Piper again! Yay, numba two! Imma go to bed after this, though, so no three for now. And to anybody who's reading this, Thanks...Oh, and the chapters are going to get longer after this, so no worries! ^_^

Chapter Two: Drunk and Broke (lethal combination!)

Shikamaru came back at twelve, just as he had promised, and it turned out that he had brought his own tent. We walked silently through the paths, me slightly behind him. Even though he had grown, Shikamaru was still the exact child that I had always known, just trapped in a more mature shell. He walked with his thumbs hooked around the straps of his backpack, staring endlessly into the sky, filled with cumulus clouds on that particular day.

"You've grown so much," was all that I could say to him without having my voice burdened with the pain of returning to the dreaded place of my birth. Shikamaru didn't answer.

Of course, the Karasu was practically turning flips in my stomach, excited to be around so much flowing chakra at once. I nearly punched myself to get it to shut up.

The entire journey was in silence, and I discovered that there was nothing I could do that would help that fact. Shikamaru was already vexed at me, I could feel, and the last thing that I wanted to do was egg him on.

I could feel, around day ten of our journey, the scenery change drastically, and I knew that we were a good ten miles away. We would have arrived by sundown.

As my luck would have it, though, there was none other awaiting me at the gate than the one and only Ibiki Morino, head of the ANBU interrogation unit…and my previous commander dude. There was nothing that I wanted more than to flow into the dirt of the path as he spied me approaching and leaned back against the gate, his eyes cool and narrowed.

"Well, Ayame Fujioka," he said to me, dismissing Shikamaru with the wave of a hand and cornering me all on my own, "back to play run-around with us again?"

I shook my head, looking down, "I don't know what any of you want, but you're not going to get it from me," I said loud and clear, and then heard Ibiki click his tongue, "I'm retired," I continued, "I never wanted this shit to begin with, and you can't start shoving it into my face now that—"

"But don't you understand, Fujioka?" Asked Ibiki, his face closing in on mine until we were mere inches apart and I couldn't focus on his eyes because my vision got fuzzy, "it doesn't matter what you want at all. You have talent, therefore you are a pawn. My pawn to be exact on that." He drew back a bit, just far enough so that I could bring his face into focus once more, "don't forget it," was all that he said before disappearing with a loud pop.

Ghost town.

I had continued through the gate and that was all that I could think, walking around and seeing everything that I could see. People everywhere of all types: vendors, ninjas, everyday people. It was getting dark though, I knew, and the Nara estate was far away.

Unable to help myself, I ducked into a bar. It was one that I had been familiar with quite a long time ago. I had a total of six-hundred Ryo in my back pocket, and if inflation hadn't changed at all, that was just enough for six large vats of sake.

At that point, all I needed was my own personal village of drunken reform. I sat at the bar and paid up for my first. It was fire in my throat and left my stomach dancing violently.

After the second, I was already feeling a little tipsy. Could I keep this going through four more? Well I was about to find out!

It might've just been my tipsiness, but as I looked around once more after the fourth, I could swear that I was looking at the back of Minato Namikaze's head. But as I blinked harder, looking into the expanse of blonde, I noticed subtle differences to his figure. For one, he was much too short to be Minato. Shoulders not broad enough. Stance not proud enough.

"Another, please," I said much too loudly, lowering my empty mug to the countertop and pulling out ten of my last twenty Ryo, slapping them into the bartender's hand. He looked alarmed for a moment as he stared into my reddened eyes, but blinked a couple of times and re-filled the mug.

The boy had turned to look at me as I lifted the mug to my lips, and I instantly regretted taking that sip, for the next thing I knew there was sake coming out of my nose and I was choking on the alcohol that attempted to snake down my throat. It was certainly Kushina I was looking at, changed in gender, hair, and eye color. Her face was right before me, staring.

And then somebody caught me from behind, pumping my stomach hard enough that I could choke out the sake, splattering it all down my front, "are you okay?" Asked the tall man behind me, his eyes slowly registering some sort of recognition as he stared down at me.

"No, I'm not," I said angrily as he removed his hands from my stomach, "why are you here?" I finally asked, fidgeting uncomfortably. I wanted to hug him—sort of, but I couldn't. It wouldn't feel right after not having seen him in four years.

I didn't have to do anything, though, because it was his grip that found me, squeezing around my shoulders until I felt that I was being smothered, "I've missed you," was all that he said, so tall and big-boned, "and you've grown very much, if I do say so myself."

"Please release me," was all that I said, and he pulled back, stars in his eyes as he looked over my face, holding his grip around my shoulders.

"Naruto," he said to the boy that looked eerily like Kushina, causing him to pay attention to our small and awkward exchange, "this is my daughter, Ayame. She's been absent from the village for a while, but I dare say she has returned."

As he spoke, I had finished my drink and pulled out the last of my money, and I was holding it out to the bartender as Jiraiya snatched it from my outstretched hand, placing it back in my pocket, "that's enough for you," was all he said as he lifted me, getting the boy, Naruto, to take my other side as we escorted Naruto back to his home, and then Jiraiya brought me back to his.

"What made you come back?" Jiraiya said as we entered his apartment and I sat down on the couch, my mind drunkenly dizzy. I knew very well where I had gotten my messy genes, even though Jiraiya's was nowhere near as bad as mine.

"Shikamaru," I said, my eyes staying blank as I bent over to touch my toes mindlessly, "he came and told me that if I didn't come back his dad would banish him from the village…or something."

"That does sound like Shikaku," Jiraiya said, nodding, as he brought over a glass of water to hand to me, "are you going to resume working with the ANBU?"

This question got me sputtering and choking on the water that I was attempting to swallow. Jiraiya just sat calmly, patting me on the back as I managed to choke up the water, "fuck no," I gasped, pinching the bridge of my nose between two fingers, "Ibiki was already threatening me on the way in."

"I know you don't want my opinion, but do you know what I think you should do?"

"You're right. I don't want your opinion," I downed the glass of water, now clutching my stomach, which was beginning to clench and threaten vomit. I hadn't drunken in a long time.

"I think that you should apply for a squad of genin," he said, and I nearly choked with laughter, which turned to a howl of pain as I ran to puke in his stainless steel sink. He was somehow still behind me as he held my hair back and I puked violently into the sink. When I was finished, Jiraiya ran the water to flush out my vomit into the drain and re-filled my glass of water.

We returned to the couch and sat silently as I finished four more glasses of water then asked slowly, "can I borrow some clothes please?"

"If you listen to what I have to say," he said, and I suddenly began to notice how old my father was. I mean, he had always been older than me and I hadn't seen him in years, but he seemed tired. Crow's feet were sprouting subtly from the corners of his eyes, and the wart on his nose had seemed to grow in size of the years.

I groaned and threw my head back, but didn't move. I could feel his fingers tracing the scars on my neck as he spoke, "think about it. You have a strong maternal instinct," I waited for him to giggle after that comment.

"You're just fucking with me," I said, trying to swat his hand away from my neck, but he just traced the scars down to my shoulder.

"No," he said, arching his eyebrows to see if I would try to say anything else before carrying on, "you always used to bring stray cats home to the Nara house and nurse them back to health before finding owners—"

"That's not maternal, dad, that's a cat fetish," I said with a roll of my eyes, swatting his hand away once more with a lazy twitch of my wrist.

He carried on as if I hadn't spoken, "—and the new genin generally only participate in D and C-rank missions, which means that you wouldn't have to kill, and for the most part, injure either. That's what you want, right?" When I stayed silent, he continued on, "well, then, I'll recommend you for the next graduating class. Keep in mind, though, it's pretty hard. They can definitely be a handful."

"Dad, I'm tired," I said, making sure that my voice sounded as if the conversation had gone in one ear and out the other—even though I had been keeping careful attention, "can I please borrow something to sleep in?"

Jiraiya sighed and managed to find me a shirt to sleep in. He was so ginormous that the shirt nearly reached my knees, even though I was fairly tall for a girl. Without a moment's hesitation, I knotted my hair on top of my head with a rubber band and crawled into his large bed.

"You know, if you had one ounce of humility, you would have offered to sleep on the couch," Jiraiya said, sliding into the other side of the bed and opening his arms up for me to cuddle like we did when I was younger. I frowned at him and turned away, leaving him to sallow in rejection.

"The apple doesn't fall far from the tree," I said mockingly, reaching out and turning off the lamp on my side of the bed, waiting for the accompanying click from his end.

It was quiet for a few minutes before he spoke again, "I hope you go see Kakashi soon," his voice was so quiet that I was sure I had imagined him speaking until he spoke again, "it would be much nicer for you to tell him than if somebody else were to."

I felt my chest clench painfully and turned my head to the other side so that I could look into Jiraiya's eyes through the dull moonlight that wafted through the window, "do I have to cut your tongue off, or are you going to shut up on your own?" He grinned and winked at me quickly before I turned back so that I was facing away form him.

In a strange kind of way, it was good to be back.

Ahhhh, so maybe it's not that bad! R&R (still not sure if this site has Ratings, though, but I will continue to write "R&R" until proven wrong) Por favor.

Good Night, world!

Piper