Chapter 4: Four Swords to Lean on
"Hey, Naruto, get in here!" He grimaced as their neighbour underneath whacked their floor with a broom and shouted about quiet. Neechan hadn't been that loud, but the hussy always complained. He put aside his scribbles and scurried out of his room and down the hall towards hers.
"Yeah?" It always made him feel odd to be in her room. It wasn't like any of the other girls' rooms in the orphanage. For one thing, there wasn't a scrap of pink anywhere. Her walls were tan, her floor was wood, and her curtains were white and plain. The only colourful things were the clothes in her closet and the three paintings on her walls: one of a fountain in a garden, another of a big cat sleeping in a tree, and the last of a wolf on a cliff howling at the moon.
"Get in here," she commanded as she dragged the laundry hamper out of her closet. He raced forwards and helped her pull the heavy thing into the middle of the room. "Today you are going to start learning how to take care of yourself. I'm going to teach you how to do laundry. You can help me every time I do it from now on."
He nodded under her intent gaze. This might be fun.
"First, we have to sort colours. All the lighter colours go together, as do the brighter colours, the intense colours, and the dark colours." After a quick demonstration, they sorted until the hamper was empty. "The reason we separate the clothes out is because the different colours are made by different dyes."
"Dyes?"
"Like the inks we use for writing. They change the colours of clothes. Every colour can only be washed in a certain temperature." He made a mental note about that. Changing the colours of things could be useful in his next pranks. He would have to ask her later where he could get some of these dyes and how to use them.
"Temperature?" he asked, unfamiliar with the word.
"How hot or cold something is. The light colours like whites and pale pastel shades don't have much dye in them, so we wash them at a much hotter temperature. Here, let's put the whites back into the hamper and wash them first."
He led the way down the steps to the basement. He froze when he found their neighbour from upstairs using one of the dryers.
"What's the matter?" his sister asked as she used her hip to shove the door open a bit wider. She froze too. "Good afternoon, Ryusaki-san."
He kept glaring, stopped the dryer, pulling his half-finished load out, and shoved past them.
Naruto stuck out his tongue at Ryusaki's back. He would have loved to yell horrible things after the man, but Riko-nee had made him promise to ignore their neighbours' rudeness. He didn't all the time, but ignoring her rule in front of her would get his ear twisted.
"There's no changing him," she grumbled as she whipped the door to the washing machine open. "Good thing you held your tongue or he'd start using permanent markers to deface our door instead of chalk."
"I don't like him, dattebayo. Why is he always so mean? We didn't do anything to him."
"Don't worry about it. So long as he doesn't smack you around, you leave him alone. He's holding himself back. He's very angry all the time because he lost his wife almost six years ago in the attack. She was a ninja, so he's always grumpy when someone reminds him of her. Just be polite to his face and you should be all right. If something else does happen, you tell the ANBU or me. We'll deal with it." She nodded determinedly to herself before starting to explain about the magic of stain remover.
Summer was hot, muggy, and evil and seemed to make Riko-nee vile. Naruto hadn't thought it was possible for an adult to have more energy than he did. He was proven wrong on a Friday afternoon in late July. He had been napping in his room, lethargic in the heat, when he heard the key scrape in the lock. He glanced up at Dog, who crouched against the wall in the kitchen that Naruto could see through his open door. Dog's weird hair was drooping in the heat; it was a blistering thirty-two degrees outside according to one of the guys in the market, whatever that meant.
The wave of cooler air that the opening door brought in was beautiful. Dog relaxed and Naruto was appalled when his sister almost bounced into the room from the sound of her soft shoes on the wooden floor.
"Naruto, you here?"
He reluctantly rolled off of his futon and staggered over to lean against his door. His sister was unbearably hyper. He couldn't believe it. It was almost as if the heat was making her happier.
"Why do you look so tired? Rough day?"
He shrugged wearily, yawning widely
"It's nice and warm outside." His sister was insane. Nice and warm? Had she even been outside?
"You're crazy," he told her with a scowl.
Her happy mood dampened significantly. "Hmm, maybe so, but it's far warmer where I come from. We're nearer to the equator there. Thirty-two degrees isn't bad when it gets over forty down there. Anyway, we're not staying here this weekend."
"But I like it here!" he protested petulantly, rubbing at his eyes, and wondered if maybe he could go jump in a stream.
"I've been stuck around here for almost three months now. I need to get out of this village or I'm going to explode. Deskwork is boring. Doing math all the time is boring. Reading books all the time is boring. We're getting out of here." Something about her tone suggested that there were reasons she wasn't saying.
"I don't want to come," he whined. He liked the village. He didn't want to leave. Who knew if there would be ramen where they were going? They were supposed to go to Ichiraku's tomorrow too. She had promised every Saturday.
"It'll be cooler where we're going. Pack some clothes that you don't mind getting really dirty."
Naruto glared at her back as she headed for her room and sent a beseeching look at Dog, who stared back blankly from behind his mask. Stomping his foot angrily, Naruto headed back into his room and sat down firmly on his bed. He wasn't going to go!
"Naruto?" His pout deepened and he clutched at his bed when Riko-nee appeared in the door with a bag slung over her shoulder. "Please pack," she cajoled.
He shook his head. He refused to be cowed even when she stepped into his room. "You can't come in!"
Her forward momentum slackened, but her expression stilled. Naruto suddenly had the feeling that this was going to be worse than her monthly weird week. She pivoted abruptly and stalked out his door, past Dog, and into the kitchen, where she began packing food into her heavy canvas backpack. He watched her with a worried scowl, wondering why she had changed into the clothes she used when she went running and why she had carefully tied her long hair up. She usually left it down except for her clip.
Once she finished with whatever she was doing in the kitchen, she disappeared into the living room, and he heard one of the closets in the hall opening up. Something clanked as she stuffed it into her pack and then a heavy thump echoed by the door. He anxiously peaked out his door and stared at the hiking boots that she had dropped.
"Naruto," she said calmly, "I'm going. Do you want to stay here by yourself and cook by yourself and pay for ramen by yourself, or are you going to come with me? You have thirty seconds to decide or I'm walking right out this door without you."
"Where are we going?" he asked.
"I've heard that there are some lakes and marshes nearby. I want to go see them. I think you can keep up with me, so I want you to come too. I thought it would be fun, but you obviously don't agree."
"Lakes?" he muttered, glancing at Dog.
"Fifteen seconds," she told him, her voice sterner than her face.
He wavered for a moment, torn between needing company and needing ramen and home.
"Ten seconds."
He raced into his room, tossed several articles of clothing into his pack, and dove out the door to slip on his sandals.
Neechan shifted some items around in her pack and glanced at Dog. "Coming?" she asked, but it wasn't really a question. She didn't spare the agent another glance as she opened the door. Naruto furtively followed in her wake, watching Dog slip down the stairs ahead of them in a dark blur. Neechan locked the door and clattered down the steps. Dog had already found the rooftops by the time Naruto made his way out the door of their building.
Naruto trotted half-heartedly in Riko's wake. He didn't know how she could handle that heavy pack. He almost forgave her for being so weird when she stopped and held out a hand to him with an apologetic smile on her face. He took her hand and made her drag him along behind her. His hand got sweaty, but hers stayed the same. It was strange. Just how much hotter was it where she came from?
Once they made it out of the gates, he kept up a steady stream of whining while his sister consulted a map and then set off along a mostly overgrown hunting track. Naruto stumbled along in her wake, not appreciating how the bracken tickled and scratched his legs. He envied Dog, who leapt slowly from tree to tree alongside them.
"Are we there yet?"
"No," she called back, pausing again to grab his hand. Naruto really wished she would just carry him, but she had to carry her pack. He didn't think she was strong enough to carry both. Dog could have, but she wasn't as strong and cool as Dog. Neechan was evil. "We've got eight kilometres to cover before we reach the first of the lakes." Eight kilometres? Naruto didn't know how far that was, but he didn't like the sound of it.
Naruto sat down at the foot of a tree with a loud pout. "I wanna stop!"
Neechan turned around and stared at him, her happiness at being out of Konoha evaporating. "Why are you being such a whiny brat?" she asked, her hands on her hips. "Geez, even Itsuki knew better than to get like this with me… Maybe I'm too soft with you. I thought you were energetic. Itsuki was lazy, but even he could cover this distance in half the time at your age. You're out of shape or you're lazy; I'm not sure which is worse. I thought you would be able to keep up with me. Obviously, I was wrong."
Naruto stared at her. The mention of Itsuki worried him. What if she thought Itsuki was a better brother than he was? What if she left him here and went home so she could go look at lakes there with Itsuki? "Don't go home!"
She blinked at him, puzzled. "Why would I go home? I want to be out here. You're the one that doesn't want to be here with me. You go home."
He stared at her, hurt echoing through him. Did she really want him to go away? His eyes stung, and he rolled up into a ball.
She cursed herself somewhere above him. "Naruto?" she called softly, kneeling in front of him. "I don't want you to have to walk in the dark, and if we don't leave now, you will."
"I don't wanna go home," he moaned into his knees, which were sticky with tears and sweat now.
He heard her sigh and then suddenly she was hugging him. "You are such a brat," she muttered into his hair. "I'm not going to send you home after I made you come with me. I'm sorry. Calm down. You're supposed to be a boy. Boys aren't supposed to cry more than sissy girls do. Are you trying to balance us out? Because I'm too boyish, you're going to be girlish?"
He raised his head and glared at her until she ruffled his sweaty hair.
"You are so petulant."
He didn't know what "petulant" meant, but he didn't like it. He pouted at her and it only made her chuckle.
"What kind of ninja are you going to be if you can't even keep up with me, a weak civilian girl?"
She was questioning his ability to be an awesome ninja that would become Hokage. There was no way he was going to take that lying down. He leapt to his feet and trotted along the path, snuffling the icky snot away so that he could breathe, glad that the evening air was cool enough to run through. He heard Riko-nee get up to follow him and she caught up quickly. She was so evil for being tall, he thought, and Dog was mean for being fast. Naruto wished the stupid guy would just carry him instead of being super aloof.
Hours of walking and running later, Naruto got his first glimpse of the lake. It was sort of cool, he supposed. Neechan laughed loudly when he told her that and started down the hill into the small valley. "The journey home will be easier," she called over her shoulder as he stared at the perfect reflection of the sunset in the water. "It's all downhill. It'll be easy compared to this. You did a great job. Once we find a good spot, we'll eat. I'm sure you're tired. We can explore tomorrow."
She set up camp and brought out some marshmallows. She showed him how to roast them over the fire while she made consolation ramen. It was nowhere near as good as Ichiraku's, but the marshmallows were good enough that he didn't complain too much. She unrolled blankets and set out a bowl of ramen for Dog, who reluctantly came closer to partake in their meal. Naruto wondered sleepily how Dog was going to trade off with Snake when they were all the way out here. Ninja were awesome though. Naruto slipped off to sleep while Riko-nee talked about the crazy patterns the stars were supposed to make.
Pissing in the bush wasn't so bad, but porridge wasn't quite as fun as all the good things he could eat at home. Snake was there when Riko-nee packed up their camp and announced that they weren't where she wanted to be yet. Naruto had thought that Dog would have gone home, but he was around too, a small pack on his own back. Snake must have brought it for him. There was one other ANBU too: an agent with a strange sort of mask that Riko-nee said was a ram. Ram was obviously a girl because she always seemed to be staring at Dog; lots of girl ninja did that. The one time he had asked Riko-nee about it, she had laughed and annoyingly refused to answer clearly.
Neechan led the way again with the trio of ANBU slipping through the trees after them. He thought that they were going to keep going until they fell off the end of the earth when she suddenly stopped and crouched down, pulling him with her.
"Look," she whispered reverently, pointing through the reeds ahead of them. She looked as though she had seen a god. Naruto squinted and stared at the strangest looking bird he had ever seen. It was skeletal and sort of grey-blue. "It's a heron. He must be a long way from home. They're supposed to be native to Water Country, not to Fire. Someone must have brought him here and he got away or his parents did. I never thought I'd see one before I died." Naruto stared at Neechan's fingers, which almost seemed to be itching to hold something. Maybe she wanted a camera.
She sighed sadly when the heron pushed away from the boggy ground and flew away. "This is a marsh," she lectured over her shoulder. "Sure, it's full of bugs and stuff like that, but it's an amazing place to watch birds and other things. You have to be careful though. You're wearing sandals. They might get sucked under. Try to stay on the driest spots please."
Naruto stuck out his tongue at her back as she trudged through the muck without a care for her shoes, getting muddy well above her calves. He left his pack with hers on a sort of hill a little ways into the swamp. The bugs were just as terrible as Riko-nee had said, but she pulled out a bottle and sprayed some smelly liquid all over him before she used it on herself. She told him he could explore as long as he called for help if something went wrong. She disappeared into the reeds and tall grass to hunt for birds while he wandered around the murky pools, poking at the mud with a sturdy stick.
Because of his prodding, he managed to find the strange alien creature. It didn't seem to like that he had accidentally stabbed it because it jumped away and puffed up like some of the villagers did when they were about to yell at him. When it croaked menacingly, Naruto gave a startled yelp. He was relieved when Snake appeared. "What's that?" he asked, totally in awe of the warty thing.
"A toad," the agent whispered.
Naruto wiped some sweat off his forehead and repeated the word under his breath, staring into the reddish toad's horizontal pupils. Way cool! Maybe this trip hadn't been a bad thing. Toads were awesome! He poked it again and chased after it as it hopped away. He hoped that they came out here more often. Maybe they could come back next weekend too.
The awesome Fox Ninja stood on the cliff and glared ferociously into the eyes of the lame Hawk Nukenin. His cape flapped behind him and his forehead protector flashed in the sunlight. "You cannot escape me!" he called to the hawk. "I am Fox Ninja! I have beaten one thousand enemies more powerful than you."
"You lie!" The stupid hawk gasped, bobbing his head like a chicken. "I am the greatest nukenin to ever live! I shall defeat you and raze your village to the ground!"
"Never!" retorted the totally cool Fox Ninja. "I shall crush you here and be home in time for ramen!"
Naruto really wished that the wooden fox statue had moving joints. It would have been even cooler if he could have made the statue strike the proper ninja poses. He didn't care that the stone hawk figurine didn't move—it was the nukenin and nukenin never looked cool—but he was disappointed in the fox. Sure, it looked awesome with its dishcloth cape and the forehead protector he had made out of a rubber band looped around its wooden ears with a piece of tinfoil with an excellent rendition of the Konoha leaf on it wrapped around the front to form the metal plate. It would have been even better if it were like those action figures that he had seen in the windows of toy stores that he had never been allowed into.
He stood on a chair from the kitchen table in front of the sink full of the dishes from his lunch with the awesome Fox Ninja on the left counter and the stupid Hawk Nukenin on the right. Through the window, he could see that it was still pouring outside and that the wind had picked up. He hoped that Neechan didn't get too wet when she came home. She got awfully grumpy when her hair got hard to brush.
He had been running around outside that morning, but when the rain had started, he had decided it was time to go home and play there. Besides, the park had been abandoned as soon as the clouds had started spitting. It had been very boring sitting all by himself at home until he had come up with the knickknack game, which wasn't a game at all, but instead was an epic struggle involving ninja, super awesome techniques, witty banter, and ramen, which of course made it the best game in existence. Much better than playing games at the park by himself when the other kids wouldn't let him play Tag.
He was just about to begin the epic clash between good and evil over the Ravine of the Kitchen Sink when he heard the lock turn. He grinned slightly, and Fox Ninja and Hawk Nukenin leapt into the sky and began a furious battle sequence as he clambered off the chair and scampered into the dining room. Fox Ninja was just about to kick the Hawk Nukenin onto the cushions around the living room table when Riko-nee finally came in the door.
He grinned at her even though she looked terrible: her brown greatcoat was soaked through and her hair was a mass of wet, windblown tangles. She smiled back, but it didn't look quite right: her eyes didn't smile with her mouth. If he hadn't known something was wrong then, the way she ripped her bag off her shoulder and simply dropped it to the floor by the door would have alerted him very quickly. Neechan always carefully put her bag on her desk before going to her room to change out of her work clothes. That she hadn't done that before shooting him a fake grin and almost running to her room told him that something bad had happened.
He cringed as her door shut very firmly behind her. He glanced anxiously at Cat, who was standing in the corner by the glass door, but he didn't move. He hadn't moved much all afternoon.
Clutching at the still battling Fox Ninja and Hawk Nukenin, Naruto crept down the hall towards his sister's room, ignoring her unspoken order to stay away. Tucking the two ninja under his arm, he turned the knob and carefully cracked the door open.
Riko-nee was still wearing her soggy coat and sitting cross-legged on her futon with a pillow shoved into her face. He could hear her muffling words he couldn't decipher into the cushion, her sopping hair rapidly making the pillowcase darken as the water seeped into it. Since she was turned away, he could now see patches of mud on her back that hadn't been there that morning. Maybe some boys had thrown mud at her as some kids had done to him last fall before he had learned to stay away from groups of older kids on muddy days.
He closed the door a bit when she dropped the pillow back on the bed and slammed her clenched fist onto it a couple times. He had never seen her act this angry before.
He was relieved when she stopped acting like those furious villagers and merely slumped forward to bury her face in her palms. He could hear her breathing in and out very deeply and unevenly as she raised her head a bit and knuckled her eyes. He finally closed the door and slipped away when she got up, determinedly pulled off her waterlogged coat, and then dug some dry clothes out of her closet.
When she appeared in the kitchen and saw the game he was playing, she cocked an eyebrow at him and her eyes finally smiled at him the way they were supposed to. "Well, at least it looks like you had a good day. Clean up that tinfoil mess you left and don't leave my pens lying around without their lids on again or I'll teach you how to scrub toilets."
He scowled pitifully at her threat and grumbled as he set aside the two ninja to clean up his mess as slowly as possible.
She frowned at him and tapped her finger mockingly against her pursed lips. "You know, I don't feel like cooking, so how about we see if Teuchi is willing to send some ramen over to us?"
Tinfoil disappeared back into the drawer and pens magically acquired lids in seconds. Fox Ninja defeated the hawk very quickly after that promise.
After the epic battle over the Ravine of the Kitchen Sink, Nariko started playing the knickknack game with Naruto. She used these times to teach him diplomacy and tact, taking offence through her character at everything he said. He started out with his foxes forcefully taking what they wanted from her own characters, at least until her "weaker" animals ganged up on him and chased him out of the game. He got into several screaming matches with her over it.
"Why do you always do that!" he yelled, stomping his feet to let out his fury. "It's really annoying! Why can't we play right?"
"If you do what you were doing to the squirrels to the other hidden villages when you're Hokage, they're all going to gang up on Konoha and burn it to the ground."
"No, they wouldn't! I wouldn't let them, dattebayo!"
"How would you do that? Konoha may be strong, but if you manage to anger enough villages, they will gang up on you just as we have played in the game. Konoha isn't strong enough to fend thousands of murderous ninja off; no more than you were able to fend off the insults and abuse of the villagers by yourself a few months ago. It is better to be friends than enemies anyway."
"But the squirrels are different. They're weak! Why shouldn't my foxes take their stupid nuts?"
"Because what if you were the squirrel?"
"I wouldn't like that at all, dattebayo! You better not do that to me too!"
"Exactly: you wouldn't like it if it were you. 'Treat others as you would like others to treat you.' Always remember that. When the villagers are mean to you, what do you do?"
"I play pranks on them and yell."
"Exactly; they don't like that, but because of what they do to you they encourage you to do it more: cause and effect. If you want them to be nice to you, you have to be nice to them. Not all of them will be. They don't understand the lesson that I'm teaching you, even though they're much older and are supposed to be wiser. It's very important always to be courteous. Even if you don't like someone all that much, being nice to him will encourage him to be nice to you in return. Think of it as an exchange of gifts."
"So, if I give them a nice present, they'll give me a good one back? And if I give them a bad one, like garbage, they throw garbage back?"
She nodded and gave him a noogie despite his futile attempts to writhe out of her grip and his loud complaints about what she was doing to his poor scalp. She took pride in how she was still stronger since she didn't doubt that soon after he passed through the Academy she would be inferior. "That's right. Now, shall we fix this game?"
She hadn't given him much of a choice.
When October 10th finally came around, Nariko took the day off work with a lot of wrangling and working overtime the week beforehand. Ii-san had not been interested in being accommodating.
She was constantly being reminded that nothing was going to be simple as long as she called Naruto her brother. His happiness was worth this trouble though. Someone had to believe that. She knew from the Hokage that Naruto's birthday was generally ignored. She was determined to make this year better, if only slightly so. She could not give him the friends he craved. She knew that he was growing tired of her stagnant company.
She had interrogated Dog as best as she could (he still refused to talk to her) and had made him write a list of things that a ninja academy student would need. She had decided not to buy Naruto any weapons just yet. She did not know how to use them, so she couldn't show him. Also, she was not willing to have him practicing with them just yet, especially if he decided to use them inside or worse, in his pranks. No, weapons could wait until the Academy.
She had bought him a ninja manual as well as a writing set to use when doing his homework. Since September, Naruto had become gained a meagre command of hiragana and katakana, but ninja seemed to like using kanji, so she had bought him a dictionary to aid his studies. Even if she could not teach him anything about being a ninja, she would provide him with the skills and the support needed to learn how to be one, no matter what she thought, so he would live.
She was just about to start breakfast when Dog-san and Jaguar-san burst into existence in her living room. Jaguar-san was another agent that was often assigned to keep an eye on Naruto. She was the only one that would talk to her since Lizard-san had moved on. Those porcelain masks irked Nariko now that she was so dependent on reading people's faces.
"What is the matter?"
"Keep Naruto inside today," Jaguar-san ordered. Nariko nodded, a little disappointed that they couldn't go to the park as planned. "Things are heating up. Someone leaked to the public that the Hokage has promised Naruto would be allowed into the Academy. Several powerful groups are feeling threatened, so they are likely to cause trouble tonight and in the near future."
Great, just peachy, mumbled the rapidly diminishing sarcastic part of her brain. "Do they know he's here?"
Jaguar nodded. "It is common knowledge now, but not as blatant as it could be. Few consciously associate the odd blonde boy with the container or the prankster. Naruto knows not to bring anyone home. However, any half-decent ninja knows he lives here. Some of the threatened parties have many ninja members. There will be two squads guarding this building today. Dog or I would like to stay inside with your permission."
It had eased Nariko's mind greatly when the ANBU had stopped staying inside the apartment to conduct surveillance. Normally, she would have denied their request, but today was not a day she wanted Naruto to remember as the day he had gotten cornered and severely injured because she had been unwilling to allow ANBU into their home.
"That's fine with me."
Jaguar-san nodded and turned to Dog-san. "I'll take first shift if you want, captain." Dog-san nodded. As soon as he was gone, Jaguar-san relaxed slightly. "Poor Naruto, he's had it rough. I've been on Dog's squad long enough to have prevented several horrific attempts on the poor kid's life. The kid gets more security than the Scroll of Seals in the Hokage's tower. Even that isn't guarded by ANBU."
Nariko didn't have any idea what Jaguar-san was talking about, but she paled at the implication.
It was at this moment that Naruto decided to wake up. He shuffled into the kitchen and looked surprised to find Jaguar-san leaning against the wall. He glanced at the calendar. "It's my—"
"Happy birthday!" Nariko smiled widely for him despite her queasiness.
He was stunned to silence for a moment before trying to correct her, "But today is a bad day."
Nariko shook her head. "Not today. Yes, you'll have to stay inside, but Jaguar-san and I will be here, and Dog-san will be by later. Now, come here and help me make breakfast."
Afterwards, she helped him tidy his room and sort through his laundry. He had filled out quite a bit. Nariko was grateful that his orange shirt was among those that had become too tight. She had blatantly refused to buy him any other orange clothes until he turned ten, pointing out that orange was how everyone in the village identified him with the boy they tormented. He had reluctantly agreed after a mountain of whining and pouting had been met with a wall of aloofness. He couldn't stand being ignored for long.
When his room was clean, she let him play with her sturdier knickknacks, bringing out a pair of walnut wood foxes for him and a brass badger for herself and played as usual. After their fight over the game, she had toned down her contrariness and had managed to work him up to the level where he was forced to solve "forest disputes," which generally included territory infringement, predation, and disputes over resources. His negotiation skills were not the best, but she could trace definite improvement.
Nariko didn't notice Dog-san twitch; she was too involved in making certain Naruto didn't rip the ninja manual to pieces in his enthusiastic perusal of its pages. Even if she had seen it, she would not have recognized it as Dog-san's equivalent to a bone-chilling scream of fear.
"Get in the bathroom," he said quietly. The pair stared at him in shock; they had never before heard him speak. He jerked his head towards the bathroom. They scrambled as quickly as they could. "Keep the lights off and lock the door. Don't make a sound no matter what you hear."
Nariko took Naruto into the tub with her. Picking up on her fright, he burrowed into her lap as she stroked his hair. Her fear became his.
Whatever was going on in the main room was happening practically silently. There was an occasional clang as metal met metal, but otherwise all was quiet. After what felt like an eternity, there was a soft thud followed by some scuffling and then several mild explosions that signalled the arrival or departure of ninja. All the while, Nariko continued to caress Naruto's hair, the repetitive motion probably reassuring her more than it comforted him.
Finally, there was a gentle knock on the door. Jaguar-san's voice came through, but Nariko kept Naruto quiet until she heard the safe word. "Nariko-san, it's okay to come out. Even the bijuu would sleep peacefully now."
Nariko set Naruto on his feet and fumbled for the latch in the darkness. They blinked in the bright hallway light. There were no signs of a fight anywhere. Jaguar looked oddly unchanged except for a new scroll in her belt. "Clean-up crews were already through here. You don't have to worry anymore. We got the group. You won't be seeing them for a while."
"Where's Dog?" Naruto asked.
"He went with the crews. He's been given a new assignment, so the Hokage wanted a word with him before he left."
"How did they get past the ANBU outside?" Nariko asked, unable to stop trembling.
"An incredibly subtle illusion was used. Don't worry; we've countered that angle now. All operatives are in pairs to help recognize the effects. Tiger and Dog spotted it. You'll be safe now. We've come up with a plan for the rest of the month too, in case they try again. The Hokage's taken over the situation now."
Even this reassurance didn't stop bone chilling terror and the sense that her life had suddenly been stained. That Naruto returned to normal as though this was a matter of course made her sick. Children adapted too quickly.
