Hey everybody. Just made this to see if my writing is still any good or is it as rusty as I thought it was. I am still working on my other stories. They might all be having a new chapter in about a month. Just wanted to try this I got from a dream out for size. Soooo...here it is. Also, review and tell me which story to update next.
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Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or the various nursery rhymes used in this story. Masashi Kishimoto and Mother Goose own them respectivly...
It was a boring day at the village hidden in the leaves. The missions were all D or C rank, and hardly required the effort or much time to do them, and were given to all the genin in the village. But the Chunin, Jonin, Naruto, and other ninja classes just found ways to quickly waste time and kept to that thing all day long. This was easy for most of the ninja in the village. In fact, a day off from missions was a great treat to all the ninja in the village...except for one boy who just happened to be named Naruto Uzumaki.
"Boy, am I bored." Naruto sighed. "There's nothing to do here. I'm a genin so why won't granny Tsunade send ME on any of the missions. Prob'ly cuz' I'm super strong and it wouldn't take me much effort but still...something is better than nothing."
He walked around the village for a while until he ended up and the ramen shop. As he entered, he noticed his favorite sensei was sitting on one of the stools. He quickly sat down beside him, which caused said sensei to turn around, not noticing Naruto coming in before.
"Iruka sensei, can you buy me a bowl or ramen pleeeeease?" Naruto pleaded. "I'll gladly pay you Tuesday for a ramen bowl today."
"Naruto, you realize its Monday right?" Iruka asked. " That means tomorrow is Tuesday.
Naruto thought that over, then said:
"I'll gladly pay you NEXT Tuesday for a FEW ramen bowls today."
He smiled and nodded at his own logical sense to make it a few ramen bowls. By next week, he should've done a couple missions, right? He thought so.
Iruka smiled and ordered four bowls of ramen. One for him and three for Naruto. Naruto threw all three bowls in his mouth, food and all, much to Iruka's displeasure, and then spit out the empty bowls right into the dishwasher of the store.
"That kid's a damn human garbage disposal!" the ramen stand owner remarked.
"Thanks again Iruka sen-SEI." Naruto cheered as he walked out the ramen shop. Before he could get too far away, however, Iruka called to him.
"Naruto, since you seem to have nothing to do, maybe you could clean out your basement. There are some things I stored down there that are from your childhood. Maybe you could enjoy a trip down memory lane."
Naruto nodded and went home to start on this right away. He didn't remember anything from his childhood so this probably would spark a few memories. When he entered his door to his house, he went in his closet and brought out some gloves, some air freshener, a few garbage bags, and a Swifer mop/duster. Then he ventured down to the door at the bottom of his steps. To be honest, he'd never been down in his basement, so he didn't know what to expect. But he opened the door and...fell down the flight of stairs all the way to the bottom right in front of a box labled "toys". He opened the box after brushing himself off and found a pair of socks situated right on top. He frowned and burrowed deeper in the box.
He pulled out some string, a torn kite, some bubble soap, and other random items. Soon, the box was mostly empty. He looked at the bottom to find an empty ramen cup, filled with ants and roaches which began to swarm up his arm and take refuge in his shirt. Naruto screamed like a little girl and sprinted up stairs to find Iruka about to come down the stairs. But he kept running to the bathroom and slammed the door . Then he jumped in a shower, with his clothes still on.
About an hour later, Naruto and Iruka were back downstairs checking the other boxes(everyone but the toy box) and Naruto suddenly spied a blue box. It wasn't really a box, more like a plastic chest. It was labled "BOOKS" in big bold letters. Naruto examined the box from all sides and finally found out how to open it. He popped the lid off and waved away the faint musky smell emanating from it. Inside was a various assortment of books but only one caught Naruto's eyes. It was called "Mother Goose's Nursery Rhymes for Everyone. There was a tight lock on it and it was large and brass, hardly rusted at all. Naruto groaned at the situation then smirked as a good way to open the book finally ventured into his mind.
He looked around to make sure Iruka wans't watching and when he saw that Iruka had left for more supplies, he then pointed at the keyhole and sent wind chakra into it to slowly turn the lock. He had to be precise, as too much chakra would break the lock and since he wanted to lock it back up he didn't want that to happen. And too little wouldn't budge it all. To top it off, he was poor at chakra control, so it took him 15 agonizing minutes to finally open it.
Naruto opened the book and gasped as a blinding light flashed straight into his face and beams of the light shot up out of his basemeny door except for one, which shot at a corner in his basement. Naruto frowned and flipped through the book and saw that all the pages were blank except for the titles which read "Hey Diddle Diddle", "Jack be Nimble," and "Little Boy Blue".
"So much for a good read." Naruto muttered as he started to dust up the nearby furnace. Suddenly, a slight movement caught his eye and he was instantly crouched over the object with a kunai in hand. The said "object" wimpered and the shinobi realized it was a mouse, but was about 1 foot tall and stood on hind legs. It was naked except for a little shirt which read "Diddle".
"Please don't hurt me kind sir." the mouse, apparently named Diddle moaned. "I'm just trying to get back home."
"Where did you come from?" Naruto asked curiously. "Maybe I can help you out."
The small mouse murmured a thank you and looked around for his house. His eyes locked onto the book.
"That's where." The mouse announced. "I'm pretty sure that's right."
Naruto eyed the book suspiciously. He DID faintly remember multiple beams of light erupting from the book earlier. And one DID land in this exact corner Diddle was in. Maybe...
"Okay, Diddle. Lets see if my hypothesis is correct. Wow, I thought Sakura was wrong about using big words make you seem smarter."
He picked up and opened the book to page one and a flash was seen. Diddle wasn't in the room. Naruto looked in the book to see his mouse friend waving contentedly back up at him. That's when Iruka decided to come back down stairs. He'd seen a flash of light and came down to see his student holding a familiar book...
"He couldn't have..." Iruka said to himself as he raced down to see Naruto looking cheerily at a opened book. That wasn't a good sign. Not good at all. Iruka raced over and snatched the book from the blonde's hands. He quickly skimmed the pages, which wasn't hard to do, even with Naruto protesting all the way. Suddenly, Naruto noticed Iruka's grim face and stopped his complaining.
"Iruka sensei!" he asked urgently. "Is there something the matter with this book? The people flew right off the page!"
"Yes, Naruto I'm afraid there is." the teacher said. "This book was found about a few years back by the third Hokage. He-"
"Hold on, sensei!" Naruto interrupted. "I'm going to get some popcorn for the story."
Iruka smacked his head and waited impatiently as Naruto sprinted on, tripped on, fell back down, and walked back up with caution the stairs. Then he had to wait for the shinobi to go BUY some popcorn, then change the bulb in his microwave and cook the popcorn. It took about 20 minutes, but that was a long time to wait in a basement for someone. Finally, Naruto skipped downstairs...and tripped wasting his bowl over the railing. Iruka quickly snatched up the bowl and caught all pieces of the buttery snack as Naruto watched intently, and clapped afterwards.
"Okay, Naruto. Is that all you have to do?"
Naruto nodded with satisfaction as he munched.
" Like I was saying," Iruka started again. "This book was found about a few years back by the third Hokage. He intrusted it to me to take it somewhere safe. But unfortunatly, this was the day I promised you we would clean up. Naturally, I wanted to please everybody. So I decided to drop by and help you out then go on my way. As we were putting away the books, there was on big heavy book full of childrens stories that I used both hands to carry, so I had to put the other book down. When I came back, it was gone. It seems you probably put it in your box and never checked in all these years. I went to tell the Hokage the bad news and he explained to me the book contained three nursery rhymes made by mother goose inside it. If the book was forced open, it would unleash all the characters from the book. It wasn't really that dangerous, rather dangerously annoying. We never saw the book again though, until now."
Naruto grinned and threw his empty popcorn bowl(wow he eats fast) into a dishwasher that magically appeared in his basement.
"That just mean I'll have to find the characters then. Who do you think this Diddle person is Iruka sensei?"
Iruka made like a v under his chin with his thumb and index finger and thought. Suddenly, he had it. A light bulb came over his head...from the ceiling. It crashed over his head and knocked him unconcious.
"Iruka sensei, are you okay?" Naruto gasped. He used his one thousand years of death technique and when it didn't seem to work, he hatched his own plan.
"I'll ask Sakura and Sasuke to help me!" Naruto exclaimed in a moment of smartness. "They'll know the answer to the problem."
So Naruto went upstairs and got and empty backpack. He put the book in it as well as some snack(you never know) some water, a kunai launcher, and those pair of socks from the basement. They really WERE his favorite toy. He put on some Sherlock Holmes clothing he got from Wal-Mart and blew a pipe filled with bubbles. Then he went on his way to Sakura's house, since it was the closest. Right when he approached her door, he heard a horrible violin like playing from inside. He loudly knocked on the door and when no one answered, he came in and saw a weird sight. On Sakura's sofa sat a cat playing a violin. Sakura herself was crouching behind a table holding her ears yelling "PLEASE MAKE IT STOP!" Naruto sweat dropped and tackled the cat. It meowed in protest and scratched Naruto's face with full vigor. Naruto shrieked and jumped backwards beside Sakura, which cause him to notice the claw mark across her face too.
"Oh Naruto, you came to help me!" the pink haired kunoichi screamed. "That cat has been playing his fiddle all day long to my disdain."(Sakura and the big words).
Suddenly, it clicked in Naruto's head. Hey Diddle DIDDLE, the CAT AND THE FIDDLE. That made perfect sense. So he must be listening to Hey, Diddle Diddle. So he reached in his pack and retrieved the book. A flash of light later and the annoying cat was gone. Sakura looked up at Naruto standing up holding a book triumphantly in his hands.
"Did I miss something?" she asked his as she stood up and brushed herself off. "What did you just do? Where is the cat? Why do you have a book?"
"I'll explain when we get Sasuke and a cow, now come on and lets get to your roof."
Sakura was about to complain and ask for a better explaination but he blonde friend was already making a beeline for her stairs. She bounded after him. When they got to the roof of her house Sakura watched as Naruto pulled out the kunai launcher, popped on a scope and took aim. Sakura began to question his motives for doing so be he quickly shushed her. The pinkette sighed and pulled up a chair to watch. Eventually, it became dark outside. The moon was out and faint stars were beginning to glow. Sakura yawned and glanced at her watch to see it'd been three hours since she'd came out. She must've fallen asleep. She feared that Naruto was gone and had already recruited Sasuke and they went to do whatever he was doing themselves when she spotted the boy fast asleep on the ground. She chuckled and was about to go get some food when she heard a loud "MOOOOO!" She looked up at the sky to see a sight that was only in fiction. A cow was flying and headed straight for...the...moon...? She was about to awaken Naruto when she looked to her side and saw the blonde already on his feet aiming at the poor cow.
"Naruto, why are you about to shoot down a innocent cow?" she asked frantically.
"Well technically its not supposed to be here so I'm taking it back to its own world." Naruto answered with a grin. "All will be answered as soon as I shoot it down. Don't worry. It should only startle it enough where it falls and it won't pierce the hide...probably."
Naruto took aim once more and a whish was heard as a single kunai sailed through the air and stabbed the cow in the udder. It mooed in anguish. Sakura glared at Naruto, who sheepishly grinned in response. A loud crash was heard as the cow broke through a roof of a familiar house. Naruto and Sakura jumped off the roof and took off towards the crash site.
Sasuke was having weird day. First, he'd seen a boy in green tights jumping running around placing a candle stick all over the place and jumping over it. It made everybody outside retreat slowly to there houses. Then, as he came back in his house, a "mooo" echoed through the village. Right when he was about to walk outside to see what it was, a cow cam crashing clean through his roof. It crushed his favorite recliner! Oh the humility of it all. There could be only one person responsible for stupidity and strangeness of this magnitude and this person was...well actually he just jumped through the hole in the roof. Sasuke glared pointedly at the blonde.
"What did you do now dobe?" he asked irritably.
"Nothin'..." Naruto answered slyly.
"There's a cow on my recliner and a hole in my freaking roof!" the Uchiha yelled. "How is that nothing?"
"Well just because something weird and offputting happened doesn't means I did it...eh I guess it does kinda mean...anyways, let me tell you the story of how this whole thing came to be. "
So Naruto told the story of how the nursery rhymes came to life, how Iruka was still in the basement, about the socks. After he was finished with his story, his two friends looked at him with shock, confusion, and irritation. But mainly irritation. Sakura was the first to speak up.
"If you hadn't been so stupid I wouldn't have to listen to a cat playing a horrible version of Mozart for an hour!" she exclaimed.
"And I'd still have a roof in my newly refurbished house!" Sasuke said annoyed.
"Who refurbishes a roof?" Naruto asked. "I didn't even know that was possible."
"I doesn't matter, it fell on my furniture and is now proceeding to squish it. And I think its bleeding from its udder."
"Sorry about that. My aim was a little off." Naruto apoligized scratching his head."
"Whatever." Sakura sighed. "Let's just find the rest of these nursery rhymes and get out of here."
"Well, after the cow jumps over the moon," Naruto began. "A little dog laughs at it and a dish runs away with spoon."
Suddenly, a high pitched scream was heard from across the street. Naruto sucked the cow in his book and the three shinobi ran outside to see Hinata running out of the Hyuga mansion followed by a laughing dog. Hinata looked backwards to see if the dog was still there and tripped over a rock. Naruto raced over and jumped towards the dog and opened the book mid-flight. The dog stopped laughing just enough to whimper as he was whisked back into the book. He helped Hinata up right as Sasuke and Sakura walked over.
"N-Naruto?" Hinata stammered in shock. "Why w-was th-that dog l-l-laughing at me? An-and wh-wh-what did you just d-do?"
So Naruto explained the whole situation over again to Hinata with a little irritation on having to do it again. When he finished, Hinata nodded.
"So, th-that means you migh-might need a li-little more help to c-catch them all. If you w-want, I could help you find the d-dish and the s-sp-spoon."
"So it is settled." Sakura announced. "Naruto, you and Hinata go look for the dish and spoon, then start on looking for the things from "Jack be Nimble". Me and Sasuke'll handle "Little Boy Blue."
"Woah woah woah." The raven haired boy said. "I never agreed to go looking for any of this stuff."
Sakura smirked. "Okay but in "Little Boy Blue" the boy blows his horn awfully loud. I wouldn't want to ruin your beauty sleep. Your hair is your most dominant feature."
Sasuke flipped her hair and "hmp'ed" and reluctantly followed his intellegent pink friend down the street. Naruto then looked at Hinata
"Alright, lets go find some silverware!"
The two walked down the opposite road of Sasuke and Sakura, hoping to hear any news of walking china or spoons. They heard plenty complaints of little boys and horns and sheep and cows with corn but ignored it considering it WAS Sakura's idea to handle that issue. Eventually, as they neared Shikamaru's house they heard a scream. It wasn't a sream about anything in particular so the pair rushed inside. Sure enough, Shikamaru's mom was backing away from a dish and spoon who were making their way for the door. Naruto dived for them, the socks at the ready to trap the devils, but missed completly. Hinata tried the same but also missed. The dish and spoon almost made it to the door when they stopped cold.
"Looks like you could use my help with the issue." a familiar voice said.
"Shikamaru, right on time!" Naruto said standing up and brushing himself off.
"So, what's with the walking dinner tools?" Shikamaru asked.
Naruto ignored his question for the moment and pulled out the book, sucking the dish and spoon back into their respective story. Suddenly, the book glowed. The pages in the book now showed the story, complete with words and the pictures. Naruto smiled.
"One down, two more to go. I hope Sasuke and Sakura hold up their end of the deal."
"You still didn't answer my question." Shikamaru asked irritably. "What did you just do? Why are dishes and spoon walking around?"
So Naruto explained the whole situation to Shikamaru, this time shortening the version to save time. Shikamaru decided to help them catch the other story book character. Considering it was "Jack be Nimble", all there was to find was Jack, and his candle stick which he would have. So the three went on their way looking for him, Naruto forgeting all about his socks. As they came to the village gate, Naruto huffed.
"How hard can it be to find and idiot jumping over a candle?" he fretted. "We've been walking for about an hour and still no sign of him!"
He pulled out a snack out his bag and the book fell out too. Just as he was about to pick it up, a cat jumped past Naruto, grabbed the book, and ran off down the road. Naruto stared back, dumbstrucked. Then he came out of shock and ran after it.
"Get that book!" Naruto yelled as he and the others ran through bushes and over buildings chasing that cat. The cat ran into a big building and Shikamaru was about to follow, but Hinata held him back. She shook her head and held uo three fingers, and started to count down, 3, 2, 1.
"Ahhhhhhh!" Naruto screamed as he scrambled out of the building, his face red. The cat was in front of him, scorched from the water.
"Stay out of the women's hot springs Naruto!" Ino shrieked as she chased him down the road in only a towel. Naruto chased the cat through a mess of dead trees, and Ino chased Naruto, Suddenly, a rip was heard. Naruto turned around to see Ino's towl was hanging on a branch and Ino was...well...you get the picture. Ino face turned red with anger.
"I'M GOING TO KILL YOU NARUTO UZUMAKI!" She bellowed.
Naruto gulped and got a burst of adrenaline, running and grabbing the cat, retrieving the book and throwing said cat over his shoulder into Ino's face. Ino stumbled and ran blindly into a clothing store, spinning around into all the clothing racks until the cat flew off into an empty dressing room. Ino walked out the store and looked down to see she was fully clothed in her usual outfit. She didn't have time to marvel or look confused because she spotted Naruto, Shikamaru, and Hinata walking down the street past Ichiraku Ramen. Still angry for earlier, she stormed over and slammed Naruto into the wall. Naruto gulped.
"Oh, you are SO dead." Shikamaru said nervously.
"I jump the candle!" a nearby voice exclaimed. Ino let Naruto go and they all looked around the corner to see a green tighted boy jumping a candle stick. It could've been Lee if it wasn't for the orange hair. Naruto let out a gasp. It was Jack the candle stick jumper...person.
"IT'S HIM! GET HIM!" he exclaimed as he ran fowards. Jack turned towards him with a evil glint in his eye. He pressed a button on his candle stick and it turned into a flaming orange sword. Naruto skidded to a halt right in front of the sword. He ducked just as Jack swung it and jumped back as that sword was thrust down at his head.
"Wow." Hinata said startled. "That w-wasn't in th-the book."
Shikamaru nodded and was about to help Naruto when Ino jumped fowards and gave Jack a bouquet of flowers.
"Excuse me mister Jack." Ino said gushing. "I've always been a fan of your story. Please take these flowers as a token of my fangirlism."
Jack smiled and took the flowers. Suddenly, he tensed up and sniffed.
"Is something burning?" he asked. Then he noticed the fuse on the end of the flower bouquet. "Oh crap."
KABOOM!
As the smoke cleared, Naruto readied the book but as soon as he was about to use it after he caught a glimpse of Jack, an extended hand came out and took the book. The smoke cleared completely to see that Jack's candle had now transformed into a giant robot suit. The nursery rhyme character smirked.
"And now it looks as if the tables have turned." he said as he rasied his giant fist above the four.
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With Sasuke and Sakura
"What are we supposed to be looking for exactly?" Sasuke asked curiously. He hadn't had time for nursery rhymes when he was a kid. He was too busy training to become a great Uchiha.
"Well, according to the rhyme, we need to find a little boy dressed in blue with horn, some sheep, some cows with corn, and a haystack." Sakura explained.
"Seems easy enough but if Naruto has the book, what do we do until then?" the Uchiha wondered aloud.
"Well, we transform this log into a animal pen." Sakura answered. "Then we just herd all the animals to it. And we carry all the hay to it as well as lure the boy to the haystack after we moved it so he'll go to sleep."
Sasuke nodded, impressed with her quick thinking in the situation. They ventured in the market, looking for a corn stall. Maybe cows came here? Their assumption was proved correct when they heard a yell coming from the "Fresh Produce" section. The two teens sprinted to the area to see cows eating all the corn. They had to do something befor it was all gone. Sakura ran over and plucked two ears of juicy, plump, ripe corn out a stand and waved it in front of each cow, who in turn followed her. She backed away slowly out of the market. The pinky nodded to Sasuke to make the pen and open the door. Sakura threw the corn in and jumped as a stampede occured for the corn. Sasuke pulled out a bag of corn he'd bought and tossed it in the pen to keep the cows busy. Then he closed the pen and locked it and put the key in his pocket.
"And that's how we do it 'n K'noha ya'll!" Sasuke said with a Southern accent.
Sakura stared at him then shook her head. She pulled out a list containing the things they needed and checked off cows.
"Okay, now we find the sheep." she said.
"That shouldn't be that difficult." Sasuke replied. "I guess it couldn't be that hard to find a few balls of fluff.
"Uh...Sasuke?" Sakura asked poking him. "We're at the market correct?"
"Yep." he answered.
"So, doesn't that mean there's a COTTON sale here? Sheep make cotton Sasuke."
"So? We can turn in shaved sheep." Sasuke said with a smirk.
"NO, Sasuke. The point is we won't know if they are sheep because they look like the cotton."
"Big ass-oh excuse my french-piles of sheep wool will NOT be bigger than the cotton."
"I guess you are right Sasuke. Let's check there anyway."
So the two young ninja wandered their way into the cotton part of the market. Sasuke gaped. Sakura's eyes popped. Big bunches of cotton lay in heaps around the whole area. They would need some help for this. Then, Sakura spotted Lee and Tenten. She pointed them out to Sasuke and they walked over to them.
"Hey, Lee!" Sakura yelled over the bustiling crowd. "Tenten!"
"Sakura!" Lee exclaimed with delight. "How are you?"
"What are you two doing here?" Sakura asked.
"This is where Lee and Guy Sensei buy their cotton." Tenten explained. "For their "special" outfits."
"It's this special cotton that comes from the sheep in the lightning country." Lee said as he picked up a big bale of cotton. The cotton started to move, causing Lee to toss it on the ground. It "Baaaa'd" at Lee and walked slowly away. Sakura blinked. Instantly, they noticed sheep everywhere; about 7 in all. Quickly, Sakura explained the story to Lee and Tenten.
"So, now that you know the story," Sakura started. "lets catch some sheep!"
Sasuke summoned the pen to their location and led the first sheep there. He then threw some more corn from his bag as well as put in some bowls of water. Sakura led the first sheep into the pen. Lee caught two sheep who were about to be stolen by two orphans. He then bought a bale of cotton for the orphans, showing off his "Nice Guy" smile to them, before taking them to the pen. Tenten pointed a pair of sharp shears at three sheep. They were startled and suprised by the razor so much, Tenten backed them up straight into the pen. Sasuke slammed the door and counted the sheep.
"One, two three..." he counted. "Six in all. Only one missing."
Suddenly, a suprised "BAAAAAAA!" rang out through the market. The four young ninja turned around to see a shaved sheep standing in front of a big stand. Sakura rushed over to collect the sheep, and sent a sharp glare in the man's direction who'd sheared it. Then she tossed it in the pen and pulled her list out.
"Well, now all there is to find is the boy and the haystack." she informed. "I'm pretty positive he'd be wherever the haystack is."
So the four shinobi jumped off, not going in any general direction, looking for a haystack.
-
With Naruto's group
Shikamaru, being the only person not standing still on shock and fear, used his Shadow Possesion to posses the others and jumped back, but not before Naruto got smashed. His backpack flew up, along with his black headband(for an unknown reason). The others had no time to mourn though, as Jack spent no time to follow up with a smashing kick which caused them all to stumble back. Then he swiped his arm at Ino causing her to fly back into a building. However, this caused the book to fly too. It landed on the ground beside Ino. Shikamaru rushed to her side, and noticed her head was brusied in a nasty shade of purple and blue. He was so worked up, the two were almost smashed by Jack's fist coming towards them, but Hinata used her eight trigrams 64 palms guard to protect them.
"I'll hold him off!" Hinata managed to strain out. "Go find Sasuke and Sakura. They'll know how to help!"
So Shikamaru gently laid Ino down away from the rubble and the fight, grabbed Naruto's backpack and the book, and ran off to find the other two. Suddenly, the lazy genius noticed a great big haystack. This unusual sight made him stop and go to investigate the oddity. He gasped when he noticed two legs notched out from the front of the haystack. Panicked, he began to dig the person out. Suddenly, the hay rustled causing Shikamaru to step back. A little boy with blue overalls lazily stretched in the hay. He yawned and rubbed his eyes. He then spotted Shikamaru and sprouted a big grin.
"I'm Little Boy Blue!" he said pointing at himself. "My friends call me Blue. What's your name?"
Shikamaru stared at the boy. Then, without a second thought, reached in Naruto's pack and pulled out the book. Blue looked genuinly confused and Shikamaru almost felt sorry for him when he sucked in the boy-hay and all- and continued to search for Sasuke and Sakura. He rushed so fast, he hardly noticed four ninja speed past him. He searched high low, far and wide. But he still found hide nor tail of them.
-
With Sasuke and Sakura
Sasuke was truly ticked off. Not only was his feet hurting for his seemingly endless search for some stupid farm animals, but no way in hell did he think it'd be this hard to find a haystack. I mean c'mon. It'd be the only one in Konoha. He'd even thought about asking Shikamaru, who'd past by them in a hurry. He looked so preoccupied, Sasuke hadn't wanted to bother him. Suddenly, a crash sounded somewhere near the ramen stand. Lee, who'd been suprisingly quiet this whole time, suddenly perked up.
"A crash means there is trouble." he announced. "We must go see the cause of this crash. We may be glad we did."
Sasuke figured they didn't have time for these kinds of distractions, but followed anyway when Lee sprung away toward the crash site, followed by Sakura and Tenten. As they neared the area, it was clear a battle had been waged here. Nearby buildings had craters embedded into them and under one of them was the unconcious, badly battered body of...Ino. Sakura ran over to her bruised friend.
"Ino!" she screamed as she shook her comrade. Sasuke and the other looked away, knowing this was one of those moments where two people need to be left alone.
"Tenten, you stay with Sakura." Sasuke orded. "Me and Lee'll check out around to see if anyone else is hurt.
Tenten nodded as the two boys flashed away. She watched as Sakura healed Ino's wounds and she started to stir. Tenten smiled that Ino was recovering, but looked out where the other two had dissapeared to.
"I hope they don't get this hurt." Tenten thought.
Meanwhile, Sasuke and Lee ran through the rubble, suprised that Ichiraku was still standing even though nothing else was. Then Sasuke noticed it. It was beneath all the rubble, but the black cloth stood out under the gray debris, and the metal plate glinted in the sun. Sasuke gingerly lifted it up and clenched his fist. For in his hand was Naruto's headband. Lee looked over a saw the headband, and his eyes burned with a hot passion.
"Let's not let Naruto's sacrifice go to waste!" he bellowed. "And maybe he's still fighting, he just dropped his headband because it got in the way."
Sasuke nodded but wasn't so sure. Naruto didn't like to fight without his headband. He remembered how in the Final Valley, how Naruto didn't want to fight him before he put on his headband. Naruto didn't seem like one to get rid of it to aid in a battle. But he didn't say any of this out loud, for Lee's sake, and followed the blue beast further towards the source of the rubble.
-
With Hinata
Hinata was fighting a losing battle. She'd hoped Shikamaru would be back by now, because her chakra was getting weak. Sooner or later she might collapse from chakra exhaustion. But she had to hold out. That thing had probably killed Naruto, one of her best friends. She wasn't going to let him get off that easy.
"Eight trigrams 128 palms guard!" she cried out as she put all her strength into this attack. It was so powerful, a crash sounded that could probably be heard throught the village(hint hint) and she hoped it was too. Atleast somebody might hear her and come help her. When the smoke from the crash cleared, Jack was still standing, smirking even more now. Hinata collapsed, now sure all o her chakra was gone.
I hope I at least bought Shikamaru enough time to find the others. She thought as her vision turned to blackness. But before she blacked out, she heard the faint, familiar shout that sounded to her like, "R...en...an!"
-
With Naruto
Naruto hadn't felt pain like this since...well since yesterday when Sakura smashed him through the third story window of her house after he'd laughed at her small bra size but...well this was a close second. He burrowed into the ground at a fast rate, but slowed it down by sending chakra from every part in his body. Now, he'd stopped burrowing in the ground. Since he was surrounded by chakra, he could feel the chakra of others. He noticed a familiar chakra get significantly stronger, then get weaker, almost fading from his radar. He focused on that one. Concentrating and rotating his chakra into a ball like form and into his hand, he shot up out the ground. Rasengan in his hand, he plowed straight through Jack's suit.
"RASENGAN!" Naruto yelled as he passed through solid steel. He could also feel himself hit Jack himself, and shoot the tyrant fiction character sailing in the sky. As Jack was falling down, Naruto turned to look down at the person who's chakra had diminished so quickly. It was Hinata's. Naruto's eyes got wide. He had to get her to a hospital quickly. Suddenly, Jack kicked Naruto in the face. Naruto grunted, then punched Jack in the stomach. Jack reeled around and caught his candlestick, which had turned back after it had been destroyed as a robot. Jack pressed a button on the candle, making it long, sharper, and blue. Naruto turned around, going for Hinata again. That's when he felt a sharp pang in his chest. He looked down to see the point of a sword sticking out of him.
"No cool maaaan." he slurred. "Thaaas cheeetin'. He murmured as he collapsed in a crumpled heap over Hinata at Jack's feet.
"And now to finish the job." Jack sneered as he lifted his blue ice sword above Naruto and Hinata. When all of a sudden, he heard a loud and annoying screech.
"HOW DARE YOU ATTACK SOMEONE FROM BEHIND!" a loud voice yelled. "THAT IS NOT YOUTHFULL!"
Jack turned just in time to see a green clad teen kick him in the jaw. Jack probably wasn't glad he turned around now. Lee(you all knew who it was) began a brutal onslaught on Jack and finished by kicking him in his "male parts". Jack doubled over in pain. Lee flipped back and turned to Sasuke, who'd just gotten there. Lee was in his nice guy pose.
"Finish the job, Sasuke."
"Right." the Uchiha made one of those one handed Chidori thingies(you know the ones he uses now in Shippuden) and stabbed Jack in the chest. Jack coughed and fell over, his sword transforming back into a candle stick. Sasuke sighed. He looked down at the unconcious Naruto to get the book but noticed the pack was gone. Sasuke was about to cry out in rage when Shikamaru suddenly appeared at his side.
"Looks like I was right to come back." he said smugly. "Here's the book. Capture him before he wakes up."
Sasuke nodded and opened the book. A bright light flashed as Jack dissipated into the light. The book lit up and the story of Jack be Nimble was filled in completly with words. Sasuke then summoned his pen and sucked it in too, and was about to protest about not finding a haystack when the whole book suddenly flashed and Little Boy Blue was filled in too.
"When did you...oh!" Sasuke exclaimed. He remembered when Shikamaru had been hurrying. Perhaps he'd found a haystack on his way and he knew what he was doing.
"By the way," Tenten started. "Why did Jack attack you guys in the first place Shikamaru?"
"Well, I guess this one was smart enough to notice we were sending him back to the book." Shika answered. "He seemed to like this world, with all the different candle jumping positions it provided."
"Well then." Sakura sighed. "Let's go take these two back to Iruka sensei and see what to do next."
-
Later that day
All eight of the ninja had recovered, thanks to Sakura and had taken the book down to Iruka in the basement. Happy that the book was filled in again, Iruka locked it up tight and told everyone to wait there while he delivered the book to Tsunade. Afterwards, he treated them all to ramen for a job well done.
"I'f fo grad Icwerakwu din bwek don!" Naruto announced as he was slurping some ramen.
"Chew, then talk Naruto." Sakura scolded him.
Naruto swallowed and eagerly continued. "I said I'm glad Ichiraku didn't break down. It was kinda odd it was the only building in this area that didn't"
Sakura shrugged. "Well maybe Hinata was leading Jack away just so your favorite ramen shop didn't get destroyed."
Hinata blushed. "Well, N-Naruto has to e-eat some-somewhere."
"Thanks Hinata-CHAN!" he said hugging her. "You are the best."
Hinata's face got red and she fainted.
"HINATA!" Naruto shrieked while everyone else laughed. Naruto would never understand Hinata.
"What I want to know is this." Sasuke said to Shikamaru. "If you had the book and Hinata was holding Jack off, how come you didn't just suck him in?"
Shikamru looked stunned. His eyes grew wide. Then he smirked. "If I did that, then Lee would've missed all the fun."
"You didn't even know Lee was there!"
Iruka sighed as his students bickered. "It's a good thing you didn't open this other book Tsunade just entrusted me, Naruto." Iruka said. "If its opened, it'd release a giant fun house over this entire are-HEY NARUTO WHAT THE HECK ARE YOU DOING?"
Everyone looked at Naruto, who was reading a book with an open lock on it. He looked up sheepishly.
"Narutoooo." Everyone groaned.
"I didn't know and I was bored." he said with a frown.
"Oh nooo!" Sakura screamed Sakura.
"Here we go again!" screamed Sasuke. as a black ball of energy engulfed the whole ramen stand.
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