DISCLAIMER: I do not own Naruto, any characters, places, or themes affiliated. I also do not own annoying Grade 7s, trippy anime music, formal debates, getting paid for nothing, scary gangs, hacking firewalls, babysitting simulated children, sleepless nights, or scary techniques that take over the world.
Chapter Eight: Plans of Action and Strange Projects
Shaun stood at the end of Michelle's driveway, that Tuesday morning, waiting for her so that both of them could take the bus to school together. The tall 17-year-old eyed the house's windows warily; he had managed to get on Michelle's parents good graces in the past few months that they had been dating, but her brother never looked at Shaun with anything less than hostility. Whenever they met, Dragan either made as many rude comments as he could, or simply gave Shaun unfriendly looks. Shaun wasn't afraid of the 12-year-old; he simply didn't want to deal with the Grade 7 unless absolutely necessary.
With minor relief, Shaun saw Michelle exit her house and wave to him in greeting. She locked the front door behind her, then walked down her driveway, adjusting her backpack and shifting her violin case between hands. She would have instrumental class that day, Shaun guessed.
"Let's go," Michelle smiled, starting to walk along the sidewalk.
Shaun fell right in step beside her, standing between her and the road with their arms touching, like he always did.
"I didn't catch up with you, yesterday," Shaun said conversationally, "You were in a rush."
"Oh...yeah," Michelle looked glum, "I wanted to find...well...you probably already know that Gaara came between worlds. I just wanted to check on him before he went far on his own."
"He would have obtained his own memories of a life in this world, right?" Shaun asked, raising and eyebrow, "And he was a very resourceful shinobi. He should be fine."
"I know," Michelle nodded, "But...still. I still worry about Denise when she goes missing every now and then, and she's always with Isaac. If I you went missing, I'd still be worried, and you..."
Michelle stopped herself. She wanted to finish with "you don't actually need me," but that seemed too harsh. Still, it was true. Shino would have become a chuunin during that first exam if he had only been able to take part in the tournament.
Shaun looked at Michelle briefly, thinking his own thoughts, then nudged her with an elbow.
"The bus is there," he said calmly, leading her at a run.
...what? He wouldn't be worried about me? Michelle thought, doing her best to keep up, See, this is why we don't drop hints for sweet talk to Shino. He rarely bothers with taking them.
Where is Gaara-kun...?
That lunch period, all eleven original portal-users in the school met together in Mr. Stoica's Strings room. They all had the alibi that they were part of two bands that Ionel just happened to be managing.
"Everyone is tuned?" Ionel asked, tapping his foot impatiently at the front of the class.
"...yes," Phil rolled his eyes, standing near the sound system, "Because I'm totally helping out a band that Michelle's in."
"What's that supposed to mean?" the latter asked, somewhat offended, from her place at a keyboard.
"It means that Phil doesn't like the trippy anime music that you and Denise are always listening to," Corey answered, holding a bass guitar with the easy grace of someone who knows what he's doing.
"My music isn't trippy!" Denise argued, pausing in the middle of tuning her acoustic guitar, then remembered one of the closing credit songs during a filler arc in the Bleach anime, "...Ok, maybe dancing plush toys is trippy. But not all of my music!"
On the other side of the room, Nat, Hinata and Kyle shared grins; Denise probably had the most diverse musical taste. If it wasn't J-pop or anime background music, it was classical, heavy metal, Romanian folk tunes, or Gino beats. So long as it wasn't rap or country, Denise listened to it.
"Do we really have to do all this?" Shaun asked, waving his electric guitar slightly to motion at the group's elaborate set-up.
"This is overkill," Isaac agreed with a yawn, sitting back on the his bench, "We could have just pretended we were all in a band. We didn't need to set up all the instruments."
"Admit it," Kyle smirked, holding a microphone, "You guys think this band thing is fun."
"Friggin' A," Nat laughed, sitting at the drum kit and giving Kyle a thumb's-up.
"Um..." Hinata played with her fingers, her instrument strapped onto her shoulders, "Do we get to play after we talk?"
"...Did you actually practice?" Kyle gave his friend a look.
"M-maybe..." Hinata looked at her feet.
Michelle smiled to herself while she arranged her sheets of chords on the keyboard. It had been enough of a surprise to find out that Isaac played the piano. What she honestly didn't expect was for Hinata to play the bass guitar. For music class, the 16-year-old played the viola, which was nothing like the bass; she must have learned from one of her foster families, or in another school.
I wonder how she sounds when she plays, Denise thought to herself, trying a few power chords for tuning, Oh well. We get to see who can play 'Haruka Kanata' better here; they're going first. There's a cool bass intro.
"So," Ionel crossed his arms, "You have now tuned and are ready, so do we warm up, or we talk about the new travellers first?"
"I vote the travellers," Denise said, promptly putting her hand up.
"I second that motion," Phil said quickly, speaking right over Kyle.
"Motion is pass, we speak about travellers," Ionel nodded, smiling slightly, "Who begins discussion?"
"Pick me!" Nat exclaimed, raising his hand high, "Over here!"
Ionel rubbed his forehead, slightly irked at Nat's volume, then nodded his approval.
"Ok, um..." Nat thought for a moment, "I don't like Linda, 'cuz I think she's annoying and doesn't stop talking about herself. But Daniel can keep coming, since he's nice enough, and he's kind of funny. And I think it's great that Gaara made it through! ...but Linda is annoying as hell..."
"Then...shall we start with discussing Linda?" Shaun said, writing as he spoke.
"...Are you taking notes?" Nat asked, looking over Shaun's shoulder.
"We sounded like a forum or formal debate of some kind, so I'm taking the minutes down," Shaun answered, his pen flying across the page.
You dork, Michelle thought affectionately.
You nerd, Kiba thought, rolling his eyes.
...This guy takes things way too seriously, Nat thought, sweatdropping.
"I don't like Linda either," Corey spoke up, "I think she should die."
"I second that motion," Phil raised his hand.
"Guys!" Michelle cut in, "Don't start."
"She's a waste of time and effort; she doesn't do anything useful, not even train," Isaac informed her, "I don't know how she became a jounin, and I don't think she deserves to be a ninja at all."
"You have no seen her fighting," Ionel pointed out.
"She seems weaker than Michiko," Isaac countered.
"Whoa," Kyle sucked in a breath sharply, "That's pretty weak."
A nerve popped on Michelle's forehead, but she kept her thoughts to herself.
"She's only annoying," Hinata argued quietly, "She's harmless."
"She's really annoying," Nat said stubbornly, "Annoying as hell, remember?"
"Y'know, we all think you're pretty annoying," Phil pointed out.
"But we don't like her," Nat said, pouting and sticking his lower lip out, "She doesn't stop being annoying."
"...You wouldn't stop being annoying, before you became a genin," Shaun said, adjusting his sunglasses with one finger.
"That's different!" Nat snapped, "Go back to writing down your dumb minutes!"
"Nat, settle down," Ionel admonished, "How about a compromise? If she causes any problems, we will confront her. If no, she is left alone. Yes?"
"...I second that motion," Michelle said softly, raising a hand.
"I third it," Denise added, "It sounds fair."
"Motion passed," Ionel nodded, "Now, what about Daniel?"
"Messy hair, and can be a bit of a douche, but he can keep coming to Konoha," Corey said flatly, "Comparing him to Linda, we should pay him to come to Konoha."
"We should all be paid!" Kyle exclaimed, with a bark of laughter, "Who's with me? I move that-"
"Shut up," Shaun grumbled, flicking Kyle on the forehead with his pencil, "That's off topic."
"Going back to Daniel, I agree with Corey," Phil spoke up, "Let him come. ...But don't pay him."
"...I still don't know," Denise said unsurely, shaking her head.
"What've you got against him?" Kyle argued, "He's tolerable, he keeps his business to himself...he hasn't done anything wrong!"
"Ano...sometimes, I see him watching me..." Hinata hesitated, "I get a bad feeling. Like...I shouldn't talk to him, just then."
"...I'm getting that vibe, too," Shaun said, suddenly, "He knows something, and it's dangerous. I don't trust him."
"I don't either," Isaac agreed, startling everyone in the room, "He needs to be watched, just the same as Linda."
"Who seconds it?" Ionel asked, raising an eyebrow.
"Me," Phil said, raising a hand.
"I third it," Shaun put his hand up.
"Motion carried," Ionel nodded, then smiled broadly, "We are all so organized! I am impressed! Now, what do we know about Gaara-sama?"
...words in Japanese, spoken with a Romanian accent...Phil's eye twitched, That shouldn't be allowed.
A moment of silence passed. Nobody had seen Gaara since he went into the tree portal in Konoha. He didn't attend their school, as far as anybody in the room knew.
"Has anybody at least heard from Gaara?" Michelle asked in a small voice; she was still worried about him.
"...He's your age," Isaac informed them flatly, "Somewhere around 16 years old."
"Really? How do you know?" Corey raised an eyebrow, always the skeptic.
"His name's Gareth Sander," Isaac continued, as if Corey hadn't spoken up, "He's part of the Crips gang."
"...Ok, that's why you scare me," Nat shuddered, "You hang out with gangs."
"But...aren't you a Blood?" Denise asked, suddenly understanding something.
Isaac nodded, and Hinata and Michelle went visibly pale, while Corey pressed his lips together tightly, and Kyle's grip on his microphone tightened. The Bloods and Crips gangs were sworn rivals; if one of each gang entered a room together, usually only one would walk out of it afterwards. Inel tried to pretend that he didn't hear anything about gangs at all.
"So, what do we do about Gaar...uh...Gareth?" Phil asked, rubbing his forehead tiredly.
"We have to find him," Michelle said, looking at her ninja team for support.
"Why?" Isaac shrugged, "So you can protect him? Jeez...and I thought you were weak-hearted before."
"We need to tell him about the portal's rules," Shaun said, still looking at things logically, even if he didn't like Gaara very much, "He doesn't know how to get back to Konoha."
"So he does need us," Nat said, twirling his drumsticks between his fingers idly, "We just need to talk to him, and then we're all home free."
"And how do we know he isn't safe?" Michelle added, "All we know is that he got through worlds."
"Do you know where he lives?" Hinata asked, looking at Isaac hesitantly.
"Do you keep track of your enemies' whereabouts?" Isaac growled, making Hinata look down quickly.
"Hey, quit picking on people!" Nat exclaimed, narrowing his eyes at his senior.
"It was a reasonable question," Isaac snapped, thinking, Dammit, somebody get me away from these stupid people...Why have I gotten along with them for so long?
"Kyle, Isaac, relax," Michelle said, pointing at them sternly, "We'll take that as a no, then. Do you know his school?"
Isaac gave Michelle a glare that chilled her very soul.
"...That's also a 'no'," Corey said, seeing Michelle try to shrink and hide behind her keyboard.
"Hey," Denise scratched her head, "Isn't Gareth the guy that none of the Bloods even know what he looks like?"
Isaac nodded silently, and Denise explained to the rest of the room.
"Gareth's very secretive; he's rarely ever seen in public, but he's also an important gang member. He has a lot of connections with information, or whatever. I guess the only reason Isaac knows what he looks like, is because he saw Gaara back in Konoha."
"Then..." Ionel scratched his bald spot, then looked at Phil, "I will need your help after school today. We can try to break into the interschool records for finding Gareth. Hinata, too."
"Why's he asking for Hinata?" Corey whispered to Phil.
"She's also in my Computer Programming class," Phil answered, "The teacher doesn't know this, but what he teaches us actually helps us figure out passwords and hack through firewalls. It's great."
"Today? I can't," Hinata shook her head, not hearing Corey and Phil's short conversation, "I have to babysit."
"Babysit who?" Kyle looked confused, "You got a job?"
"No, it's for school," Hinata shook her head again.
"...You're babysitting a teacher's kid?" it was Nat's turn to look confused.
"No, I...never mind. You'll see after school today."
Tralalalala...the next day:
"A kid..." Corey grumbled, stomping as he marched along the sidewalk, "What's with you people and little children?"
Wednesday morning, all of the people who lived in or around Denise's apartment complex walked to school together. What Hinata had meant the day before, was that for a project in her Parenting course, she needed to take care of a simulated baby for two days straight. Michelle was doing the same project at the same time; both teens recieved a doll that was the same size as a human infant, and had sensors built into it to record abuse, neglect, or improper handling. It even had a timer and speaker, so that it would cry at certain times to be 'fed' or taken care of; all that the girls had to do was put in a key and hold it until the baby cried again, so it wasn't as difficult as an actual child.
"Babies are edible," Isaac shrugged, earning a laugh from Corey and Denise, and disgruntled looks from Hinata, Kyle and Nat.
"That's true," Corey nodded, a broad smile on his face.
"That's mean!" Hinata gasped.
"That's gross!" Nat made a face.
"That's...hey, how would you know?" Kyle asked, looking at the two other teens suspiciously.
Corey simply gave Kyle a knowing look, and Isaac ignored the question. Nat started to make a comment about how 'baby' was made of plastic, so Hinata couldn't eat it, but then the doll that Hinata was carrying began to cry.
"...that's how it cries?" Nat asked, incredulous, while Hinata quickly inserted her key into a keyhole at the baby's back.
"It sounds like a tape recording of a wounded cat," Kyle said flatly.
"A wounded cat that's drowning," Denise added, with a smirk she must have learned from Itachi.
"Do you want to take care of him?" Hinata asked, offering the child to her junior student.
"No way!" Denise stepped back immediately, avoiding even touching the doll, "The only reason I like Saneijin is because he beats on Kankurou. And I don't even like him that much; if he weren't Michiko's kid, I'd avoid him."
"I wonder how Michi-chan's managing?" Hinata thought out loud, with a sigh.
"She probably got three of those things," Isaac smirked, but only half joking.
"No, just one," Hinata shook her head, "You're not allowed to take care of more than one."
"She's probably ok," Nat said, putting his hand on his chin while he thought, "She's used to taking care of kids, isn't she?"
"Not babies," Hinata answered, "And not overnight. She was so worried when we first got our babies; I hope she got through the night."
HAH. ...saw some people doing this project one day, and it made me laugh...
At that moment, Michelle stumbled, bleary-eyed, out of her house, holding her 'baby' in its carrier with a weak arm. Shaun silently took the carrier from her when she reached the sidewalk, and strode beside her, acting as her source of energy, serenity and confidence. It wasn't working; looking at her sideways, he saw dark circles under her eyes.
"She woke me up three times last night," Michelle explained, when asked why she was so tired.
"...That's better than a real baby," Shaun offered, making a good point.
They had just reached the bus stop; Michelle gave Shaun an exhausted look, then started looking down the street for the bus. She leaned against the bus stop's pole, and Shaun stood beside her, still carrying the simulated baby. Neither spoke; after about ten minutes, Shaun started to feel a little awkward.
"...You only need to take care of it for one more night, right?" Shaun asked, trying to start a conversation, I hate it when you act all dead, like this.
Hearing no answer, he stopped watching for the bus and looked at Michelle. He blinked at what he saw, then smiled affectionately; she'd fallen asleep, leaning against the pole.
"Never mind..."
And fast-forward to school...
"Hey, Hinata?"
Looking up from showing Nat how to carry her baby, Hinata saw Daniel standing by their picnic table. It was lunchtime, so the group of friends were taking advantage of the good weather and staying outside.
"Oh...hi, Daniel. Is there anything you needed?" Hinata asked, while Nat stared at the doll in his arms, hoping he was holding it right.
"Yeah, um..." Daniel scratched his head thoughtfully, "Is it possible for you to take things back with you between portals? You know, like say I wanted to bring in a katana from Konoha for a research project? Nothing big; just for school."
Hinata thought for a moment; she still didn't completely trust Daniel. But he didn't have that intimidating aura around him just then; he seemed sincere about being careful. And at least he was asking for help, instead of going ahead and experimenting with taking items across.
"Promise you won't bring anything across that would help you take over the world?" Hinata asked, raising her eyebrows.
"I promise," Daniel nodded, with a small smile and salute.
"Ok, well...it's the same as taking techniques across worlds. You just need to hold onto the object and continue thinking about it so that it gets carried over," Hinata explained, "Michelle did it for the first time with a bag of food; she'd been hungry when coming between worlds, so that food was the first thing on her mind. Pauline accidently brought over a scroll that she was studying, once."
"Oh. Ok," Daniel nodded, and with another small smile, he was gone.
He's not that bad a guy, Hinata thought to herself, Well...sometimes he says suggestive things as jokes. But so do Kiba and Naruto, sometimes.
Suddenly, the simulated baby Naruto was holding began to cry, and he nearly screamed with shock.
"What'd I do?" Nat exclaimed, holding the baby out to Hinata, "What'd I do? Am I hurting him?"
"It's fine, Naruto-kun," Hinata smiled, gently taking the doll from Nat.
She unzipped the baby's shirt at the back, and inserted the key into its place; immediately, the baby was silent.
"He was 'hungry'," Hinata explained, and Nat sighed in relief.
"Whew. I thought I broke his neck, or something."
Itachi: You just had to put in the simulated babies thing.
Esperwen: That project is just sooo funny to watch. I had to.
Denise: What happened to just carrying around a raw egg or a bag of flour for that project? That's so much easier.
Esperwen: Exactly. The project is supposed to show teens how hard it is to take care of babies. And it's just so hilarious...
Denise: ...ok, enough about the babies. Reader, please read and review. Esperwen knows she's a day late, but it's a long chapter, so don't get mad at her. Otherwise she'll stop writing and I'll die.
