Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto, only my OCs and this story (as well as the cover image).
Chapter 2
"If you can't go back to your mother's womb, you'd better learn to be a good fighter."
― Anchee Min, Red Azalea
As you can imagine, the aftermath of that lovely little turning point in my life was rather grim. It involved lots of professing of apologies on Otou san's part, lots of scolding and imprisonment in the depths of hell (my crib) from Okaa san and several days of having panic attacks and wishing that somewhere there was an ice cold beer with my name on it.
I would've killed to see a Bear Grylls survival show one more time.
And oh god, how many Super Bowls would I have missed by now?!
But eventually, my mind started to calm and digest this new knowledge. I was in a fictional anime about ninjas, that I had only watched once or twice when baby sitting my buddy's daughter. She had, in a lisp not so different from my own, explained several things as we watched, like how there were several countries each with a hidden village that trained ninja, who were sort of like their police and army rolled into one. The metal bands that they wore showed which village they were from, or whether they had defected. Now that I thought about it, I remembered seeing the blonde brat the show was named after always running to our Ramen stand to eat in the show.
I didn't think I'd seen Naruto running around, but for all I knew, he may not have been born yet.
Overall, this was far too complicated, and wholly unfair to dump all of this onto a toddler.
Not that the universe seemed all that guilty for sticking me in this situation.
However eventually, time was the factor that finally brought me to terms with my new existence. At the very least, my dad was an awesome chef, and if I stayed a citizen, my worst troubles would be fighting off obesity.
But the idea of living a normal, domestic life...quite frankly sickened me. My head felt heavy and a nasty pulling feeling in my chest arose whenever I considered that. Once I was aware of the ninjas presence, I felt stupid for not noticing earlier. By my third birthday I was walking and talking, and the crib was too easy to escape for it to be useful.
My parents were rather surprised to find me trying to burn it behind our house with a broken gas lamp.
And so I started to sneak out even more and wander around, learning about Kohona and watching the protectors of our city. It was strange to see 12 year olds running around with their sensei's, reminding me on all the Jet Lee and Jackie Chan movies I watched about the Shaolin monks. The more I saw, the more I was certain that despite the dangerous lifestyle, I was set on becoming a ninja. I might as well live this life fully and all.
There was also the idea of fighting.
I had been a boxer in my last life; it was something I did since my teens and being in the ring felt as natural as breathing. It helped me realise my worries, and enveloped me in passion that was blissful and better than sex. It was comforting even, to feel the bandages on my hands and feet and to slap powder into my palms. I was no misogynist, but there was something about fighting, pushing my body, being the best, winning...
I had to feel that again.
It must have been weird to witness a toddler shadow boxing in the outskirts of the forest, but each day I would practice what I remembered. It was infuriating at first; my new figure felt stiff, clumsy and moves that my mind were remembered perfectly were hard to translate into my muscles. My form as a whole was soft and weak, and hadn't felt the tearing, painful training that I had had to create the weapon my body had been before. The idea of tying my hair back was strange as well; I was used to shaving it close to the skull, but at the moment it bounced around in thick dark curls.
Of course, Okaa san and Onee san found this adorable. I think I would've broken their hearts if I had gotten rid of it.
A good thing about being a kid again was the flexibility; splits were considered a girly thing to be able to do with the people I used to know, but a) I had a vagina now so big deal and b) flexibility would help my fighting style to develop. The thing with children was they didn't really think about their limitations; if they saw someone doing acrobatics, they'd shout 'look, I can do it too!' and do so like nothing could stop them.
It was hard to accept the fact that I would have to work to get back to what I was before; almost nostalgic to be able to hold a plank for 10 seconds, or relearn to climb a tree. But there was one word that I'd be damned would never be associated with me - a quitter.
By the age of 6, I was feeling an inkling of my old power; my body was forming muscles and strength that looked strange on a little girl, and Okaa san was always giving me shrewd looks everytime she dressed me (I feared I would never escape those bowed, fluffy dresses). I was building up my endurance as well; every where I went, I ran. Through the streets, up and down the stairs, into the forest, anywhere I could.
Then there was this new idea of chakra. Some of the villagers thought it was made up, and that ninjas were using magic to accomplish all of their amazing feats. In a way, it was, especially compared to anything else in my old world. However there was more to it that simple voodoo; chakra was our life force (as hippie as that sounded), and thick form of energy that we could channel and manipulate.
I certainly didn't expect to be able to conjure magic frogs or snap trees in half simply because I knew more about it that other kids my age from TV; it seemed to be based on meditation, having total control of it before anything crazy could be accomplished. It took a while of just simple breathing meditations that I was terrible at for a good few months to calm myself down enough to realise something was there, deep within the cockles of my core.
I wondered if it would have been there before in my old world.
My chakra felt chaotic, volcanic even, and I was scared at first to feel this raw power. But eventually, it became comforting to feel. I grew to understand that it was mine and an irreplaceable part of me. The first time I tried to channel it to move around my body, I was out for a few hours like a light bulb, with a nasty headache to boot that threw me into one of my moods for the rest of the day. But after I managed to accomplished that after countless failures, I didn't experiment any further; the theory of chakra was still foreign to me, and I didn't want to permanently damage myself because I didn't wait to be taught by actual nin.
There were always lots of other kids playing in the streets, and sometimes I stopped my training to join. The only one I knew fairly well was Keiko, a girl my age from an average ninja family of Kohona. Her skin was tanned, hair a dark inky purple and had mischievous brown eyes that were always looking for trouble that I was all too happy to join in with. She was extremely boisterous, but didn't care about getting dirty unlike my girly older sister, and told me all about the things her parents would tell her. Keiko showed me her toy kunai they had given her, and after some begging showed me how they had told her to throw it. I was eager to improve, so every time I could find her we played a competition to see who could hit the most targets.
Otherwise, my childhood was...better than the first. The idea of my own real family unconditionally loving me was becoming easier to accept, and our village was a safe one to grow up in.
One day, it was time for me to join the ninja academy. I was terrifically excited, ready to learn the asian take on fighting and to become great again. That morning, Otou san walked me out of the house, clad in his usual clothes sans his working apron while I trudged next to him with my hair pulled up in a pink ribbon and wearing a sunny t shirt and knee length shorts. The weather was as optimistic as I felt, and for once I wasn't complaining that Ayame was playing with the ends of my ponytail as we walked. The wall of the academy sharpened as we drew closer, a welcome banner in the arch way and a large crowd of parents dropping off children outside. I saw Keiko animatedly jump up and down in front of her father, who was a mirror image of his daughter.
I ran forward with a wide grin ready to call her name when a hand clamped on mine and tugged me away. I looked up in wary confusion at my father. "Otou san? Where are we going? School is that way!"
Otou san looked down at me with surprise, as if the idea of me training as a nin was unexpected. "No, Tora-chan. Your mother and I enrolled you into the village school, with your sister. Come along, you don't want to be late!"
An intense feeling of horror drained my face of colour as I was dragged away from my future.
Thank you for all the lovely responses this story has been getting! It was a bit of a surprise, but sure as hell is inspiring :D
So, the road to become the greatest isn't all that simple even before school has started. Tora's not too happy about the change in plan so far...
Love,
Renzin xo
