumaki Narumi," I wheezed.
"Nara Shikamaru," he sighed, "Man, this blows."
The ending consensus was to wait it out until sunset and then head home. Shikamaru and I settled into the grass to watch the clouds, pointing out which ones vaguely resembled what. It was fun, and the first social interaction I'd truly had outside of formal events and Naruto. Still, it didn't take the edge off of the impending doom at what awaited us at home.
We were just a few minutes away from heading back when a branch snapped eerily in the forest. Freezing, as if that could hide us from our mothers, we laid in wait. Only to have my brother pop out of the foliage.
"Naruto! How'd you find us?" I asked.
His chakra was all over the place, probably from running. He plopped down next to us.
"Because it's where I would have gone, dattebayo," he said, before looking at Shikamaru curiously. "Who's that?"
"Ah, Naruto, this is Shikamaru-kun. Shikamaru-kun, this is my twin brother, Naruto."
"Cool, hey! Mom told me that if you didn't get home by sun down that you wouldn't get dango for a whole month." I felt my mouth drop open in horror. "That's why I came to find you," he amended.
"We'd better get going then," I jumped up quickly before turning to my new friend. "You coming?"
Shikamaru grumbled to himself and got up.
"Alright, let's make this a race."
I nodded along to Naruto's idea.
"It'll get us there faster," was all Shikamaru had to say about it.
We were all cut off by a siren, the one that signaled an infiltration attempt.
"Oh, no, Mom's gonna kill us for sure" I groaned. "We gotta go."
Once again we were interrupted by the distinct sound of a ninja landing clumsily on the ground. There was a loud rustle. "Let go of me!"
"Shut it, kid, your clan's going to pay for my retirement fund," a voice growled lowly, trying not to attract attention.
"My aniki will stop you," the kid's voice threatened.
We huddled behind a tree. "We gotta save him, he's being kidnapped."
"Yeah, dattebayo!" Naruto agreed. We both looked to Shikamaru to see how he felt.
He nodded, "We'll need a plan. Okay, who's the fastest between you two?"
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"Hey, stop right there," I ordered, pointing at the foreign nin holding a dark haired little boy against his will.
"Shut it, squirt, before I silence you for good," the man hissed, scowling heavily behind his black mask.
"My daddy wouldn't like that."
"Yeah? Who's your daddy, little girl?"
I didn't feel so great about admitting who my father was, because Mom and Dad always stressed never to tell anyone, because the people who should know did know. But this was a part of the plan, I just needed to follow through for this to work. So I took a deep breath and stated with all the ignorance of an angry child I could muster, "Namikaze Minato," I tried to smirk, but it felt like a grimace. I just needed to stall for a good three more minutes we were in the clear.
C'mon, Naru, I thought to myself nervously, as the man smiled down at me sadistically. "Really now, and where is he?"
This guy was falling right into Shikamaru's plan. It was almost shocking how well this was going accordingly. Here goes my lying skills. "He's at a meeting with Suna right now, but he'll be here!" I stomped my foot, like Shikamaru told me, for the added childish effect. I need to make him underestimate me so completely, he won't see Shikamaru's trap coming. I ran away, trying to draw him toward the set up while discreetly avoiding the trip wire that was laid out. Once again, the man fell for it, literally. He face planted on the ground while the dark haired boy rolled away. I grabbed him, and began to head for the village, hoping to meet at a halfway point. Shikamaru joined up with us once we were out of the small clearing. The man was fast, though. His speed out matching us easily.
"Scramble," Shikamaru called.
All three of us did so, the boys went right, I went left. The man went after the boy he had originally planned on taking. I took to the trees, hopping from one to the other like I was taught to. I found the boy and Shikamaru cornered into a tree trunk, there was really only one thing I could do, so I jumped.
The ambush was easy, because the man was focused on threatening the boys. My feet landed first, connecting with his head, causing it to jerk to the side as he was thrown off balance and fell to the ground. I landed, slightly unbalanced, but otherwise okay
"Kotaro-kun, what's this? You're letting a bunch of kids beat up on you?" a voice teased.
The man, Kotaro, it would seem, got up from the dirt, stalking toward us. "Just surprised me is all."
Five more people jumped down, foreign nin, judging by the head bands. There were two girls and three boys, all wearing loose, scarf-like masks.
"We've wasted enough time already."
"This was supposed to be in and out, if you've just cost us our ransom I won't forgive you."
"But I found a little surprise on the way, isn't that right, girly?" Kotaro looked at me with a dark gleam in his eyes. He nodded his head towards me, "She's one of the Hokage's brats." I couldn't see under his mask, but I felt like he was smirking.
A familiar silence surrounded us, the kidnappers not seeming to notice. I paled drastically, this could only mean one thing.
"What, are you scared?" One of the ladies mocked in a sickly sweet voice. I nodded. "Don't worry you won't be hurt by us if your daddy pays up… Maybe."
"That's not what I'm scared of," I stated, a chill going down my spine.
That's when she arrived. Mom's red hair was tied up in a ponytail, but she still wore her apron and had a kitchen knife in her hand, the one she used for cutting beef or chicken. Her killing intent permeated the air, luckily not pointed at me. I wasn't too keen on seeing her tear apart these people, no matter how much they deserved it, it was still gross.
The foreign ninja scoffed at her, "What, a stay at home mom is going to stop us?"
A yellow blur stopped right beside us, "My wife isn't the only 'stay-at-home-mom' you have to worry about."
"Dad!" I exclaimed, relief washing over me. It was nice to know our plan worked. "Hey, Shikamaru-kun, this is my dad. Dad, this is a friend I made today. He's the one that came up with the plan and everything," I told him, grinning at Shikamaru.
Dad smiled, "That's nice, Narumi. You can tell me all about it while we let the women do their thing," Dad said, leading me over to some slightly familiar konoha jounin. The two women, stepped up with Mom. That's when it clicked.
"They're their mothers?" I motioned to my new friends.
"Yes, I was planning for you to meet them at your birthday party, but now is good, too."
I purposely ignored the sound of terrified screams. Instead of focusing on the torture my mom was dishing out I grabbed Shikamaru and the boy, and brought them over to the group so they wouldn't watch the ensuing horror. Shikamaru seemed to shake out of his slight daze and went over to a man with scars, who seemed to be his dad.
I turned to my own, "Where's Naruto?"
"Back at the house," Dad looked at the two other men, "We can head over there. Kushina made ramen, and I have a feeling this may take a while."
"Fine by me. Troublesome woman wouldn't let me join in, anyway. Said it was her 'right' as a mother," the scarred man grumbled.
"Mom made ramen?" I immediately held up my arms, so Dad could carry me. "Let's go, let's go!"
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And so we all ended up at our house eating ramen.
"And then," I told Naruto, "we had to split up, so he went for Sasuke-kun," I motioned to Sasuke, "'Because he wanted him first so I went tree hopping, and ambushed the guy while he was talking and stuff. I kicked him right in the head! And then, and then, " I took a deep breath, to prepare myself. "And then five other people jumped from the trees, they were his friends, but they were mean to each other, so maybe they weren't friends. Then Mom showed up. All our moms did, and so that's where they are right now, kicking butt."
I grinned, proud at Naruto's astonished expression. "What? I missed all that? Dang it, you guys got all the fun."
"Next time, I'll be the runner, then," I offered.
"There better not be a next time, dattebane."
Naruto and I glanced at each other before running and glomping Mom. Her hair was slightly ruffled, but besides that there was no inclination that she had just been kicking butt. She hugged us back, before looking up at the other adults.
"Did you eat all the ramen?"
"Well..." Dad trailed off.
"We did, it was really good," Naruto said.
"Yeah, the best! But look, we made new friends."
We dragged her over to introduce her to Shikamaru and Sasuke, who were playing shogi together. They said hello, and Mom seemed to like them. I tugged at Naruto's shirt, to signal that he should be the one to ask.
He grinned, "Hey, can they come to our birthday party?"
And so, that is how Naruto and I made our first friends.
First chapter complete!
