This story is inspired by the movie Monsters Inc., I was watching it and this idea had came to me and I really do enjoy writing this. I have everything planned out and I know where I'm going with this story and on top of everything... I have a BETA! I would like to thank backwards. for being my BETA! Anyway, I hope you enjoy, I spent a lot of time with this one and I hope you enjoy! Read and Review! Oh, and some of the characters might seem a lttle out of character... I needed interesting villains!
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters!
"Happy birthday Sakura-chan!"
I jumped up at the sound of the loud voice, dropping my laptop in the process. I quickly scurried off my bed to retrieve it.
"Naruto, you scared me," I said, barely looking up. I knew it was Naruto; he was the only one who entered my room through the closet instead of my actual door. He casually made his way over to my bed and sat down, relaxing back into the pillows. I got up and locked my bedroom door before joining him again, opting to sitting up instead. I quickly looked him over, his looks not frightening me because I was already accustomed to his appearance. He looked like a crossbreed of a human and a fox, having an equal amount of traits from both sides. He had orange and white fox like ears on top of his wild blonde hair, he also contained whiskers that came out of his cheeks. When he talked or smiled he revealed rows of sharp fangs, and when he walked his tails swayed back and forth… all nine of them glowing a bright red. His appearance alone gave off this dark, menacing aura even though he was extremely friendly. Besides all of that, he looked like a human boy!
"Sakura-chan, how did I scare you?" He asked with a laugh, "I never scared you before, why now?" He sat up, looking into my eyes with his red slitted ones, an amused look on his face.
"Don't get so confident, it was just a figure of speech," I said with an eye roll. You might wonder why I was so casual with the idea of having Naruto, this unusual creature, on my bed.
It had all started when I was seven and when Naruto was not as scary as he is now. Naruto was assigned to scare a human child, which happened to be me, as a rite of passage for all of the little monster children. He did not do a very good job, entering my room timidly and stumbling out a soft "boo". I, being the eccentric child I was, happily grabbed a hold of him, thinking he was an adorable little creature. I forced him to stay the entire day with me, playing dolls and dress-up and tea party. Him wanting to leave immediately had promised me anything in order to escape my room at that moment, so he had promised to come back every day. Surprisingly, he has kept his promise to this very day, showing up in my room at four o'clock exactly. We had grown up together, being my friend that I hid from my parents all of these years. His presence became a regular thing in my life, something I longed for throughout the day. Even though we have been friends for years, I still do not know much about his world. The few things I do know about Naruto's world is that my closet is a portal between my world and his. His world is full of creatures similar to him that humans call monsters, and he is a part of an organization called the Underground which is filled with good monsters like Naruto.
"Naruto? Dobe, are you in here?" I heard the voice, it was barely audible but I knew it was coming from my closet. Glancing at Naruto, I knew he had also heard the voice by the shocked expression plastered on his face. He put his finger up at his mouth, signaling me to stay quiet. He moved to my closet, disappearing inside, but as soon as he closed the door I jumped off my bed hurrying towards it. I stood silently behind the door listening closely to the voices on the other side.
"Naruto, what were you doing in your closet?"
"N-Nothing,"
"Every day you disappear in your room at this time and you hide in your closet…?"
"No! That's not what I do!"
"Then what is it?"
"I-I ju-"
"There must be something in your closet so I'm going in there."
"No! Teme wait! Stop! You can't go in there!"
"I'll do what I want, Dobe." The unfamiliar voice got closer to the door and I slowly began to back away from it; part of me being terrified to meet one of Naruto's "friends", and this one did not seem too friendly…
"Sasuke don't touch that!" Naruto yelled in attempt to stop the man, Sasuke. The door knob turned slowly and I stood frozen right in front of it. I couldn't move, as much as I wanted to run and hide I could not. The door finally opened and my breath got caught in my throat as I stood face to face with a terrifying creature. It stood at least a head taller than me, its skin a dark brown/gray color, large wings on its back that looked similar to talons, a four-edged star that laid on top its nose, wild black hair that spiked out in all directions, and bright red eyes that felt like they were keeping you from moving. Suddenly, I was scared, I couldn't breathe. It felt as if this creature was choking me, just the way he was looking at me made me feel this certain way.
"Sasuke! Leave her alone!" Naruto viciously yelled, pushing the creature roughly. Losing his balance, the creature, Sasuke fell over letting go of the grip he had on me. I dropped to me knees gasping for air, he did not physically choke me but he had done it in some way. Naruto ran to my side, hugging me tightly to his chest. I do not remember when I had began to cry but I was soon bawling into Naruto, not wanting to let go of him.
"It's okay Sakura-chan; this is why I did not want anyone to know about you. You could get hurt so easily." Naruto whispered to me. From the corner of my eyes I saw a tear run down Naruto's face and his tails began to lash around madly.
"A human Naruto? You must be crazy! A human girl!" The Sasuke creature had risen once again and was laughing madly, "She's going to get killed no matter what you do! You're dad will find out, so just kill her now!"
"Shut up Sasuke! No one asked for your damn opinion!" Naruto spat as his tails began smacking into things, one of them hitting Sasuke on the leg with a loud sizzling sound.
"Naruto! Control yourself." Sasuke said through his teeth, he turned his back to us and in one swift movement he was gone. I watched Naruto as he rocked me back and forth in a soothing manner. I was not sure if he was doing this for me or to calm himself down because he looked scared... and confused, and seeing him this way had me worried.
"Sakura-chan," Naruto said after several second of silence, "Everything will be okay… I'm going to take you to Tsunade; she'll know what to do. You'll be safe once again, okay?" He finished looking down at me. I nodded; unsure of what other possible solution there was for me. Naruto picked me up and put me on his back, now that he's tails were calm. He swiftly made his way through the portal, shutting the closet door, leaving the human world behind us for now.
"Naruto! What were you thinking? A human in our world! Do you know how difficult it would be to keep her safe? Especially if she means a lot to you! Your dad is going to go after her, and you know this!"
"Baa-chan, you're human! And technically… this is Sasuke's fault, if he wasn't so damn curious everything would be fine right now!"
I was sitting down in the office listening to the two bicker back and forth, repeating the same exact stuff over and over again. The lady, Tsunade, was the leader of the Underground and just so happened to be human! She looked in her late twenties; she had long blonde hair, a small diamond directly in the middle of her forehead, and she had enormously large breasts which were entirely too distracting when first encountering her. One thing unusual and amusing about the organization was that it is actually underground. The whole place is a labyrinth of tunnels with a bunch of bedrooms, halls, meeting rooms, and offices. Most of the creatures part of the Underground live here, and none of them were as frightening as Sasuke was, some of them look completely human!
"Sakura will be watched over by Gaara, Sasuke, and I; she will be fine!" I focused back in on the conversation, hearing my name being used by Naruto.
"Ugh... fine Naruto," Tsunade said with a loud sigh, "You three will be responsible for her and will be required to train her, she's not always going to be protected by you." Naruto nodded eagerly, and flashed me a wild grin with his fangs.
"Here take this," She said handing Naruto a list, "You, Sasuke, Gaara, and her-"
"Sakura, her name is Sakura," Naruto interrupted, correcting her.
"Sakura, are assigned to pick up these items from the market for dinner and supplies that we need around the organization, just watch out for the hunters. You know how crazy Temari is about Gaara." She finished with a wink, dismissing us out of her office.
In the past hour of wandering the market with Naruto, Sasuke, and Gaara looking helplessly for items that I was positive were not here, I've learned a couple of interesting things. There are a group of humans called the Hunters; their purpose is the capture of all monsters that defy their laws, which happened to be most of the monsters in this world. One of the leaders of the Hunters is Temari, Gaara's sister, whose ultimate goal is to capture and convince her brother to join her. Gaara, unlike Temari, is not a human even though he does resemble one; he has messy red hair, very light eyes which is surrounded by a massive amount of eyeliner, and he has a tattoo upon his forehead that is the word love in Kanji. From time to time I do forget that Gaara is there because he is extremely quiet, but I would prefer him over Naruto and Sasuke's constant bickering.
"Dobe, she set us up again, none of this stuff is here!" Sasuke said as he snatched the list out of Naruto's hand.
"Teme! They are here, I swe-"
"Hello boys, funny seeing you here," I looked up to find a teenage girl, around my age, standing on one of the shorter buildings in the market. She had wild blonde hair that was parted into four small pony tails and her bangs came down to her forehead. She wasn't alone though, she had a couple of other girls behind her that carried themselves in a way that might have intimidated others, including myself, but not the guys.
"Temari," Naruto growled, clenching his fists, "Tsunade said you would show up today."
"Sister, if you have came for me again, I'm letting you know that you are not going to capture me." Gaara spoke, for the first time all day. When the words left his mouth there was this certain tone to them that sent shivers down my back.
"Oh don't flatter yourself little brother; I'm not here for you. I'm under direct orders from my leader to bring back your new friend right there," She said pointing directly at me. I took a step backwards, shocked by her response. They had wanted me, my first day in Naruto's world and the Hunters want me... fantastic.
"Told you so dobe, everyone is going to be coming after her, and now we have to protect her." Sasuke said in a rather unenthusiastic tone of voice.
"Shut up Sasuke. Stop being a little baby, we can handle them." Naruto finished with a menacing grin on his face, showing some of his fangs.
"Of course the son of darkness would be the cocky one... Get her girls." As on cue, the girls behind Temari leaped off the building in attacking mode. I took a couple of steps backwards again, now hiding behind Naruto. He flashed me a reassuring smile before turning to face the first girl that was advancing on him.
The girl made the first move by throwing a punch directly at Naruto's face and, in a blink of an eye, he caught the punch and roundhouse kicked her into the nearby stand, her body destroying all of the fruits that was once there. Advancing on his back side was another female hunter, thinking she had caught him off guard, she had jumped with a knife ready in her hand and before she was able to get close to him, she was violently smacked by one of his tails, her stomach sizzling from the encounter; her body went flying into the nearby building, destroying the brick wall.
Removing my eyes off of Naruto, I noticed that Sasuke had finished off all of the other girls and Gaara, who now had a giant sand tail emerging from his backside, was in mid-battle with Temari and he seemed to have the upper hand.
"Temari, look," Naruto said, motioning around her, "You're standing alone. Just retreat and we won't have to kill you."
"Heh." Temari laughed bitterly, spitting out blood. "You're right. I stand no chance against all three of you." Temari stood up straight, looking at the three of them in the eye, completely fearless.
"The girls I had were new, I shouldn't have tried to take you on with inexperienced hunters like that, and it was foolish. But I am smart enough to know when to stop in order to save my own life." And with that she was gone. She disappeared in less than a second, not caring about any of her dying comrades on the market place. The section of the market place we were in was now destroyed; buildings were demolished, stands were crushed and set on fire, and there were dead bodies scattered around. This all had happened in less than a couple of minutes, it was all so overwhelming, so unreal.
I didn't want to be here, it was frightening and I was the weak one compared to everyone else. Naruto and all of the other monsters could easily kill a human with just a flick of their finger, not even breaking a sweat. I wanted to be home, in my bed, away from all of this madness. Dealing with one monster was enough but now I was wrapped up in the middle of their world without a way to get out... Unless I became stronger and that idea was very unlikely.
"Sakura-chan did you hear me?"
I looked up at Naruto's face, losing my train of thought, "No sorry, I zoned out."
"Oh, I said we have to report this...incident to Tsunade before she finds out from someone else. So we have to start heading back to the main headquarters." I nodded, still a bit shook up about the situation that had just happened. Naruto gave me one of his famous grins, flashing all of his fangs, and motioned for me to get on his back which I did without any arguments. After I was adjusted they took off running at an extremely fast pace, a pace that was inhumanly possible, leaving our surroundings a blur as we passed by. We had reached Tsunade's office in less than five minutes and as soon as we reached the door she summoned us in. She sat behind her desk, her hands intertwined underneath her chin and a serious expression on her face.
"Tell me exactly what had happened."
"So you say he's protective over this girl?"
"Yes leader-sama," Temari answered, bowing down in front of the woman that was in charge of the entire organization called the Hunters.
"Is she pretty?"
"W-What?"
"I asked if she was pretty,"
Temari's brows furrowed, unsure of how to answer her leader's question. She did not look up at her though; she kept her head down and spoke out.
"Yes leader-sama."
"That explains, he was always memorized by the pretty ones but for him to be so protective over her... there must be something else about her, some type of connection..." The leader rose out of her chair and slowly walked over to spot where Temari was bowed down, her bright red hair flowing behind her. She gently placed a finger underneath Temari's chin, lifting her face to look at her, her violet eyes staring into Temari's. "I want you to find out why. I don't care how you do so but I want answers, is that understood?"
"Yes leader-sama."
"Good. I want my little boy home and capturing her, right now, is the only way to get him before his father does."
I hope you enjoyed this, read and review if you would like more!
