Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.
A/N: Sorry about the lack of updates on both of my stories, I'm a pre-law and economics double major and it eats up a lot of my time...
I really hope you all enjoy this chapter, I've been working on it steadily since the first post. You all should expect another in about two and a half weeks. Also, thanks to all of you who put me on alerts and favs and reviewed! I really appreciate it!
On with the story!
Chapter Two
"Friendship is unncessesary, like philosophy, like art... It has no survival value;
rather it is one of those things that give value to survival." -C.S. Lewis
Mina used her shunshin no jutsu to leave her father's office, and ended it in her bedroom in her parent's house.
It was a nice room, but a slightly out dated one. It was very much the same as when the ANBU captain was a thirteen year old chuunin, but somehow she did not quite have the heart to re-do it.
Mina shrugged these thoughts off and grabbed her sealing scrolls with her supplies and laid them out on her bed; weapons first, survival gear next. She then pulled her katana down from the top shelf of her closet and laid it out onto her flowery duvet next to her scrolls.
Next, Mina stripped out of her standard jonin garb, and got into her ANBU gear. Long, dark, cargo pants that tucked into her black-ops issue matte-black boots. Black tank top that made the tattoo on her arm stand out, silver chest armor, hand guards, wrist guards, knee plates, shin guards.
Everything was silver. She wrapped the dark red bandages of a captain around her right thigh, and put her holster in place. She put her scrolls into one of the deep, cargo pockets of her pants. She put her black leather belt around her waist to hold up her baggy pants, and provide her with her med kit.
She strapped her blade onto her back.
Finally, she placed her mask on her face, that of an un-named hunter-nin.
She was out of her house in less than three minutes. She flew by third storey windows, over rooftops and stopped at team mate number one's house. Mina knocked on his window, which was situated on the second floor.
He was sitting at his desk, and looked up. Upon seeing her, he went to the window and opened it.
"Gate, ten minutes." Mina said.
Sakumo nodded. "See you then."
She was gone, leaving wind in her wake.
Mina repeated this process, stopping at team mate number two's house. Her room was on the first floor in the back of the house.
She tapped on the window.
The window opened and a petite, long black haired, young woman stared up at her with dark violet eyes. She was sitting at her desk like Sakumo had been, but hers was pushed up against her window.
"Mina." The girl greeted, smirking a little as her friend balanced on her window sill.
"If I were any other ANBU captain, I'd have you reported for revealing S -class secrets, Mikoto."
Uchiha Mikoto shrugged, uncaring. It was an empty threat, and they both knew it.
"Gate, five minutes." Mina said, as protocol demanded.
Mikoto flicked her off.
Mina smiled as she left.
ANBU squad hunter-three was at the designated meet spot at the designated time, geared up and ready to go.
Sakumo showed first, his gravity defying silver hair giving him away immediately despite the plain porcelain mask. He came to stand directly next to Mina as they waited for Mikoto to show.
He pulled a book of mind /number games out of nowhere, and a pen from behind his ear. A penchant he had, but at least it was as bad as uncle Kakashi's….
Mikoto showed a minute later, her hair in a plaited braid that ran down her back. She adjusted her katana on her back marginally and gave the ready signal in the hand-signing language all ANBU were taught to know.
Mina signed an affirmative, and Sakumo put his book away, his pen back behind one ear.
They walked over to the gate, and Mina took note that it was hot today, as should be expected from a Fire Country August. There was barely a breeze, and it was humid.
It would make travelling a bit more difficult, but it shouldn't present any real problems like rain would have.
"Move out." She said quietly, taking off into the trees to the right side of the road, followed closely by the others.
They stopped half an hour later so Mina could explain the mission to them. She had already read and burned the scroll in the village.
Mina crouched down, and Mikoto and Sakumo popped a squat as well, forming a tight triangle. Mina activated her byakugan, as a precautionary measure against eavesdroppers and would be ambushers.
"Alright, so the objective is to hunt down a sound Nin by the name of Yuudai, he assassinated the Mizukage's apprentice, made an attempt to kill the Kazekage's son, and he killed Hokage-sama's third son, from what our sources can tell, Yuudai is directly answering to the leader of Oto. He is said to be going after someone close to the Raikage next. Lord Hokage wants him for interrogation, as does Lord Kazekage."
Sakumo pushed his mask up onto the side of his head, and the other two did as well. He stared into Mina's face for a moment, looking at her seriously.
"Can you handle this just now?" he asked, straight to the point.
Mina nodded solemnly. "I can, I will. For Kaito, I must. I'll worry about my mental state later."
Sakumo did not speak, just continued to stare at her, scrutinizing her, assessing her. He sighed after a moment. "I'll watch your back extra closely this time, then."
Mikoto frowned, "I don't want you putting this mission ahead of your mental state."
Mina turned to face her, "I'll be fine, if it's too much, I'll ask one of you to make the hit, okay? Miki, Sakumo, please don't give me this right now. I'll let you take over if I can't handle it. Let's just go. We're meeting up with Suna black ops two days from now just outside of Kumo."
Mikoto and Sakumo nodded, they all fixed their masks into place, and they were gone.
It took a day and a half of heavy travelling to make it to the outskirts of Kumo in time to meet the Suna-black-ops.
When they finally did reach the pre-set meeting point, the Suna-nin were already there. The two of them were sitting under a rather large boulder, and among some small, scrubby bushes.
"Good afternoon." One of them greeted, standing up from the ground in front of Mina. He had quite distinctive red hair, his pierced ears were just visible, he was tall, and his fingers were very tan.
"And yourself." Mina replied. She smiled to herself; there was no real way for him to disguise himself.
"So, Blondie, you got a plan?" Red asked amicably.
"I might, but you'll have to wait and see, Red." She snarked back, moving around him, to stand next to the other Suna-nin. This one had brown hair that was tied back into a messy bun, and she had a distinctive tattoo in the shape of a mask on the nape of her neck.
The brunette haired girl nodded at Mina good naturedly. "Sup?" she asked.
Mina replied with two fingered salute of acknowledgement, pulling a scroll out of a deep, cargo pocket in the meantime.
She laid it out in front of her on a hip height rock that was rather flat. She unsealed it, and it revealed a very detailed map. At the bottom right hand corner, was the map maker's mark, a small toad.
She gathered everyone around it, and began to point out strike points.
"Alright," Mina began, "there is only one viable entry point for Yuudai if he is to "complete" his mission of killing someone close to the Raikage. Right here." She pointed to a tiny slash on the map that was outlined in blue.
"This is a sewage line that only two chunin patrol, and in shifts at that… Yuudai will find it easier to slip into the village this way; unfortunately, it is especially convenient for him because of its proximity to the Raikage's nephew's residence. Konoha intelligence indicates that the nephew is most likely the target."
Red stopped gazing at the map at looked up at her, his amber eyes flashing through the holes in his mask. "You're not planning on using the kid as bait, are you?" he asked, a hint of waspishness in his voice.
"No," Mina replied stoically, "we're going to grab Yuudai on his way in. The Raikage has been informed of our presence and has agreed to let us take the killer down. Raikage-sama has placed a tight guard on his nephew's home to ensure his safety."
Red paused a moment, staring at her, hard. Mina avoided the urge to shift uncomfortably under his scrutiny.
"Alright." He agreed after a moment, turning away and back to his team.
"When do we leave?" The brunette Suna-nin spoke up.
"Now." Mina replied.
The area was clear in half a minute, with no trace left behind of a shinobi presence.
Red had set up a series of traps in the sewers with Sakumo's help, making them impassable.
When they met back up with the group, the combined squads set up on the side of a craggy cliff-face, in a small outcropping that was barely four feet wide, and ten feet across, with a low overhanging ceiling of four feet. The five of them squished on to it, not showing their discomfort for the chosen watch-point.
Mina and Miki sat up front, cross-legged and on the edge, both utilizing their doujutsu to watch the drainage opening seventy feet down and half a mile away horizontally.
Sakumo, Red and the brunette sat back, not making any noise. Sakumo had pulled out his puzzle book, and was working his way through an obnoxiously hard word-game. Red and the brunette woman were playing a silent game of cards, Red was losing.
Mina smirked at that, he was usually a good card-player, but today he was getting a taste of his own medicine.
They all sat like this for an hour and forty-three minutes, until Miki and Mina both detected movement to the right of the large drainage pipe. About thirty yards out was a large man going an insane speed. A speed meant for stealth, and also of intent purpose.
"Sighted." Miki and Mina announced at the same time, and Mina would have found it amusing if not for the seriousness of the situation.
The group was up in a second and swiftly down the side of the cliff in not even the blink of an eye. Yuudai spotted them coming and knew that his mission was ruined; he turned fleetly and darted away from the black-ops pursuing him. Yuudai made it about one hundred yards before they caught up with him.
Mikoto and Mina were in the front with Red, Sakumo and the brunette behind them.
Yuudai in his panic of being found out in the open, made a wild move. Unsheathing his katana from his back and performing a hand sign that made the air around him distort with waves, he charged Mina.
In an instant, there was a shrieking sound in the air and then a snap. Yuudai collapsed to the ground, choking horrifically as he clawed at the johyo string around his neck. Red held the other end.
Sakumo walked around the red-head and lifted a glowing green palm to Yuudai, knocking him medically unconscious.
Mina frowned slightly under her mask, and pulled a scroll from her cargo pockets. She walked over to the slumped body a few feet from her and waited for Red to finish tying him up. When Yuudai was chakra-bound and decidedly helpless, Mina sealed him in her holding scroll, and shoved it back into her pocket.
"First order of business?" Red asked, turning to face Mina as though nothing had just happened.
"We're to go to Suna and allow Yuudai to be questioned for three days before you and your team mate accompany us and the prisoner to Konoha, where we will conduct an interrogation of our own." She replied, pushing these recent events to the back of her thoughts, it would not do to be distracted on a mission.
Red nodded, "Let's go."
The combined black-ops were gone.
After two days of travelling they made it to Sunagakure.
Mina handed over the holding scroll containing Yuudai to Red and the brunette woman, and was escorted by a chunin to her team's usual accommodations in the Kazekage's home.
When the team was left alone in the foyer of the large home, they finally removed their masks.
A blonde woman came bursting through a side door, looking a little frazzled and who could blame her? She was the Kazekage's ambassador to the Leaf, and stress came with the territory.
"Just got word of you all being in the village, so I'm gonna get someone to clean your usual rooms, okay?" The older blonde asked.
"That'd be great, Temari-san." Mina replied with a smile.
"Good. You kids know where the kitchen is in this place, so go and help yourselves." Nara Temari told them, leaving them as fast as she'd come upon them.
The three ANBU left the foyer and made their way through a door on the right and down a hallway to the kitchen. They rummaged through the refrigerator and found some left over rice balls and cold tea, and proceeded to demolish half the plate and three quarters of the jug of tea.
When they were nearly through the food, two people came trudging through the back door of the kitchen.
"Ugh, you're all a bunch of lucky bastards, you didn't have to go and report." The brunette said, slumping into a free chair by Mikoto and snatching a rice ball off the plate, pushing her mask up and off of her face. Sabaku no Chouko wiped her eyes of the sweat that had built up on her face, smearing her copious amounts of purple eyeliner as she did.
Red slumped in the free seat next to Mina. He pulled his mask off and set it on the table, then stole Mina's glass of tea, chugging it and then refilling it before setting it back down.
"Nice, Karasu." Mina told him, smirking.
"I aim to please, Blondie." He replied, snatching the last of the rice balls off the plate in the center, making Chouko pout with indignation.
He finished it in two bites. "That's way harsh cuz'," Chouko retorted to the lack of rice balls.
"Sorry, Cho." Karasu replied, his amber eyes flashing with amusement. The tall red-head, son of the Kazekage, stood with ease and walked over to the pantry, rummaging through it for a few moments before he found what he was looking for. He emerged with a triumphant look on his face and a jar of peanut butter.
He loped over to the drawer that contained cutlery and extracted a spoon.
He returned to the table, taking up his spot once more. With a flourish he opened the jar, and handed the lid to Mina, who arched an eyebrow in response. Karasu then unceremoniously stuck the spoon into the jar and began to eat the peanut butter straight up.
Chouko made mock gagging noises, as she left the table to poke around the kitchen for more edibles.
"That's kind of gross, you know?" Mina told the slightly older Nin.
Karasu shrugged, "As long as Kaa-san doesn't catch me, it's all good."
The group lapsed into silence, and Mina looked over to her team mates, they were absorbed in one of Sakumo's puzzles, solving it together, Miki would point out an answer and Sakumo would circle it, or shake his head and point to something else with his pen.
Mina sighed; she was tired and ready for a shower. Thankfully, just as she thought this, Temari came into the kitchen.
"Bedrooms are ready, you know where they are." She looked over at her niece who was rummaging through the fridge and her nephew who was eating peanut butter straight from the jar, and rolled her eyes.
"Good to see you too, aunt Temari," Chouko called from the fridge, and returning from its chilly depths with a yogurt.
"You too, kid. Oh, and Karasu?" Temari replied, her head swiveling in his direction.
The red head in question looked up from his peanut butter, an almost nonexistent eyebrow arched in question.
"Your mom's in the foyer, you might want to hide that." Temari told him, pointing at the offending jar.
Karasu's eyes widened just a smidge, and he stood to make his escape from the kitchen.
"I smell peanut butter, Karasu! If you're eating it out of the jar again, I'll have your ass!"
Karasu stood, ruffled Mina's hair, and then he escaped through the back door; with his jar of peanut butter.
When Sabaku no Matsuri came in, looking every inch the scary-mother-type, Mina snickered internally, but she couldn't really blame Red for running.
The sun was just beginning to set when Mina left the kitchen ten minutes later, after Matsuri had told them she'd make pork dumplings for dinner in an hour, and to come back down then.
Temari had turned down the invitation when it was extended to her; apparently her lazy ass husband was taking her out tonight.
The blonde Namikaze had ducked out then, figuring she had enough time to grab a shower and change before then, so she went through a familiar bunch of twists and turns to her usual guest bedroom.
She went in and locked the door behind her, and stripped down to just her pants and tank top, leaving her armor in a pile at the foot of the bed with her katana on the top of the dresser.
She went into the small but well equipped adjoining bathroom that was painted a lovely sage color, and went to the shower. She turned the water on, and waited for the freezing cold, filtered groundwater that Suna used -because of the lack of lakes and rivers in the desert- to heat up.
She stripped down completely and sat on the side of the tub, a hand in the spray beyond, testing the temperature.
After five minutes, the water was warm enough to bathe in, and she stepped under the artificial downpour. She just stood there for a few minutes, enjoying the feeling of the warm water.
Barely finding the motivation to move from her spot under the warm spray, she moved and located the shampoo on a ledge, and poured copious amounts of it into her one girlish vanity.
She washed it twice, to fully rid it of sand and dirt and utter failure. Then she conditioned, and received a mental image of her male subordinates shocked faces at the fact that their captain was so damned feminine. She chuckled softly at that.
Mina was perfectly fine with being a female, especially when she could prove her worth as a shinobi in about two seconds flat. Everyone knew she could kick some serious ass.
This brought on a troubling thought, one she had suppressed until now because of her unwillingness to look at it while she was on duty.
Why had Karasu stepped in when Yuudai had charged? Did he do it out of instinct for a comrade, or because he felt she needed saving…?
If saving her was the case, she would need to have a conversation with him about her capability as a kunoichi. She frowned for a moment, rinsing out the last of the conditioner, and picking up a bar of soap.
Surely Karasu knew her better than to think she had needed his help?
Mina rolled her shoulders, to work out the stress building up there, and decided not to focus on the circumstances around Yuudai's capture. It was working her up.
She finished up her lengthy shower, and stepped out of the expensively tiled-tub, grabbing a fluffy white towel from the rack above the toilet as she did.
She left the bathroom, still toweling herself off, and pulled her only other scroll out of her dirty pants pocket. Mina unsealed it rapidly and snatched her backup ANBU clothes out and sealed her dirty ones away.
There was a sudden rap on the door, and Mina pulled her towel about herself firmly, tucking it under an armpit before she unlocked and answered the knock.
Karasu was standing outside the door, with an armful of fabric. He was also freshly showered and clothed, and he looked ridiculously at ease with himself as he took up the bulk of the doorway.
"My mother sent these up for you" he told her handing the blonde the armful of clothes.
"Tell her thank you for me?" Mina replied, gratefully accepting them, and eager to wear something other than shinobi clothes.
"Sure thing. Dinner's in twenty minutes by the way." Karasu responded, smiling and preparing to leave.
"Alright, um…" she trailed off, causing him to look at her.
One of her hands unconsciously made its way to the back of her damp neck and scratched a non-existent itch, a tick of hers that Karasu had also seen her famous father execute.
"Something up?" he asked, concerned.
"No, it's nothing." She replied giving him a half hearted smile that did not reach her cerulean eyes, waving it off. "I'll see you at dinner."
"Okay." Karasu nodded, looking a bit puzzled. He turned away and walked down the hall, he heard her door close with a barely audible click.
Well, whatever it was she wanted to say, she'd tell him in her own good time, the red head figured.
She always did.
Mina went back into her borrowed room and let out a sigh of exasperation. She had been about to bring up her thoughts about the capture to Karasu, but his puzzled face had made her realize what an idiot she was being about the whole matter.
Karasu knew her, he had most likely been acting out of instinct, and it was pointless to wonder about anything otherwise. If he stepped in again on a different occasion, she would say something, but right now, speculation on such a trivial matter was just stupid.
With that last thought, Mina got dressed in the clothes Matsuri-san had lent her. They consisted mainly of a pair of dark red harem pants and a fitted long sleeve black shirt, with a square neckline. She set aside her clean ANBU clothes on the dresser, next to her katana.
The blonde pulled her semi-dry hair up into a messy bun and left the room, shutting the door behind her and wandering down the hallways barefoot to the kitchen for dinner.
She arrived at the same time as Chouko; Karasu was already there, setting the table for his mother. He looked up when she entered, and smiled, then nodded at the stack of napkins that still needed distributing amongst the place settings.
Mina rolled her eyes at him and took the napkins, following him around the table in his circular pattern to put the pieces of cloth at each seat.
Sakumo and Mikoto came in a minute later and talked to Chouko who was leaning against the kitchen island, pouring drinks into cups. Mikoto and Sakumo then took the cups to the table.
The Kazekage showed up right as Matsuri was putting the finishing touches on the food, he looked a bit drawn. Mina went over to him after he greeted his wife and gave him a hug.
"From dad." She explained, smiling at the red headed Kage.
Gaara took this in stride, smiled a bit and nodded, "Tell him thank you, and that he still owes me a drink for our last card game."
Mina's own smile widened, "I'll let him know, but you know he's gonna say that he won…"
Gaara chuckled, "but, I won."
"You both say you won, Lord Kazekage." Mina replied innocently.
Matsuri laughed, "She's got your number Gaara, I think you and Naruto are just going to have to have a rematch."
Gaara rolled his eyes amicably and took his heavy looking gourd off his back, then placed it in the corner of the kitchen.
The group made their way over to the table, and took their respective seats, Chouko and Matsuri bringing large plates of steaming food over to set in the middle.
They all sat at the cramped table, and waited for a few moments. After about a minute, a tall man, dressed in black, with a puppet on his back burst through the back door.
The party ignored the obnoxious entrance, as it was a daily occurrence in the Sabaku household, and the Konoha-nin had witnessed it on several occasions, and waited tor Kankuro to settle himself in his seat next to his daughter.
When he did, Matsuri began to chatter about some academy students she had run into earlier that day, and conversation picked up in a few seconds.
When dinner was through, Kankuro stayed behind to chat with Gaara and Matsuri while helping them with washing dishes.
The younger crowd, however; parted ways to relax, and ignore politics in general. Sakumo went to work on his latest puzzle, and Mikoto sat by him in the living room sharpening her katana. Chouko was sitting in an armchair drawing.
Karasu and Mina who had followed everyone into the room stood in the door way for a few moments, looking out on the rather boring scene.
Mina had just resolved herself to going back to her room and going to sleep early when Karasu tugged on her sleeve. She looked up at him and was practically dragged away by him, outside.
She tugged her arm free in a rather gentle manner for one that was slightly peeved being treated like a misbehaving academy student. He glanced down when she did, and saw her irritated expression.
"Sorry, I just didn't want you to escape before I could show you something." He told her, seeing the expression replaced by one of curiosity, he felt a little safer from her irritation.
"Like what?" Mina asked.
"Just come on." Karasu replied, walking, not off the property but parallel to the wall. He then began to walk up the wall.
Mina sighed, resigned to see whatever it was the crazy red head wanted her to see. It'll only be a few minutes, she rationalized.
When they reached the roof, Karasu sat down and waited patiently for her to sit down next to him. She did, noticing that Karasu and she were facing away from the lights of the city, and out over the desert, as the wall was lower in elevation than they were and the Kazekage's house was almost unreasonably tall.
"If I'm right, "Karasu started, "and I read the chart correctly, today is August twelfth, and there should be…" he trailed off and squinted at the sky and then suddenly shot his arm out, startling Mina.
Well, as much as an ANBU captain could be startled. His dark sleeve covered arm was about a centimeter from her nose, and she went cross eyed in annoyance.
"Look! There!" he was pointing.
Mina's eyes followed his finger's trajectory to a bright spot of light shooting across the sky; soon, there was another, and another. A meteor shower.
The sky was perfectly clear and the desert provided the perfect darkness needed to really observe such a celestial event.
"I thought you of all people would appreciate it…." Karasu told her, looking down at her tanned, smiling face briefly before looking back up to the show in the heavens.
"It is awesome." Mina agreed softly, losing her annoyance with her boisterous friend and making Karasu strain a little to hear her reply.
Karasu smiled and allowed the conversation to lapse into silence. He lay back, and put his arms behind his head, about half a minute later, he heard Mina do the same thing.
She scooted down the side of the roof so that their faces were level. She looked over at him, finding that he was already staring at her.
He quirked an eyebrow, and the face he made, made her laugh. She turned back to the shower and pulled one arm out from under her gold hair and pointed at something.
Karasu followed her finger's trajectory and saw that she was pointing to a cluster of stars.
"I used to know what it was called…" Mina said quietly, "Kaito knew all the names by heart, and he'd pull us all out to the back yard so he could ramble about some astronomical finding or mythology…." She trailed off, choking up a little.
Karasu turned his gaze back to the blonde woman next to him; she sat back up and clutched her knees to her chest, then rested her chin on top of her knees as she looked, not up, but out at the sand stretching out to meet the horizon.
Karasu sat up and scooted closer to her, noticing that she had put a good two feet of distance between them as he did. He put an arm around her and pulled her into his chest.
Mina looked up at him with surprise, and Karasu could see the tell-tale tear tracks running down her face, making her already cerulean eyes take on a horribly distressed, and even bluer, glow.
"Hoki boshi." He said after a moment.
"What?" she asked looking confused, wiping her tears away with the back of a petite hand.
"Its name, means dabs of paint on the sky." Karasu offered, pushing her hand away from her face, and using the bottom of his clean, long shirt sleeve to wipe the salty water away.
When he finished that, he pushed a few of her stray blonde locks out of her face and pushed them behind her ears.
She let out a shuddery breath in an attempt to regain her composure but lost it and began crying anew.
"I'm sorry." She told him shakily.
"Don't apologize, Mina. You don't ever have to apologize to me, you should know that." Karasu murmured, putting his chin on top of her head, and tracing circles on her shoulder blades.
He had known that her brother's death must weigh heavily on her, especially because she was the oldest and quite possibly the next Hokage and people around her expected her to be a pillar of strength, always.
It was why he had stepped in during the confrontation with Yuudai. Sure, the sound bastard had also tried to assassinate him, but he was far more concerned about Mina's mental state. Yuudai was the sick fuck that had killed Kaito.
He knew she could have handled the fucker all by herself, and done a better job than he could do on his best day. But he was a worrier when it came to her.
Karasu knew different about her than most people did, he knew that she was a sensitive woman that bottled things to the point that she didn't know which ways were up or down anymore.
As long as she wanted him around, hell, even if she didn't want him around, he would make sure to be there to catch her. Because, if he didn't who would? Who knew her like he did, knew when she was about to fall apart?
Not even her family knew her like that.
If they did, they wouldn't put so much damn pressure on her. Sure, she's a prodigy, but the hell?
That was why she was his best friend, he got her, and she understood him.
Kami knows he loves her, wants her to be more than his best friend. But if best friend was all he ever got, he could be content with that, and he'd keep his silence on the matter.
The next morning at breakfast, Mina refused to meet his gaze. Normally this would not bother the Sabaku, but damn it when she did it, it bothered him.
Was she embarrassed? He wondered to himself, eating another bite of his leftover pork dumplings.
Hatake, Uchiha and his cousin had not bothered to wake up at eight this morning like he and Mina had, instead, they left the pair to wallow in their own awkwardness and confusion.
Mina poked at her instant ramen that sat cooling in the bowl before her, and glanced up at Karasu. He was zoning out into space somewhere over her head. Mina let out a breath and made to pick up her almost forgotten chopsticks when Karasu spoke.
"What's your deal?" he asked abruptly.
Mina halted in mid pick up, a bit stunned and losing one of the sticks to the floor. She couldn't quite find it in herself to look up, and then she heard him move. She hung her head in resignation, staring at her cooling ramen, her long blonde hair falling into her face.
Then there were fingers under her chin, forcing her to look up, gentle, but adamant.
When she did she found that he had not left, but rather come over to her side of the table. He leaned down and rested his forehead against hers.
She swallowed with great difficulty, though she was not at all sure why it was so unnerving having him in her space. It was nothing new; they had been the best of friends since their academy days when he did an exchange year at the Konoha academy.
"I shouldn't've cried all over you last night, it was obnoxious of me." Mina whispered, almost afraid that if she spoke any louder he would suddenly disappear into thin air.
He shook his head with a small smile, his forehead rubbing against hers. "It's fine. Leave it; I don't want you to be an awkward blob around me for the rest of the day, Blondie."
Mina gave him a crooked smile and nodded haltingly. Satisfied, Karasu picked up his half empty plate and walked to the sink, dumping it there for washing later.
He came back over and stole her bowl of untouched ramen from her, moving swiftly across the kitchen to the microwave, where he reheated it. When he was sufficiently happy with the temperature, he returned it with a fresh set of chopsticks.
Mina smiled and thanked him, and finally began to eat her breakfast. Karasu sat with her until she was finished, and patience was not his strongest suit but he did try admirably. His antsy behavior was hilarious.
Mina could not control her smile from spreading further, for the first time in several months, she was actually happy.
Hoki Boshi- also known as "Subaru" in Japanese, and in English as the Peliades Cluster. It's located in the constellation Taurus.