okay, I just have a weird feeling I should post this up early so I'm going to do it. Hope no one minds ;) for my best beloveds - weehoo107 - I wish I knew the answer to that one. I have no idea how many chapters this is going to be though I'm counting on it not being anywhere near as long as my Tales Within Tales. So far I'm working through chapter 16 at the moment. It might have been shorter but characters keep insisting on introducing themselves and I haven't even gotten to some of the plot points I've already embedded in posted chapters. Hopefully it will be just right - not too long, not too short. I'll tell you when I find the end. meanwhile... the plot chickenz... velo! - yes, things get... er, serious in this chapter. Hopefully just the right amount of serious. The idea of Jiraiya hitting on Kushina almost made me laugh so hard I hurt and I just might have to swipe that idea from you for later chapters - (or a later one shot!)lol. Poor Minato. Poor Jiraiya! And yes, I think you've helped hit the nail on the head if Jiraiya is Minato's example of what 'seduction' is about. That's what he gets for being taught by the pervy sage. I'll also admit, I laughed myself when Minato popped out with the 'why aren't you beautiful' question. Trust me, that will come back to haunt him later. ;) jini! - beloved fact checker! I think I'm getting attached to Umino too. I just needed filler but he's really making himself a spot. And I enjoyed working with the Kushina shifting image idea. It'll expand as we go, I'm hoping to give a good excuse by the end of why Naruto gets toasted turning into Kyuubi and yet comes back with all his clothes on and intact ;) As for Minato being annoyed at the lack of seduction - yes. Yes he is. She's doing it wrong! But you already know how this chapter goes :) bylaternlight - welcome to the party! Pull up a chair and get comfy. and thank you. I tend to think that relationships should be based on more than physical aspects and friendship goes a looong way when it comes to things staying through thick and thin. I wanted Minato and Kushina's relationship to be believable and to have an abiding aspect. Which, to me, means starting at the basics and making a solid base before you move upward and onward together. Of course, that said, I now feel a little nervous about this chapter - lol. silverstarkakashi4eva - dang I hope I got that right. welcome, welcome, drinks are in the fridge, help yourself. and I'm glad you're enjoying. Much more Minato/Kushina to come. Promise! and mc - always faithful, I adore you. yes, Minato doesn't know how to relax or enjoy quiet or simply be. If Kushina taught him nothing else, that would be worth the lesson. Luckily, she's got even more up her sleeve. And I'm glad you found me on LiveJournal. I get to ramble a bit more and explore ideas a bit more over there ;) and you're right - he has been self-medicating on battles (amazing turn of phrase - absolutely perfect!). And he's been called back - and now he's back from that too. Hopefully the little fox will still know exactly what he needs as opposed to what he thinks he needs ;) - and for everyone else that was waiting to review the last chapter until the day before I post - heh - don't let this stop ya. I'll take double reviews! here we go, gentle readers, don't forget how this story started...
Chapter 9:
Each time he moved his stomach lurched. His skin felt sick - cold and chilled and clammy when he returned to his village.
He felt ill and his soul felt fouled. He'd thought that wasn't possible anymore.
There was a smell in his nostrils that made his throat ache and he knew it was his own skin that was giving it off. When he touched things with his fingers, it took a long moment for the sensation to register. He was trying not to touch things with his fingers, with any part of himself, though. He felt as if it might spread the taint he carried. The gouges on his side and the gashes over his shoulder and back ached with a dull throb that told him just how bad they were but somehow that was so… normal a feeling that it didn't register quite right to his mind. A mind that felt coated with something sticky and oily, something dark that whispered as it slipped its diseased fingers into every crack and crevice of his thoughts.
He was still ANBU however. He was still Namikaze Minato. He could hide what was going on inside himself and the taint on his soul that made his blood boil despite the sick feeling in his gut and the cold of his skin… and the ache in him to go back to killing things.
Any things.
He reported what he'd found to the Hokage and then what methods he'd found to destroy it. He spoke without inflection. He reported facts. Details. Where he could, he gave place names he'd hunted the nightmare though. What should have been a horror story sounded like a budget report when he gave it. His voice stayed calm and it didn't shake or give away any emotion but cold efficiency.
He was ANBU. He was Namikaze. Nothing else was allowed to get in the way of those simple facts.
If he hadn't been ready to drop from exhaustion, he wouldn't have come back just now though.
He wasn't human yet. He wasn't fit to be around fragile people.
The frustrated, violent need to keep killing hadn't faded out of him yet.
The Hokage dismissed him and he ignored the instruction to go to the infirmary and have his wounds looked at. If anyone tried to touch him – he didn't think his control was strong enough right now not to react. Instead he went back to his apartment building and climbed the wall to let himself in his window. At the moment, using the stairs was far too normal for his mind to abide by.
He needed a shower. He needed food. He needed sleep.
He needed to lock himself in his room until he was safe for the rest of Konoha. Until his skin felt like something other than a dead corpse's and the frustrated rage at a world where the helpless suffered had finished burning through his blood. When the childish desire to hurt something, anything, to try to block out the sickness in his soul had faded.
When he didn't have to lock his mind on dark, vicious thoughts to keep it from replaying other images that made him want to vomit and curl into a ball and never stop shaking.
He was through the window and bedroom and padding silently down the short hallway before he realized –
He was in the wrong apartment.
What had been bubbling like bile in his veins, almost too loud for rational thoughts, stilled for just a moment and he was aware of the sounds of voices. Laughter.
Of life.
His vision was dark around its edges, full of shadows that were just waiting for him to let his guard down to swallow him whole but through that he was aware of people gathered around a couch, of something cooking on the nearby stove, of… his eyes focused just enough to give him the single person that flickered like golden flame and he rested a hand on the wall to brace himself, trapped in a suspended moment like an ant caught in oil.
The sounds stopped and faces he knew he should recognize and didn't turned to him but all he saw were golden eyes that widened and then narrowed.
He blinked and the room was suddenly empty. He caught at the wall again as he realized he'd been about to pitch forward. Arms came around his ribs, surprisingly strong and steadying. A body was pressed against his, holding him up, supporting him.
Touching him –
The snarl rolled out of his throat without the need for thought and his entire body stiffened, muscles coiling. His fingers, numb, still sought automatically for vulnerable spots.
And a quiet, crooning rumble slipped through him.
His fingers stayed pressed to the pressure points but they didn't push. The crooning filled his chest, a small, sighing sound and in the distraction of it, he realized he was gently being pushed down onto the couch. He sat – but his fingers shifted to catch at and hold and his fox's woman's body slid into his lap facing him. Her thighs bracketed his on either side, strangely sheltering instead of confining. The weight, the pressure of her… felt good.
He felt fingers in his hair and suddenly the reinforced porcelain mask he'd been wearing was coming loose. For the first time in days he saw things without the surrounding darkness of its eye holes. It made the skin tingle across his cheeks and nose, the first time he'd felt anything for – for a very long time. He inhaled and for the first time in what felt like forever smelled something other than swamp and blood and rot. He smelled citrus and earth. A grove of lemon trees on a hot summer day.
His fox. He knew her smell.
She shifted on him to set the mask aside and it lifted her hips from his. He reached out and pulled her back down on him firmly. It made her jump, just a little in surprise, but the dark violence in him was shifting, finding outlet and he clamped down and held her still while he rolled his hips under hers. It took away the dead chill that had clung to his flesh for so long.
Even exhausted and half a creature, he never would have be so careless with a woman. With any other woman. But she was his fox and he realized that he resented the fact she didn't think he was worth seducing.
Her fingers found the muscles of his shoulders and dug in as he moved, kneading hard enough to hurt – and to feel wonderful. She settled tighter against him too and, for a brief second, he felt something other than sick or angry or frustrated. He felt smug and his fingers flexed on her and held on tight. The crooning noise in her throat had changed pitch.
Physically, there was no way, even if he'd been sure of her, that he would have been in the mood to toss her down and take her. Somehow… that wasn't the point. He wasn't sure what the point was. Just that – she drove the sick, numb feeling from his body where she touched him and the violence at the edges of his mind had retreated in the face of a different kind of dark hunger.
Her fingers moved on him again and unfastened the filthy ANBU vest to help him out of it. He moved his arms to make it easier for her but he didn't let go of her hips or let up on the pressure he used to keep her pressed tightly against him. She didn't protest or try to slip away.
The arm guards, dented and scratched came next and for the first time he realized they'd left bruises on his forearms where they'd taken impacts that would have shattered his bones otherwise. Methodical, she stripped his gloves off next. The imprints from the bite marks started to show then around and over the larger, more ubiquitous bruises on his arms. Pathetically small half circles from blunt teeth that had never been meant for rending.
Children's teeth.
She didn't acknowledge them, just reached down to tug his shirt free of his pants and then she paused. He waited, mind shut off and moving on impulse alone.
Squirming she made it off his lap and onto her feet but it was only because her fingers had dug into him like claws and were pulling him upright with her that he let her go long enough for that. Upright, he could tug her closer into him; press more of her body into his. It made a hundred hidden pains from cuts and bruises and torn muscles start aching – but it meant he was still alive. His hands moved to secure her body more tightly against his.
She stepped back and he took the step with her to keep them in contact. Needing what the rub and grind and pressure from her body did to his. She took another step and he took it with her, following because, even gone to dark impulses and mindless… he would pursue doggedly – but he would never force.
Somehow the tugging, pulling motions had them in the bathroom, in the shower, and she let him have her then, let her body press completely and entirely into his. It pulled a low sound out of his throat and he lowered his head as his hands moved over her. The violence was gone, replaced with a low, rumbling hunger and the frustration had changed to something that had an outlet. He ground his hips against hers and one of her hands clawed on his shoulder as he pushed her back against the tile of the wall.
The water came on suddenly, hot and pounding and he winced under it, momentarily confused and distracted. Then he hissed as it abraded the open flesh on his other shoulder. It hurt, it hurt badly enough that his vision went black and yet…
Oh… thank any kind deity and fate that still existed in the world… it felt good. It felt – clean.
He shut his eyes and let his head sag forward and suddenly he was simply tired. Tired and worn out and wishing he remembered how to cry. His exhale went on forever and he was vaguely aware, when he opened his eyes, of a red head near his nose and long, barely there fingers slowly lifting the shirt where the blood had dried it to his wounds.
"Little fox…" he finally managed it and the sound came out broken and raw. She crooned at him and the top of her nose nudged at his throat and the underside of his jaw. Her arms were still around him even as she maneuvered the shirt, so he shut his eyes and held on to her.
The shower went by in odd fits. He was aware of his shirt coming off. At some point he realized he was barefoot. He smelled soap and long fingered hands were rubbing suds over him with a kneading efficiency that brought life back to his numb skin. He felt strands of wet red hair as he tangled them around his fingers again and again. There was a scalp massage that almost made his knees buckle and he sagged, but the slender form in front of him was strong enough to keep him from falling. Shampoo washed down over his cheeks and he could smell rosemary and mint and knew it was the little fox's and that he smelled like her now. The water finally shut off and the next thing he knew she was leading him into her bedroom.
For some reason he found it funny that she'd stripped him entirely… but left his pants on.
"Change." He found a pair of his own pants, clean and comfortable, pressed into his hands and he did as instructed, wondering when she'd been given access to his clothes and why she'd taken them when she had. She moved around the room, pulling thick blankets over all the open windows. Making a den, it occurred to him belatedly.
Then she was urging him to sit down on the bed and he was tugging her with him, wanting the weight and friction and pressure of her in his lap again but she was wiggling out of his grip.
"Food," she instructed and managed to weasel her way free. He watched her disappear out the bedroom door and then frowned and leaned down without thinking about it to pick up his wet ANBU pants and drape them over a chair. She came back and there was a flurry of soft pushes and clicking noises from her tongue until he was sitting down on the bed again. He reached for her but she pushed a warm bowl into his hands instead.
Ramen. For some reason, it almost broke him. But she sat down behind him on the bed and her bare legs slipped forward on either side of him to wrap around his waist. It steadied him and, methodical, he ate while she stitched up where the claws had laid his shoulder blade open and then inspected his ribs, carefully cleaning out the punctures. He ignored it as best as he could and only paused in his eating when it was at its worse. Her crooning made it easier than he would have expected.
He finished the bowl and sat with it in his hands, head bowed as she finished her work on his abused body. He thought… he thought but couldn't be sure that he felt the soothing heat of foreign chakra prodding at the stitched sections of his skin. The bowl was slipped out of his slack hands and he felt nudges.
"Sleep," her voice instructed, the word almost a croon itself.
"Can you stop the dreams?" he was too tired for pride, too exhausted and finally warm and human feeling again.
"Of course," her voice was soft and she was drawing back sheets and blankets for him that felt cool and smelled clean and freshly washed. "I will dream for you."
That would – he thought that would work. She reached out to prod him again and he caught her and dragged her down onto the bed. She finally let him. The exhaustion was winning – but restlessness still gnawed at him. She lay on the bed on her back, hair across the white of the pillows like streams of fire, gold eyes ancient and soft as they watched him. He wouldn't be able to sleep on his back the way he usually did. Instead, he shifted over her and settled on his stomach between her legs. It was too intimate – and he didn't care. He needed her weight and the pressure of her body and he couldn't hold her on his chest the way he was used to. Moving, he rested his head in the curve between her shoulder and chest and exhaled. Under his cheek he could feel the steady beat of her heart and she made a soft sound in her throat. She was dry. He wondered how she managed that when she had been in the shower with him. Kitsune magic…
Slender arms came up and around him, careful of his wounded shoulder and it felt right. It felt… comforting… His eyes were too hot and dry to leave open anymore and he shut them, content to never move again. He felt her legs rub up against his and her long fingers trailed through his hair.
"Yondaime…" she murmured softly and he was surprised, as he drowned in sleep, to find his lips relaxing at their edges and, barely, curving upward.
True to her word, he dreamed fox dreams. His world was full of vibrant scents that all but glowed with rich textured colors and he ran on four paws low to the ground. He felt the freedom of wind in the fur that covered his small compact body and the contentment of lying curled in a tumble of siblings. Long jaws snapped at incandescent beetles and he knew the pleasure of lying in the dirt while the sun baked down on him. He wandered hidden paths that he knew without remembering how. He wandered the dappled woods and sun warmed fields for a long time.
It felt… too long.
He raised his nose from the turtle he'd been investigating lazily and listened as the wind rippled over the tall grass and the trees that bordered it. Barely there a sound came to him and it was so faint he almost ignored it. Except it came again and he felt the way it shivered under his skin and filled him with energy and the desire to find it. He left the turtle and stretched his long legs, reveling in the feel of muscles coiling and releasing in perfect tandem. The earth felt good under his paws and where the grass brushed against his fur it was soothing. The path through the trees broke and he recognized the old ruined shack. He recognized the woman in front of it and knew she was just like him for all that she'd lost her beautiful fur and had to balance awkward and fragile on two legs. Even without the perfection of her smaller body… he thought she was so beautiful she made his heart hurt in his chest.
Three bounds brought him to her and one more leap had him in her opening arms. She was laughing and the sound made his insides vibrate with helpless pleasure. He lapped at her throat and cheeks to hear it again and basked in the rewarding sound. Her body had fingers, beautiful, wonderful fingers and she used them to scratch all the best places through his thick fur.
The world was beautiful and he'd never been so happy. He thought his small body might burst with it.
He woke up in the dark and felt utterly disoriented for a long moment before the constant burning throb along his shoulder reminded him where – and what – he was. Inhaling helped a little but somehow the scents of fox and fresh sheets and soap seemed shallow compared to what he had been able to smell in his dream. He had an arm wrapped around a pillow, not a woman's body, and he slit his eyes open.
He hadn't needed to. He'd already known the room was empty of the feel of her.
His mouth felt dry and when he sat up the world went black for a moment. How long had he been asleep? He was just starting to stand, surprised that it wasn't more difficult than it was, that his body didn't ache the way he'd expected it to, when he heard the tapping sound again. Knowing what it meant – and wondering with suddenly narrow eyes who was sneaking into his fox's bedroom – he walked over and slid one of the blankets free of the window, careful to stay to the side so he offered no silhouette as a target. Outside, it was night and Konaha lay silent. A man already dressed in ANBU garb with the face of a raven looked back at him from the windowsill.
"The Hokage says you are to lead us back the way you came." If there was any surprise at finding him in a bedroom that wasn't his there was no indication. But the man was ANBU. "He thinks there may be one of the Hidden Villages responsible for what you saw."
He nodded and pulled himself smoothly up onto the sill next to the man. His shoulder felt far too functional.
"I have back-up equipment in my apartment. Tell the Hokage I'll be there soon."
The other ANBU was gone with a nod and Minato looked back into the bedroom. She wasn't there.
He didn't know where she'd gone.
Soundless he pulled himself up the side of the building and minutes later was headed for the Hokage's apartments. He'd left a note for her on his bed. It seemed foolish – but he wouldn't run away without a word either. It simply said:
"I'll come back."
If there was anything else to add, he couldn't think of what it should be.
