Author Notes: Here's is chapter 2 of TPB! Nothing much to say about it though...
Again, feel free to message and review. I'm open to anything that will help improve my writing. But if you just want to tell me how awesome the story is, that fine too! I'd really like to know how i'm doing so far...
In chapter 2, we discover some more about Kita and her past... Enjoy!
Disclaimer: Other than Kitana Izanaki, I don't own anything...
Chapter 2 – The Broken Link
He had to think fast. They were black, and white and definitely set on messing him up if they had the chance. There were too many of them, which meant that the only way for him to stop them was by increasing in numbers himself. He smirked as he focused his chakra and made the familiar hand sign. He opened his eyes as he performed his trademark jutsu. "Multi Shadow Clone jutsu!" Clouds of smoke appeared around him and from the smoke about five dozen Narutos emerged.
"Let's get them, guys!" one of them called out, punching a fist in the air and pointing at the black and white creatures charging at them.
The clone army launched a counterattack and one by one took down their assailants, each time causing big pools of pitch-black liquid to fall to the ground.
When the clones had taken them all out, Naruto again made his hand seal, dissolving his clones in poufs of smoke.
"Good job, Naruto, Sai," he heard the voice of Kakashi Hatake say as he jumped down from the tree branch from where he had been observing their training. Sai, who had been hiding in the bushes as his ink beasts had attacked, emerged from his green shelter. "Yeah, that was a pretty good training. And you know what that means right?" he stated with a sheepish grin. Kakashi put and hand over his face and shook his head.
"Let me guess. You plan on emptying my pockets at Ichiraku's?" he said tiredly.
Naruto's eyes lit up at the mere mentioning of Ichiraku ramen. "Wow, Kakashi-sensei, you are awesome! Let's go!" he said, leaving a sweatdropping Kakashi and Sai behind him as he bolted off towards his beloved ramen.
"Thanks a bunch, Kakashi-sensei," Naruto managed to choke out whilst devouring his ninth bowl of barbeque pork ramen.
"Anything for my students," Kakashi said hesitantly as he mournfully looked in his empty wallet.
Suddenly Naruto stopped wolfing down his food and sadly lowered his head.
"What's wrong?" Sai, who sat on the other side of Kakashi, asked. "It's nothing," Naruto said quietly. "Come now, Naruto. We know you better than that," his sensei said, looking at him closely with his exposed eye. Naruto sighed deeply before answering. "I was just thinking about Sasuke," he replied and tightened his grip on his chopsticks. "I just hope that someday we'll be able to bring him back where he belongs. I'll do anything it takes to bring him back."
Kakashi took a deep breath and then exhaled deeply. "I know, Naruto. I've been thinking a lot about Sasuke lately. I can't help but feel I should have done more to keep him in the village. Maybe if he had gotten the support he needed, he would've realized that the strength he sought out so desperately had been inside him all along," he said, his voice charge with regret. "But we did support him, didn't we? What more could we have done?" Naruto asked in frustration.
"It wasn't our support he needed," the Copy Ninja replied. "Then who?" Naruto inquired confusedly. Kakashi closed his eye as he took a drink of his sake. "The one person that could have put his mind at ease back then, was the person closest to him," he finally answered.
"Kita," Naruto whispered.
"But then why didn't she?" Sai turned to listen in on the conversation.
"Even though they had always been friends, ever since Itachi left Kitana has for some reason kept her distance from Sasuke," Kakashi explained. Sai frowned and had some more ramen from the bowl in front of him. "Maybe she felt betrayed by Itachi and Sasuke just reminded her too much of his brother," he said in-between mouthfuls. "I don't think that was it," Kakashi responded, "she has never shown any anger whatsoever directed towards Itachi. And at that point it was only Sasuke who she was avoiding. I think Kitana might have known something back then that we didn't."
"Now, I need you to lay very still for me, Nini. Can you do that?" Kitana asked the scared little girl that laid out on the operating table in front of her. "This won't hurt one bit," she reassured child when she saw the terrified expression in her big brown eyes.
Nini hesitantly nodded as Kitana smiled down upon her.
"Good. Don't be scared. You're in good hands now," Kitana said as she washed her hands in the bowl that she had set up on the small table next to her. She placed her hands slightly above Nini's body and slowly moved them down towards her legs. She positioned her hands right above Nini's left shin and closed her eyes.
Slowly and gradually she let fixed amounts of her chakra flow to her hands, carefully molding it into the desired state with her mind. Once she was satisfied with the result, she let her chakra flow gently into Nini's tiny body.
"What are you doing?" Nini's fragile voice sounded suddenly.
Kitana smiled at her reassuringly. "It's fairly simple really," she replied slowly, careful not to break her concentration, "I possess water-type and earth-type chakra, which I can use to perform certain techniques." Nini frowned and tiny wrinkles crept on her forehead. "What kind of techniques?" she asked. Kitana didn't respond at first. With closed eyes she focused on the hard parts of Nini's leg, she sensed were the bone was positioned and little by little moved her chakra towards it. Again she started to manipulate her chakra, bending it and kneading it until it was just right.
"The technique I use requires a lot of concentration. I use my affinity for water to transform my chakra into water, enabling it to enter the human body that consists for seventy percent of water. Once I am inside I use my affinity for earth to detect the minerals inside the body, in this case your bones. By comparing the densities of the minerals I can detect fractures and then use my earth-chakra to heal them." Nini's eyes grew wide as she gazed at Kitana in awe.
"Heal them? But How?" she inquired.
Kitana smiled softly. "I transform my chakra to have the same mineral composition as the bone and incorporate it in the fracture in order to mend it," she replied. "Now, I need you be very still, Nini. Right now I really need to focus."
Kitana wiped the sweat from her forehead and let herself plop down in a chair as she breathed heavily. She was always exhausted at the end of the day. She made it all sound so simple when she explained her healing technique to Nini, but the reality was there was a lot more to it. Sure, the principle was fairly straightforward, but the execution required a lot of skill and discipline. It cost her a great deal of energy to concentrate on her chakra and manipulate its nature, especially once it was inside a body. The host's defense mechanisms were constantly trying to expel her chakra from the body and it took a lot of effort to overcome that.
"Kita!" she heard a small voice call out to her. She opened her eyes to see Nini wobbling towards her on her crutches as her parents followed her.
"How are you feeling?" Kitana asked as she gently stroked the little girl's hair.
"I'm a lot better! You were right, it didn't hurt one bit," Nini chimed happily and beamed up at Kitana. "Thank you so much, Kita," a woman's voice said.
Kitana looked to see Nini's mother smiling down at her. "It's my pleasure. We couldn't let your little girl sit around with a broken leg, could we?" she replied, winking at her patient. "Just promise me you'll be careful the first few days and come back next week for a follow-up," she added.
"I promise," Nini said in a serious tone as she solemnly held up her left hand. "Let's go home now, sweetie," her father said, placing a hand on her shoulder. "Okay, daddy. Bye, Kita. And thanks again!" she said with a smile as she waved and walked towards the door with her parents. But before she stepped out, she turned around and looked at Kitana with sparkling eyes.
"You know, up until now I always wanted to be teacher as a grown up, but I don't want that anymore. I want to go to the Academy and be an awesome Shinobi just like you," she said, determination evident in her voice.
Kitana's eyes grew dark and she turned her head away from the door.
"Come, Nini, we must go," her mother said nervously as she quickly ushered her daughter outside, all the while desperately avoiding Kitana's gaze.
After they had left, Kitana stood up and walked towards the window of her small clinic. She had been healing people fulltime for the past three years. She had figured that even though she might not have wanted to be a Shinobi anymore, she still felt a strong need to help the people of the Hidden Leaf. She had decided to use her abilities to tend only to civilians, but never Shinobi. They had their own to take care of them. She refused to be part of the world that had taken everything she held dear from her. Her family, her closest friend and her sensei. The Third Hokage had been her last link to Shinobi world and the day he died that link broke.
Kitana sighed deeply as she looked out the window at the village and the people in it. Her eyes traveled across the streets as she saw her old friends Shino, Hinata, Kiba and his dog Akamaru pass by. Kitana averted her eyes from them and looked up at the Hokage faces carved in the mountains.
"Sensei," she whispered as her eyes trailed the features of the Third's face. Her heart rate sped up and her breathing became unstable as the image of her lifeless mentor reappeared before her eyes. He had been more than merely a teacher to her. When her parents had died, he had taken her in, loved her like she was his own and had always guided her on her path of life.
"But he is not here to do that anymore," she scolded herself, "now you only have yourself to depend on."
