Author's Note: From here, updates will really take a long time. Thanks for reading, by the way.
Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto. Masashi Kishimoto has still all rights reserved.
Changing Motives
Chapter 2 – The Mission
Naruto suddenly opened his eyes, already demanding for a reason why he had to.
As if already scripted and had been taken into his head, Naruto raised himself from the bed, putting himself into a sitting position. Slowly, he turned his head to the alarm clock to know what ungodly time was it that he had awoken at. Narrowing his eyes to clearly see the image from the intelligent human invention known as clock, Naruto tried to make out the meaning of the image laid in front of him.
Three… Three… He yawned, breaking his first attempt to discern the time. Three-fifty-eight… He returned his gaze in front of him, analyzing in his mind what he had just read. It took him almost nine and a half second for realization to take place. Three-fifty-eight?! He shouted in his mind. What on this world is happening to me?! He stood up; the opposite of what his mind was telling him. Damn! Even my body continues to resist me! After already accepting the defiance his body did, Naruto sighed at the ever-dark mornings that he must grow accustomed to. Inability to adapt would lessen his chances of survival.
"For a ninja, dying because of waking up a bit earlier than the last is just unacceptable." He was able to say aloud, but not minding if someone would hear him or not. The stone wall of his apartment in one of those rock towers in Iwagakure was so thick that it had become soundproof.
Since everything that he had been doing in every morning was already as good as memorized in his mind, Naruto did every morning rituals of his as if he was a dead person walking without any consciousness at all. He only felt that he had finished everything if he already reached out and touched the soft fabric that held the metal plate of his forehead protector, muttering a small 'oh' as if nothing happened at all. He tied his forehead protector on his left arm, as he would whenever he was not in battle or in the battlefield.
Yup, he began to talk in his mind again. I need to meet Team Obsidian since the Tsuchikage ordered me to. He gritted his teeth when he remembered that there was something to do, because he recalled that once upon a time, many people just expected him not to remember something of good purpose. Damn those people… He was able to add in his thoughts.
Naruto wasn't just the idiot person that most knew – in the past. No, Naruto wasn't a complete dead last or stupid or idiot as others knew of him. In fact, he was a brilliant mind waiting to be polished more than better. He was an idiot in the eyes of the people because that was the thing he chose. He was a dead last because that was his mind told him to be. He looked like stupid because he knew better than anyone else that no one would ever mind him if he showed them that it was merely impossible to make an agreeable contact with him.
Before his mind could dwell in deeper inside his memories, Naruto slapped his cheeks looking outside the window to throw away his worthless contemplation of the past…. or whatever. It was the past, of course, which he kept denying inside himself even though his memories were vivid. But to Naruto, the past was simply a reminder of how those people wrecked his life. The past was something that couldn't haunt him. Today he was in the present, and everything around him was as malleable as he wanted; forging a better future was easier than going through the life of murderous intent against his life of determination.
"Ready for the new day…"
"Naruto-senpai, it seems that you're a minute earlier than yesterday." Moko quickly commented, as soon as Naruto reached the spot where they also met that day before.
"Well, I woke up a minute earlier than yesterday, Moko-niichan." Naruto answered, smiling a big grin to the trio who stood in front of him.
"But I thought that your place is just a ten minute jumps and hops away, Naruto-senpai?" Sumi inquired, some tracks of irritation still present on her face.
"Well, you see I was already preparing my things before I go when I realized that my forehead protector is missing. I rearranged the things in my place, so I ended up coming here at a longer time than the calculated time." Naruto explained, some twitches in his face suggesting that he was rummaging into his pool of reasons. The frown on the faces of Team Obsidian implied steady disbelief, prompting Naruto to a conclusion that he had ran into the pool of idiotic reasoning in the dump of his mind. Stupid reasonings… Kaka–– he stopped in his trail of thoughts, putting a glare of anger to himself. It was already his pact to himself never to bring up any person in his mind, even though their names. He was suddenly snapped out from the collective physical realm called reality, to the dark recesses of his mind called thoughts. He cringed; his face becoming a portrait of anger, hatred, and loneliness combined.
Team Obsidian quickly saw the change in Naruto's face, urging them to speak up and inquire about what Naruto was thinking. "Naruto-senpai, are you alright?" Sumi asked.
Naruto unhurriedly turned his gaze to the dark-brown haired kunoichi, his eyes already lost its vibrant blue and turned into a deep ocean of nothingness and dullness. Sumi almost jumped in surprise after realizing how Naruto could tell something different in his self just by his eyes. She cringed, hesitation followed, which brought her into an instant silence.
After seeing Sumi being quieted by his eerie silence, Naruto suddenly felt cold in his heart; he knew that Sumi didn't want to see him looking like a creepy source of coldness and awkwardness. No, I shouldn't let myself be affected by petty memories, he tried to smile inwardly, only to fail. His attempt to show a physical smile didn't fail him, although it was obvious in Nebi's eyes that it was a fake one. Naruto was a master of parading some masks and smiling widely was one of his best. The questioning gaze of Nebi reached him, which almost sent a message saying 'You're faking it.' Naruto grinned wider, especially at the grey-haired boy, 'I know. Just play with it.'
"I'm fine." Naruto answered.
Nebi sighed. He's indeed a very stubborn person… He began to talk. "Naruto-senpai, actually, we already expected you to come by here since we both know that all of us will not be having missions for a while. Do you want to relax a bit with us?"
Very good, Nebi, Naruto thought. "Actually, I didn't come here because I want to relax; I came here by purpose to meet you and tell you something."
"What is it, Senpai?"
"The Tsuchikage calls for you." Naruto said.
"WHAT?!" A loud set of voices replied to Naruto's calm one. Each of them suddenly glared daggers to the blond shinobi, which in turn became the source of laughter for Naruto. Seeing how the people in the team reacted released the tension building inside him. He continued to chuckle until the glare of daggers turned into stares of katanas. "Why didn't you tell us immediately?" Another statement was thrown. "It's because of your 'being-late-attitude' that delayed us from an important message."
Naruto just smiled at the complaints, thinking of the real reason why he was late – not that he was really to attend a real briefing – for the viewpoints of Team Obsidian. Actually, he didn't do his ninja walk – the leaps and hops in roofs – because he felt the need of walking in the streets of Iwa at the moment. With the decision made, he began to walk again at the streets of the village. Upon walking, he met another man that he failed to remember the name but still being able to strike a conversation without stating at least the name. He ended the talk and proceeded to where he was now.
"Tsuchikage-sama!" Team Obsidian made a bow of apology that almost let them touch the floor with their foreheads. "We're very sorry for reporting very late for the mission briefing. Someone was in a delay to relay us the message you've given." They didn't dare to look at the face of Ōnoki, feeling that their Kage could kill them with an eye glare.
Ouch, Naruto thought, looking at Ōnoki for some help for explanations.
"Team Obsidian, be at ease." Ōnoki told the team, earning for himself some curious looks from the three. "Apology not accepted," he said; frown was all that could be seen forming in the faces of Obsidian. The Tsuchikage sighed. "Apology not accepted because you haven't done anything wrong. Don't worry for being late; actually, I was surprised to find you here coming so early than I expected."
"We thought that you relayed a message to senpai for us to be called into your presence?" Moko asked.
"I did." Ōnoki answered. "And I told that to Naruto yesterday, meaning that he could call you at any times he want at this very day." The team was preparing to hurl another question of protest when he waved them off and talked again. "I know; you thought that I ordered it today, which would make the message be branded as 'Please acknowledge immediately.'"
Team Obsidian flushed in red, embarrassment filling them up. The Tsuchikage cleared his throat and it gathered their attention. But before he could speak up, Naruto intervened in the conversation.
"Ōnoki-jiji, now that I've assembled them to you, can I now go?" He asked, and Team Obsidian's eyebrows twitched upon the title given to their Tsuchikage.
"No, Naruto; I need you for another mission." Ōnoki told him, a sly smile forming in his lips.
Naruto growled. "You're becoming devious as years pass, Ōnoki-jiji."
"I know that if I ask for your presence, you will just come five hours after the order comes to you. But I also know that you value the missions being given to Team Obsidian because you believe that they can accomplish it in no time, therefore you help them with it by telling them my order immediately." He rested his elbows on his working table, interlacing his hands and placing his chin on it. "That's why I made sure that you give the order to them, so that I can see you earlier than you usually are." He was finally able to break a larger, grimmer smile.
"Fine," Naruto could only say, feeling defeated because Ōnoki outwitted him for the moment. "I suppose another mission after some tiring months and coming back just two days ago will not hurt me."
"Tsuchikage-sama, we understand your sarcasm to Naruto by putting him into a barrage of missions that will not let him rest, but…" Moko was talking nervously. "I don't think we can handle another as big as just the one we finished just two days ago..." He looked at the Tsuchikage, his eyes still fearing not to look straightly at the eyes of his superior and his older leader.
"Don't worry, Team Obsidian, your mission this time is a B-rank in the right purpose." Ōnoki told them. "Your mission is to escort one of our ninjas to the northeastern border of Fire Country until you return together in Iwa."
Team Obsidian – in any way, matter, and form – was shocked to hear the mission being given to them by the Tsuchikage. Since sternness was one word that accompanied Ōnoki when handing over missions, nobody from the team was able to complain about it. They just looked at the Tsuchikage with some doubt if they could do it without sacrificing the rank of mission attached to it.
"Ōnoki-jiji!" Naruto suddenly burst, looking irritated by the way his face scowled to the Tsuchikage. "That is not a B-rank you're giving them! It's an A-rank mission on the wrong side of the field!" He pointed his fingers to Team Obsidian. "I'm not underestimating them – if that old look of yours you are giving me is telling me – but you must understand the gravity of the mission you are giving them!"
Moko slapped his forehead with the sudden speech of his senpai. Nebi just shrugged off Naruto's behavior, since he was already familiar with it. Sumi inwardly smiled because there was someone inside the room who had the guts to stand against the Kage's order with the reason that they could also tell with confidence. But there wasn't just any confidence in Iwa that could go against the Tsuchikage's will.
"I know you're worried for them, after all, they are still chuunin." Ōnoki answered. "But I know that they already at low-jounin level; I was already preparing to raise their ranks once they accomplished their mission I gave them. I know you are also – wait, I'm still speaking––" Ōnoki waved off the already launched mouth of Naruto "––considering the fact that their safety will be compromised. But, I tell you this, they didn't become ninja so that they will not face the dangers of this world." He gave Naruto a serious glance. "You know about that, right?"
Naruto hesitated to answer and just nodded to the Tsuchikage.
"Don't worry too much about them. They are just escorts – or maybe reinforcements and allies, as I suppose – to help the ninja I will send. By the way, I trust that ninja's abilities to achieve success in this mission and grant the safety to Obsidian as well." Ōnoki told Naruto.
Before Naruto could pose another question concerning the identity of the ninja, Ōnoki started talking again, now focusing his attention to the blond ninja. "Alright, Naruto, time for your briefing." He inspired for air before continuing. "Your mission is to retrieve a scroll from one of our associate living undercover for some time now. I need you to get the information collected for a long time now without compromising the identity of that associate of us." Ōnoki talked for more. "You are to go to the northeastern border of Fire Country to meet up with…" The words of the Tsuchikage seemed to blur in Naruto's ears, as his eyes widened in sudden realization of what the kage had planned from the beginning, maybe even before them stepping into the cold floors of his office.
The implication was well shouted inside the room.
"HELL NO." Naruto was able to mutter.
Team Obsidian observed warily at Naruto as the latter sped up his jumps through the tree branches that served as their paths in going to their specified mission point. They could not believe how much of Naruto changed when he knew that he was going on a mission together with a team. They couldn't understand why Naruto was not minding them as they ventured together in two missions intertwined almost to one, which required their full cooperation. Lately, Naruto was defending them from the mission that the Tsuchikage gave them. Now, Naruto wasn't minding them, almost giving them the impression that the blond Iwa shinobi was wishing for them to be caught by the enemy.
Team Obsidian glanced at each other, throwing among them some silent questions that seemed they didn't want to ask verbally. It almost looked like that in the silence that shrouded Naruto in his simultaneous jumps through the dense trees, one word was enough for a trigger for the blond shinobi to put a silent slit in their throats.
Goodness, one of them sighed. Team Obsidian couldn't make it for one day without Naruto talking for them for almost half a day already!
They suddenly tensed when Naruto stopped tree-jumping and turned around to face them. They stopped to meet up at the spot Naruto indicated them to come.
When the team was gathered, Naruto took a glance to each one, his face and eyes emotionless. It took years of intense experience for a ninja to remove his emotion from his face and it would probably take one kage-ship of age and experience to learn how to erase an emotion even though present with some allies! The blond shinobi pulled out a rolled paper from his vest, opening it out on the ground for all to see.
It was a map of the ninja countries that spanned some area still not yet known how specifically vast.
"As indicated by this forest that we are currently taking in, it seems that we have already entered the territory Kusagakure, the Grass Village. We should be more careful in taking this path since the village is allied to Konoha; therefore they are also aware of the enemies that Konoha has." Naruto pointed the spot southwest to the drawn borders of the Earth Country. "It will take us three days to cross the village since exposure of our presence is just deemed not an option in this mission. I've already asked the Tsuchikage that if we are compromised just even here at Grass Village, we will return without questions and protests being raised. Is that understood?" Naruto gave them a stern gaze. Team Obsidian only nodded. Naruto's eyebrow twitched in annoyance. "I said," he began to talk again, "is that understood?"
"Yes, sir." Team Obsidian hastily answered.
"Now, we will traverse the border of the Fire country in the north portion, us edging the borders of both Takigakure, the Waterfall Village, for the next two days and Otogakure, for the subsequent three days. You will notice that we are at a slow rate, but still covering for speed. Crossing the Takigakure-Fire border will not be that hard, since Konoha and Fire and Takigakure just seem not to have something against each other; patrols will simply be inefficient to put in an almost steady situation the three posses." Naruto was pointing at the land northeast of Kusagakure as he explained their path at Taki-Fire border. He then slid his finger to the village right of Takigakure. He started to explain again.
"Otogakure is known to be a village hostile to Konoha. I will expect a hard time if we navigate the exact border of Oto-Fire, since the place seems to be always filled with patrols coming from both Oto and Konoha. I planned for us to go deeper into Fire's territory." Naruto ended when Moko raised his hands to ask a question.
"Naruto-senpai, will going deeper into the territory of Fire not compromise our mission?" Moko said.
"No, Moko-niichan." Naruto said; Moko inwardly thanked Kami-sama for the blond shinobi retaining his calling of them. "Konoha is far… friendlier – I should say – than the rest of some ninja who are against us. We walk into their territory without breaking a fight and acting suspiciously. I know some patrols will spot us, but we'll just hand them over some fake identities." Naruto explained him.
"Why don't we just henge our forehead protectors into one that belonged to Kusagakure?" Sumi suggested. "I've read it once in the books; it seems that the alliance being professed in both Kusagakure and Konoha is likely to be the steady peace that has stayed between the two village for a long time now. It means that their alliance is stood only by their harmonious lives with each other, not actually a pledged alliance by paper and blood." She looked at the people in front of her. "It means that the patrol may ask of us our identities but not our registration numbers for possible tracking; it will hurt their stance with Kusagakure."
Moko nodded actively at what Sumi was saying, while Nebi was having doubts in his mind but still accepted Sumi's explanation as good. Naruto just looked impassively at Team Obsidian, the depth of his eyes seemed unfathomable to the sight of the Iwa-nins with him.
"Sumi-chan, your side was well explained. It's a plausible action, but I doubt we will attain success even at a twenty-five percent chance." Naruto said blatantly that Sumi focused her attention more on the negative statement of Naruto's comment to her than the good one.
"Sumi-chan," Naruto called her, holding his temples as he assessed how the woman took his words to her. "The only thing you've overlooked in your proposition is that using the Kusagakure forehead protector will be the very thing that tells us who we are." Three sets of eyes looked at him at the same time. "Let me explain. First of all, I don't want to underestimate the patrols being sent by Konoha. Sumi, you suggested to henge our forehead protectors to the ones similar to Kusagakure – that is technically unsafe since patrols being sent always look out for the chakra signatures, not by how someone looks. Casting a henge to the forehead protectors will basically put chakra into the thing; that will lead the patrols to be curious why the forehead protectors seemed to possess some chakra." He sighed. "That'll lead to a blow to our cover." He gave a small glance at Sumi. "But you are correct in the other aspects; Konoha will honor Kusa's secrecy since their alliance is of living in peace for a long time now – no documents and policies signed with each other."
Naruto stood and turned his direction east. "I'll provide everything for our cover; it's a three day journey in Kusa, and we have a lot of source for our identities."
Team Obsidian looked at Naruto. They shuddered at the blonde's statement about the 'source' he just talked about.
After two days of travelling under the shadows in Kusagakure, Naruto and Team Obsidian were able to go out across of the village border. And in that span of time and some grueling questions hanging in the air, Naruto was able to provide himself and the three Iwa-nins with him new identities and a real-enough forehead protector of the Village Hidden in Grass. Once they were breathing the air that stayed in the territory of Fire, Team Obsidian was giving Naruto a death glare, which the blond shinobi wasn't minding at all.
"Naruto-senpai, can we now ask from where did you get these things you've given us?" Nebi asked, which startled Sumi and Moko, and caught the attention of Naruto. It was rare scenery that Nebi himself started a conversation; much more that it was a question.
"Will you die if you don't know?" Naruto replied.
"Senpai, crediting on how much information each of us knows is vital for the success of the mission, is it not?" Nebi asked Naruto, challenging the blond shinobi with his knowledge. "If everyone is just aware of everything, then every action we will do goes on smoothly. It's a natural fact of cooperation." Nebi told Naruto.
"Nebi-kun, the amount of knowledge a ninja possesses to help his village is directly proportional to the amount of damage he can give to his own village." Naruto glared at Nebi. "The more you know, the more the enemies will know of you and your village. Do you think of risking our village just for you to know what I am doing to my mission? Yes, I want to point that fact." Naruto put the glare to Nebi's other teammates. "We have separate missions. The one's assigned to you is to escort me, not to bother me in my own mission." He started jumping into the trees again. "Now, do your mission if you don't want to fail the Tsuchikage."
Team Obsidian was left in the clearing with their mouth hanging open in shock. There was no way in the ninja world that the person they were escorting was the Naruto they met at Iwagakure.
What happened to Naruto? They never knew Naruto could be that cold. For them – and they didn't want to admit it – it was already traumatic to see a sudden change in behavior with the people they knew. And it was Naruto – the only person they knew that could easily disrespect the Tsuchikage without fail.
When Naruto felt that Team Obsidian wasn't moving from their place, Naruto stopped tree-jumping and returned to where the team was standing.
"Alright, before we proceed to go deeper into Fire's territory for the next days, we'll camp in the trees in the next nearest village here."
Team Obsidian couldn't answer.
- End of Chapter -
This chapter is actually some words shorter than the first two.
I've warned you: updates will come late from now on.
But I promise I will not leave this on hiatus or end it hanging. I've decided to finish this no matter what.
Thanks for reading and sorry for my grammar.