Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto or any of the characters.
Summary: The sky was tangerine, like their beginning friendship... "Why don't you run along to your mother or something?" "I don't have a mother.." The winds of change are coming...NARUTO AND OC FRIENDSHIP.
Author's Note: Ok. This time I'm trying to make a serious fan fiction, multi-chapter. But it's sooooo hard. ;(
I have never made a project like this before, so wish me luck.
Hope you like it.
Orange Chicken and Ramen
A Fan Fiction By ReignBeau54
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Chapter One: Genesis
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"And the days went by like paper in the wind. Everything changed, then changed again. It's hard to find a friend. It's hard to find a friend."
-Tom Petty
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Indian summers in Konoha was wistful and beautiful. Warn breezes whisked green leaves to and fro, their dance enticing the other woodland creature to join in the reverie.
"And...got it."
A picture was quickly snapped, and the girl holding the camera adjusted her glasses and lept off the branch with ease.
Watanabe Ren loved beautiful things, because she believed she was not beautiful.
Her wide rimmed eyeglasses were large, and prominent freckles lined her arms and face. She blew a lock of apricot hair from her face, and walked slowly and deliberately to the pond in front of her. Leaning down, she looked at her reflection.
"Hey Freck-Face." She swallowed and walked back into training ground 6, where she would then follow the long winding roads and alley to her spot.
While walking she pulled out a wrench and a stylus from her fanny pack and her broken goggles from her vest pocket.
Stupid Ryo and Kyo...stupid! STUPID!
She laughed at her angry thoughts, because she would never say them out loud. She was the one who stayed in her place. The one who conformed to society.
She hated conforming. Thus, she hated herself.
Ren hated herself as much as she loved her inventions.
Since she was old enough to hold a wrench she has been tinkering with gadgets in her grandfather's workshop. Surmise (the name of the shop that her grandfather owned) was known for its ability to take anything broken and make it new and improved again. In bigger cities, fixing a toaster was not a glamorous job. In Konoha, a relatively small community known for its ninja more than its innovations, a mechanic and engineer was necessary.
Ren thought that her grandfather should not have retired from the shinobi life only to fix incompetent people's washing machines.
Of course, she did not say that out loud.
She meandered through the crowd, not looking ahead of her. When Ren set to doing something, like fixing her mangled goggles, you could not stop her for nothing.
A blur hit her hard. She fell to her ground clumsily. Her goggles rolled over to the path of a moving wagon. The crack heard was small, but it was sickening and deafening in her ears. A old lady helped her up. She smiled politely and thanked her, even though that same woman would not return the ball that fell in her yard to Kaede-san. She cried for days. Baby.
Looking back sharply, she saw a yellow and orange blur running with paint buckets.
Stupid.
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Effectively losing the two chuunin following him, Naruto laughed out loud at what his newest prank led to. He used special paint this time, so that Hokage Mountain would be rainbow colored for a while.
Like he cares if Iruka-sensei yells at him or Hokage-jiji stares disappointedly. The villagers hate and ignore him, so he has to make himself known NO MATTER WHAT.
His stomach growled loudly. He frowned, and went across the street to a little grocery named Fuji's Delights.
Going in he went with the same hostile stares and whispers.
Mothers held their children a little closer to their person.
Old gossipy woman looked with squinted eyes oozing with hatred.
One man even had the gall to spit at him, though the boy narrowly dodged the disgusting phlegm.
Naruto was used to this kind of treatment, so he went right on to the front of the counter and put his shopping list down. It was but the basic essentials: milk, eggs, bread, and ramen. He rang the small bell located on the tabletop.
A stocky man, bowlegged and with a brow that looked like it was carved onto his face like sculpture came up. He took the list, not acknowledging Naruto, and started to fill the orders.
"Excuse me, sir? I have a list of things here." a young woman with a fashionable hat asked. The cashier immediately put Naruto's list down and smiled at the woman.
"Coming up, madam."
Naruto stomach grew louder, and he peeped "But sir--"
The owner of the establishment spun around, eyes squinted.
"If you don't want my service, then leave you piece of filth!"
The woman he was currently attending to looked down at the blond, nose in the air, and sniffed.
A rumbling of voices soon filled the grocery, agreeing animately with the bowlegged owner. The same man who tried to spit at him cried out "Get the demon brat out of here!" with a crazed look in his eyes.
The crowd cheered, and the owner picked up the now struggling Naruto. The spiting man opened the door, and the owner threw Naruto out into the busy street.
"And stay out, demon!" Fuji said, closing the door behind him.
Naruto sighed, dusting himself off. He stuck his tongue out toward the door, and headed down the street.
"I won't let them fall this time," Naruto said, wishing the tears away.
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Ren glides past the throngs of people, spinning not so gracefully on her roller sandals, invention #5.
Seeing a melon peddler in her path, she bends to her footwear once more and press the pink button on her sandals; the spring mechanism.
Jumping up, she goes right over the man and his cart, peddler looking up at her with a white face. She ignores him and leaps away.
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Naruto sees a ball roll past his feet, and picks it up. The panic stricken kids look as he runs toward them, blue eyes shining.
"Hey guys, can I play with you?"
"No way!" they cry together, the biggest snatching the ball from Naruto and sticking his tongue out at him. They all run away, laughing and continuing their game. Naruto frowns, and continues on his way.
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Ren merely looked at the blond kid swinging.
"Hey kid. Get off. This is my swing."
The boy, turns suddenly, looking at the person that said that. Instead of seeing another angry looking adult, he sees a taller girl looking down at him with a scowl.
Naruto was afraid inside. She had the same face as those people in the store. Demon hater.
"Maa, I don't wanna!"
He did not show it though.
Ren kicked him off the swing, Naruto landing with a thud on her right. She plopped down on and started swinging again.
"Leave," she said.
Ren knew that he was just a kid, but if the kids at the academy did it to her then she can do it too, right?
Naruto looked down at the ground. Saltwater was slowly rolling down his cheek, stopping right before it falls.
Ren looked back up and saw that blond kid just sitting there. Why won't he run away? Like she did.
"Jeez, small fry, why don't you run along to your mother or something?" Ren said, waving him away. Just leave already, god.
Silence filled the clearing. The trees branches swayed quietly. "I don't have a mom."
Ren looked at him confusedly, then with indignation. "Ok...then what about your dad?"
Naruto shakes his head, sniffing a little. He refused to cry in front of this rude girl.
"Aunt, uncle?" Ren asked, somewhat subdued from her first statement.
Naruto puts his head down farther than before. In a small whisper, he saids "I have nobody."
The girl's eyes widened, as the information given to her sunk into her head. Her heart just fell into her stomach. She breathed harder, looking at this crying boy. She was becoming like them. Like THEM.
NO!
"I'm sorry."
Ren bursted this out, and she gasped that something so emotional came from her mouth. Who was this kid making her do these weird things?
"You can stay on the swing, I'll sit down here." Ren clears a space beside the tree. She pulls out an orange from her tote bag and proceeds to peel it systematically.
"What's your name, kid?" Ren asks, busy with her work.
"Naruto, Uzumaki Naruto." he replies, looking at the orange slowly being exposed from its skin.
"Hmm...Watanabe Ren. Do you like music?" Ren looked at him from the corner of her eye.
Naruto sniffed loudly, then said "Yeah. I guess."
Ren took out a small radio and a plaid red handkerchief. She quickly walked to Naruto and cleaned up his face. Naruto watched her stunned. First she kicked him, now she was cleaning him up? What next?
Satisfied with his work, Ren walked back to the swing, turning on the radio as she went. A pop ballad started playing.
"I love this song!" Naruto said, jumping up and bobbing along to the music. Ren let a small smile grace her features. She liked the song too.
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Before long, Ren and Naruto hit it off. Naruto learned that Ren was three years his senior and about to graduate the Ninja Academy, liked music and oranges, and hated stupid and overly nice people. Her grandfather used to be the Gadget Genius of Konoha, known for his traps and war mechanisms more traditional ninja arts like ninjustu.
Naruto, not one to be one upped, proclaims loudly "HA! My dream is to become the greatest Hokage, that way the whole village will stop disrespecting me and treating me like I'm somebody...somebody important. Hokage trumps "gadget genius" any day!"
Ren, not being one to take things lying down as well, saids "Well then! I suppose the "next Hokage" does not want some orange!"
"Well--" his response was interrupted by a loud growling noise coming from his person. Particularly, his stomach.
Ren, satisfied, smirked confidently. Naruto, humiliated, begs for forgiveness.
"Maa maa, nee-chan, I was kidding! Gadget genius could trump Hokage...uh...every other week! Yeah! So, can I have some please?!"
Ren turns her head away, and is laughing inwardly when she hears a gasp from the boy's mouth.
"It's 'May I...'"
"Sure! Right! Whatever you want!" Naruto said, eagerly looking at the orange pieces in her hands.
"...and sure you can, silly!" she replies, turning her head back and revealing a large dimple-showing smile.
"Yosh! Thanks nee-chan! I'm hungry!" He took a orange piece and instantly put it in his mouth.
Ren laughed, out loud this time, and his shenanigans. "Your very welcome! Sorry I was rude..."
"It ok!" he said, mouth filled with citrus goodness.
"Ugh, close your mouth when you eat!"
They sat there for a while, eating oranges and enjoying the weather.
Soon the 'bunch' of oranges that Ren had turned to one, and the sky changed from a sky-blue to a warm tangerine.
Naruto patted his stomach contentedly, at least four oranges in his belly at that moment.
"Woo! That hit the spot. I didn't eat since morning..."
Ren gasped at this, since it was 5:30 now. "You don't live on the streets do you?"
Naruto smiled, eyes closed. "Nah, I live in my own apartment."
Ren raised an eyebrow. "With no one to take care of you?"
"I live alone."
Ren looked shocked. A kid this young living alone... "An how old are you?"
Naruto opened his eyes and smiled widely. "I'm turning nine next October."
Nine?! What the...
"Ok, who pays for your food and clothing, or rent for that matter?" Time to do the math now...
Naruto thought about this for a moment. "Well, Hokage-jiji and Iruka-nii give me money to buy stuff, and I guess they come around once in a while to see what I'm doing."
He looked up to see Ren with a dumbfounded look. "What?" he asked.
Hokage-sama...Iruka-sensei...Wow, kid's got connections...
"I couldn't bear to live alone at your age, and I can't do it now. I have no parents too, you know?"
Naruto's eyes widened as Ren took off her glasses and rubbed her eyes. "But at last I have my grandfather and my aunt to fall back on and stuff...I'm scared of being alone."
Another long silence came, and the blues and purples of the night started to arrive.
"I could be your friend, if you want." Ren suddenly said.
"What?" said Naruto, confused.
"I said, I could be your friend...no, your sister. Your nee-chan." She spun around to look at him.
"Give me your hand." she commanded, eyes serious.
"Uh...ok.." Naruto complied, drawing his arm to her.
Ren takes a kunai from her pocket, left there from kunai practice the day before. She slashes her wrist first, blood rushing down like a scarlet sea. She then slashes Naruto's wrist, him wincing as she did so.
"Are you crazy?!" he cried, struggling to get free.
"Hold on. I know what I'm doing." Ren looked at him sincerely, and wrapped their wrists together with a stray cloth.
"I'm not one for the supernatural, but my friend Kaede said once that when you do this, our partner's blood would run into our bloodstream and we would become blood siblings."
Naruto looked thoughtful for a moment, then replied "That's stupid." Ren smacked him with her free hand, then untied the knot.
"See? Now were are binded together. I will be your sister now, and help you throughout life. You will be my brother, and do the same for me when I need it."
"Whoa, a sister...cool!"
She looked up. The moon was visible.
"Dang! I need to get home Naruto..." Finding a permanent marker, she searches her person for a paper.
"Uh, do you have some paper?" Ren asked.
"No."
"Hmm..." she snaps her finger, and reaches into her bag once more. The last orange. She scribbles on it furiously, then throws it to Naruto. He catches it, and looks at the writing.
"What is this?" he calls to the rollerskating girl.
"My address. You can come anytime Naruto! Bye!" she glides away, hair blowing in the evening wind.
Naruto looks at the orange, then at his wrist. Strange girls...oranges...wrist-slashing...sister.
He smiles.