Where the Hell are We Now! (working title)
By Kaori
"I see, and how does that make you feel?" Bradley asked, in a neutral tone. He scribbled down his patient's responses and made the appropriate "hmm" noises.
"Well?" the distraught woman asked. "What's wrong with Miho?" Bradley tipped his head to the side like he'd seen the therapists on television do and looked her straight in the eyes.
"Miss Ryujouji," he said. "your cat is pregnant and the tomcat that hangs around the alley behind the fish market is the father."
"WHAAAAAAT!"
Bradley had gotten a job in the animal clinic as a, for lack of a better description, pet psychic. It had been Kiba's mother's idea. At first he was just helping keep the patients calm, but when Tsume caught him talking to a guinea pig in the waiting room all that changed.
Said guinea pig was a repeat patient that was always brought in for extreme nervous behavior. Bradley, after a lengthy conversation, was able to learn that the poor thing was constantly terrorized by his owner's children and suffered frequent nervous breakdowns. The guinea pig was soon placed in a much less stressful environment.
It was a lot simpler to get Bradley to talk to the patients rather than using a ninken as a translator. This left the ninken free for additional training and missions.
Kotorra and Gina weren't so fortunate. Thus far they were fired from five restaurants, each time for the same reason. Word travels fast in the village and, despite Saindaime's revelation that they themselves weren't demons (and even then most there were a few skeptics about that), being a "demon sympathizer" was just as bad. They'd dumped hot food and beverages on the heads and laps of several people they'd heard badmouthing Naruto (though to be honest, they weren't sure why everyone seemed to loathe him so much but didn't like anyone talking trash about their friends) and the owners weren't too happy about that, never mind the patrons.
Since then the two had taken to sitting on a wall near the shopping district. Invariably they were joined by Konohamru, or Kiba and Akamaru (usually Kiba and Akamaru). Today it was just the two of them and Kotorra was fiddling with the headset Sarutobi had given her while Gina kept up some light chatter. Sakura approached them, arms akimbo.
"Don't you two think you should be looking for work instead of sitting on this wall all day?" she asked.
"Blasphemy!" cried Gina and Kotorra.
"You can't expect Bradley-san's salary to take care of all your living expenses."
"Of course not, but until we think of something it's the wall for us." said Kotorra. Sakura gave a heavy sigh before cocking her head to one side.
"What are you working on?" she asked, truly curious. While Sasuke had dismissed the trio as being useless, Sakura wanted to learn more. The three could do things that didn't require any chakra; granted it was due to an unpredictable virus but there had to be a way for someone who wasn't exposed to the virus to do it. Gina had indulged her curiosity on a few occasions (which led to the Haruno household getting some very interesting lawn ornaments) but it was rare that she got to watch Kotorra as she was unable to manifest her power at will.
"Nothing important." Murmured the brunette. "Especially since I can't get it to work for some strange reason."
"Really?" Gina frowned. "That's unusual. Are you sure you're not out of range?"
"That is virtually impossible and now is not the time to be having this conversation." Sakura frowned at that.
"What do you mean by that?"
"Oh, err…she's just cranky. Best to ignore her." Hedged Gina. "So…where's Asshat?"
"I thought I told you to stop calling Sasuke-kun 'Asshat'!" raged Sakura.
"But it suits him."
"No it doesn't!"
While Gina and Sakura argued, Kotorra took it as an opportunity to test her device again. She slipped the headset on and hid it under her hair. Unbeknownst to her, she was being watched.
"This is Agent 72650-Beta-G, call-sign: Toolkit calling any Network ship. Do you read? Toolkit calling The Network." She waited for a response. "Toolkit to The Network, respond if you receive." She waited again and sighed, removing the headset. "Damn, it's not working. I should be able to pick up any signals with this. I wonder…" she adjusted it and was surprised when she heard two people talking over what she presumed were walkie-talkies.
Adjusting the headset a second time she found herself listening to another transmission, one she recognized as not originating from this world; it was about an interstellar battleship. The people here would have no idea what that was. Sighing heavily she turned the headset off. The experiment had taught her three things. 1) She could pick up terrestrial signals. 2) She could pick up interstellar signals. 3) She and her friends were somewhere The Network had not reached which in itself was extraordinary. The Network was everywhere. True there were places they had not contacted, but The Network had mapped the entire universe and had stations everywhere. If she was somewhere that she couldn't contact them from, that was saying a lot. "This is bad…"
"What is?" Gina asked, cutting Sakura off mid-rant.
"I'll tell you later." Kotorra waved the question off.
"Oh, okay."
"Anyway, it's almost dinner time. Why don't we get something to eat?"
"Foooood!" cheered Gina. "Let's go to that barbecue place with the grill in the middle of the table!"
"Sure, let's go liberate Bradley first. Sakura, you coming?"
"No thanks." Said Sakura. "My parents are waiting for me at home."
"Ah, I suppose we'll be seeing you around then."
As the three girls separated, the figure that had been silently observing them made his way to the Hokage Tower.
The following morning, Bradley got up to find his two friends already awake and sitting at the table with notepads and pens.
"How long have you two been up?" he asked.
"A little over an hour." Chirped Gina. "Breakfast's on the stove by the way."
"Thanks." Bradley shuffled into the kitchen and sniffed. "Mm…bacon."
Once he had filled his plate with food, he settled down in the empty chair.
"So, what are you two working on?"
"Well, we're not going to get any decent work in this town, so we thought why not start our own business?" Kotorra explained.
"What kind of business?" Bradley spread some jam on his toast.
"We have noticed a severe lack of gourmet coffee in this village." Gina said solemnly. Bradley nearly spit out his food.
"Hell no. You are not inflicting Starbucks on these poor people!"
"That's what I said." Kotorra deadpanned. "We need money but even I'm not that desperate."
"No, we haven't even hit desperate yet. If we were desperate we'd put you on the corner and make you dance for money." Gina leered.
"Thank God we're not desperate then. I never want to do that again."
"So we're going with the coffee shop idea."
"No you damn caffeine whore!"
"Plea hee heese! Just on ickle coffee bar for little moi!" Gina pouted, making Bambi eyes. Kotorra shuddered.
"Ugh, don't do that! You look like a rabid mink when you do that!"
"Then give me my coffee shop!"
"No! No! A thousand times no!"
"Enough about that for now." Bradley said, putting down his glass of milk. "Have you made any headway?" Kotorra shook her head.
"It's weird. I'm receiving transmissions but when I try to contact The Network I don't get a response. It's like they don't even exist."
"So then, we didn't just get warped to another planet?" frowned Gina. "You think we punched a hole in the dimensional wall."
"Maybe." Kotorra tapped her pen on the table. "I don't understand how though, but either way it looks like we're going to be stuck here for a while."
"At least it's a nice prison." Shrugged Gina. "Anyway, back to my coffee shop..."
"No!"
"You're no fun!"
"Oi, I'm going to work." Bradley stated. "Try not to get into trouble while I'm gone."
"Trouble is our pet Bradley." Kotorra remarked. "But don't worry, I doubt we'll cause any property damage."
"The best I can hope for I suppose."
I'm getting tired so I think I'll stop here for now. Next chapter: we find out whether Kotorra and Gina started Konoha's first coffee chain, or ended up shaking their booties in the street for cash; Gina meets Team Gai; Kotorra, Naruto, and Konohamaru get chased by Sakura; and Bradley psychoanalyses a parakeet. Also, it's the beginning of the chuunin exam! Hell yeah!
