Chapter 11
A/N: after you've read this chapter, know that I updated ahead of schedule. Why? Read at the bottom.
Anko deserved to be happy. As the rain came crashing down on the roofs, the streets and the trees and grass Naruto thought this to himself once more. She deserved happiness. After such a life she deserved to have someone that mattered to her, that she could wake up next to and smile contently at. Someone she could argue with, someone that could make her more angry than anyone else yet who later could make her so happy. Someone to share existence with, become a "together" with, a "we". She deserved that.
Not this... of all things possible not this Naruto thought as he looked down at the coffin in front of him.
From what he had understood it had been a routine mission. A crime lord had taken over some outlying villages in the depths of some small backwards country, enforcing their brutal rule. Three Konoha nins had been dispatched to clear them out. Anko had been one of them. It was a simple mission, in, deal with them and out. It had seemed an average, almost mundane, mission. Of course, that was only because the filthy whoresons to peasants who had come crawling begging for their aid had failed to mention that said crime-lord was an a-ranked missing nin, one with a ten million bounty on his head!
The other two shinobi, chuunin both, sent had said that it had gone so fast. In one second he had just been there, unleashing a devastating wind jutsu that could have razed the village and killed them all. Anko had been the only one capable of reacting, managing to parry the attack and launch herself at the man. The battle had been short and brutal, Anko managing to kill him before the two chuunin even got to him. Yet, the man's blades had been poisoned. Bloodwhisper poison. It had gone into Anko's blood-stream, destroyed its ability to coagulate and slowly dissolve the very walls of her arteries. Anko had died in incredible pain, coughing and screaming. They hadn't said it but Naruto knew she had, he had used the very same poison several times. It always had the same effect.
Standing in front of the coffin in black funeral clothing Naruto found himself not even able to care about the rain that came crashing down at him. Around him the other funeral attendees were standing with umbrellas in their hands. Naruto somehow found something offensive about their measures to shield themselves from the rain. He wanted to tear those things out of their hands, throw them to the winds.
He didn't however, he didn't find the strength to do so. Frankly, he didn't find the strength to do anything as it was. All he could do was stand there, watching the coffin in which Mitarashi Anko now lay, dead. Death.. such an absurd concept. For someone to be dead... it made no sense. Human life, human existence, was built around the countless processes of the human body. Air was inhaled, the oxygen absorbed and sent out into the blood, carbon dioxide being sent out of the body with the exhale. The blood pumped around by the heart, each beat incredibly powerful and sending litres of blood moving. The flow of the blood through the liver and the kidneys where it was cleansed of impurities, to the brain where the oxygen was released to reach the sensitive brain cells without the accompanying blood cells. Muscles, nerves, lymphoid system, glands and organs, from the deepest cores of the cells out to the whole of it all, the bones, organs, flesh, muscles and blood all encased in the epidermis.
For all that to have ceased... all of it being reduced to still, unmoving bits. It wasn't a human any more. Mitarashi Anko wasn't dead. She had ceased to be. In this world there were no longer any such thing, no longer such a concept, as Mitarashi Anko. She existed only as a memory now, a collection of scattered and fragmented images in the mind, no different from a thought-out hypothesis. She was gone... and Naruto was left alone.
"Naruto-kun..." a voice said beside him. He didn't look, he didn't need to. It was evident that it was Rin. The woman stood next to him with her umbrella in hand, looking at him with those concerned eyes of hers, eyes that he in a fit of irrationality felt like he wanted to tear out of her head. He didn't do that, he simply stood there, watching the coffin.
The ceremony had been over with in a respectable amount of time. The priest had not rushed anything nor had he spoken simply standard phrases. His words, pitiful and inadequate as they were by their very nature, were at least acceptable. It had not dragged out either though, being concluded in a sombre and dignified manner. The coffin would now lie here for a while, for people to say "goodbye". What kind of absurd idea was that? Goodbye? There was nothing to say goodbye to, just a rotting pile of flesh and bone in no way relevant to the woman that had disappeared. In fact, why was he even here? He should be doing something, work on a project, read a book, train himself. This standing here was idiotic, served no purpose. Yet, he did not move.
"She loved tea ceremonies," Rin said now, Naruto first now reacting.
"I didn't know that," he said, his voice hoarse. It felt like something had kicked him in the guts. Why didn't he know that fact? Was this a lie by Rin to provoke a reaction in him? No, Rin didn't lie.
"She confided it in me only the day before she headed out," Rin told him gently. "We were talking about what she liked, after a while that titbit came out. She had only participated in a few but told me that she had thought now and then about attending more of them."
"I understand," Naruto whispered, now looking around himself. The attendees were beginning to break up. a trio of figures were already heading away from the group, namely the peasants who had requested Konoha's aid. They had claimed to want to pay respects to the woman who saved their families... It seemed as though more were going to leave as well. Leave huh? That made him think of something. "I shouldn't be wasting time here," he muttered to himself now.
"What did you say?" Rin asked him, Naruto shaking his head.
"Nothing," he said, "never mind. Thank you for attending this ceremony Heisei-sensei."
Rin looked at him, worry in her eyes. "It was the least I could do," she said eventually and Naruto nodded.
"I thank you for that." With that, he looked towards the east, towards the village proper. "Bye for now," he said, starting to move towards the village once more. There was nothing to be gained by standing by her grave. She was already gone. Instead, there were other things to do. He knew that the peasants were staying at the inn by the city square. That was where they would be heading right now, to pack up and head away from the village. There was however a section of that road which went between two neighbourhoods, flanked on both sides by high fences. Speeding up, Naruto made sure he'd catch up with the peasants there. It was cold, almost immobile and fixed inside him, yet never the less it consumed him. Cold, harsh fury. He found himself whipped into action, refusing to stand idly by now. Not now, not here, not with the evident lies he saw! Rounding the corner, he could see the backs of the peasants and the long, lonely road they were on.
With one shunshin, he moved up to stand right behind them, letting the landing be hard enough that it kicked up a gust of wind that none of them failed to notice. They all looked back just as Naruto's hand shot out, grabbing hold of the middlemost peasant's throat and lifted him into the air. Their outcries of shock and fright, combined with the choked sounds the man Naruto held, echoed across the street. Pushing upwards, he hoisted the man a full foot up in the air, leaving his feet dangling, his hands gripping Naruto's in panic and his face getting redder and redder.
"So you "didn't know"," Naruto said, his voice glacial. It cut through the sound of the falling rain like a knife through water. "So it just "happened" to be an infamous A-rank missing-nin there?"
"S-sir!" one of the other peasants begun now, "I swear, we didn't know he was a ninja, we thought he was a mere bandit!"
"We promise, on the graves of our ancestors!" the last one added.
"Why not on the grave of the woman who died because you conveniently failed to mention something that would have made the mission fifty times as expensive?" Naruto asked, his voice sinking into a hiss, "Tell me, what precedent does it set if you are allowed to live?" he continued, "If you get away with this, what's to stop every dreg in the five nations to lie about the missions they ask us to do to lower costs?"
"We won't let anyone know about any of this!" the second peasant swore. "We didn't mean for anyone to die! We grieve her death like she was one of us!"
"Oh really?" Naruto asked as the rumble of thunder could be heard in the distance, "is it not rather that you'll go home now and celebrate this, not sparing one thought for the woman who died because of you?"
"No, we swear!" the peasants answered, their friend getting more and more red in the face from being choked. Naruto looked down at them, feeling his utter contempt for them well forth. These snivelling, parasitic worms. What motivated any part of their dirt-covered existence? He wanted, more than anything else, burn their village to the ground and crucify them all on the nearest hill. He wanted to, but he didn't. Instead, he threw the man he held by the throat to the ground and towered above them, glaring at them with a frozen glare.
"Then go to the Hokage's office," he told them, "Let him know you're going to petition the daimyo for extra taxes in order to pay off this mission. And obviously you will pay generous interest to compensate as much as you can for this valiant woman's death." Now he hunched down in front of them, still glaring at them, "that, I hope, is not too much to ask for. Is it?" he asked lowly.
"No!" the peasants all answered fearfully.
"I swear on my mother's soul that we'll honour her death shinobi-sama!" the third one said. They were scared nearly witless Naruto realized. He must seem like the shinigami himself right now, a terrifying, inhuman being promising death.
"I trust you know where the office is," he said and the peasants all quickly nodded. "Then move, now." he finished the discussion and the peasants all scrambled to their feet, running away as fast as their legs could carry them. Naruto got to his feet, sighing deeply in an attempt to rid himself of the festering feeling in his mind that he had been too kind. He now looked backwards, seeing how Rin stood a few meters away only. He could tell she had been watching, her face showed her shock, and she seemed to have been moving to stop him. Another stab of anger came to him now and he gritted his teeth.
"I'm not that irrational," he said, almost lifelessly, before he turned away from her and left. He didn't go home however, he couldn't make himself do that. Blindly he wandered the streets of Konoha, stalking the roads without any real thought as to where he was going or indeed how far or for how long he wandered. He merely walked through the empty streets with a nearly sleepwalking gait. It felt as if he wanted to disappear, that if he walked for long enough perhaps is body would dissolve into the water and vanish into the earth.
Anko... he remembered the first time he had met her, a small child only just apprenticed to Orochimaru. Anko, already then having her weird sense of humour, had leaped out from behind a door wearing a monster mask as Naruto had been about to go to bed. He had been terrified and ran away with Anko chasing him halfway around the house before Orochimaru had tripped her and told her to stop it. That was all she had done the first weeks, terrorize and prank him. It was only after a good while that she showed another side. Naruto had a few months into his training been subjected to a powerful genjutsu as part of his training to ignore pain and fear, he had been a mess that night. But Anko had come to him, sat in bed with the then seven year old boy, ruffled his hair and told him that surely he wasn't so much of a scaredy-cat that he cried for that, not after all the training she had given him. She had always been there after that, like an older sister she had looked after him, always been ready to, in her own special way, comfort and support him.
But she was gone... had ceased to exist... and Naruto was left alone. Naruto ended up stopping and looked up towards the sky. The darkness was falling, the overcast sky pitch black. In the far distance he could even hear thunder. He closed his eyes and let the rain come down now, not even able to dryly remark to himself how dramatically fitting the entire world seemed to be. All he did was standing there, letting the rain whip against his skin and the cold seep into his very being. Let him wash away, let him freeze to ice, let the ice melt and let him vanish into the sewers and out into the river. Naruto found himself incapable of caring any more. He didn't know how long he stood there before someone called out to him.
"Naruto-san." a voice said through the sound of the falling rain, provoking no response from him initially. Yet when the voice called out once more he turned his head somewhat to look. It was Guren that had spoken. She stood a few meters away under the cover of an umbrella, worry in her eyes. "You will catch a cold," Guren said now, coming up with the umbrella. Naruto held up one hand to motion for her to stop however.
"Being wet and cold doesn't increase the risks of getting sick," he said, "that's a myth."
"Still," She insisted, "you can't stand out here like this."
"Because?" Naruto asked snidely, "I don't recall you having any responsibility for me." Guren sighed now.
"Then what will you do?" she asked him, "Just stand here?"
"For a while," Naruto said, "An hour or two perhaps. Then I'll go home, fall asleep and when I wake up go back to work." That was all that would come out of this... out of Anko's death. What he felt wasn't going to infringe on his duties. He had this evening to suffer, to grieve, to feel the loss of, and then it was back to work. Anko was a memory now, memories stayed in the back of the head where they belonged. That was what he had been taught after all. Guren didn't stop looking at him however.
"I've got a better idea," She told him eventually, Naruto glancing back at her, "Do you know where you are?" she continued, Naruto looking around for the first time now. He didn't recognize this part of Konoha... "You're right outside our home," Guren told him, "the Camellia district. Come with me, we'll get you into some dry clothes and give you something warm to drink. Come on." Now Guren took his hand, leading him through the street and towards the nearby district. Naruto didn't find it in him to object., he didn't have the strength to. Instead, he was taken to one of the buildings inside this place that had become the Tsubaki clan's home.
Only a few weeks ago there had been nothing here but a meadow, some trees and the brook that ran through the area. Yet when the Tsubaki clan had been officially recognized and made part of Konoha Guren had been told to pick a good place to build their district. She had and then, the next day, the entire district had just stood there, homes enough to house the entire new clan as well as their coming children and families had spring up in one night. Naruto had suspected that shodaime's bloodline still was hidden away somewhere but never gotten anything confirmed.
However it had sprung up, Naruto hadn't thought more about that then and right now he wasn't able to care. He only allowed himself to be led into one of the buildings, Guren folding her umbrella and ushering him inside. The building seemed to be built after all available standard designs, a small hallway with a larger kitchen/dining room further in, a bathroom to the left and a living room to the right, No words were spoken yet Guren gave him a bathrobe and dry underwear along with a towel and let him into the bathroom. Somehow Naruto found himself beginning to resent her yet he still didn't object, he just towelled off and got into the dry clothes. When he got out Guren had already made tea and put out two mugs on the table in the living room. Like he was an old invalid she led him in there to sit down on the giant sofa in there and sat down next to him. She nearly shoved the mug of tea into his hands and Naruto took a swift, deep swig in irritation. Let him get scalded, at least it'd make her look like a fool. More and more her meddling started to irk him. The tea however turned out to be cool enough that it didn't scald him. Glancing at Guren, he could see in her eyes that she had anticipated this.
"It's like with Yukimaru for me," she said now. " It hurts, you don't know where to go or even if you want it to go away. At times, it feels like it'd be better if you went away."
"Don't try to tie Yukimaru and Anko together," Naruto said now, only barely stopping himself from snapping. "He was a boy you saw one time. Anko was the only thing that kept me sane."
"His mother was the only person to ever show me genuine kindness," Guren responded. "But you're right, they aren't the same and I can only imagine how you are feeling."
"So why am I here?" Naruto asked, drinking another mouthful of tea.
"Because I care about you," Guren said, "as does the entire clan." Naruto found himself almost revolted by what she said. Wrong, wrong down to the very core, they didn't care about him, they wouldn't if they knew the truth! They saw a saviour where there was only a man who had thought to continue Orochimaru's work! Wrong! False! Naruto found himself clutching the tea mug in his hands. He took a few deep breaths, staring straight ahead, in an effort to calm down before he did something drastic. Guren leaned forwards, putting a hand on his wrist. "Easy." she said, "Naruto-san, you don't have to be alone. I mean, I can't take your sorrow off you or make it lesser, but we're here for you. If you need, in whatever way, there's an entire clan here who honours and respects you. In whatever way we can be, we're here for you." Naruto snorted, only further and further enraged.
"So "you'll do anything to help me", is that it?" he asked bitterly, looking at Guren with narrowed eyes.
"Yes," she told him plainly. There it snapped for Naruto. He was so disgusted by the ignorant desire to help him she showed, that utter, revolting lack of knowledge of what lay behind his actions in truth. He put the mug on the table with a small slam and turned towards her. Naruto couldn't take this, not that starry-eyed devotion, and he now acted to break it, to make her recoil in horror and throw him out, as he deserved. He leaned in and kissed her, deeply too. Like with all things he had learned the things taught to him by that whore who had taken his virginity remained clear in his head. He now used this knowledge, letting his tongue and lips run over Guren's, capture her completely with his aggressive kiss as his hand reached around to capture her head as well. This was it, he could feel how she recoiled, she'd push him away, recoil in disgust and throw him out now that he had spat her kindness in the face. In a twisted, despicable show of his pathetic nature he did what Anko had done, let carnal desire talk., He didn't use it as the shield against loneliness Anko had though, he used it as a sword to stab into the kindness offered him, that was how wretched he was.
When his punishment came, it came fiercer and more powerful than he had expected. He had expected her to freeze up, shove him off her, look at him in shock and betrayal. What he hadn't expected was a punch to the gut, powerful enough to lift him off the sofa. Naruto gave up a choked sounds as the air was expelled out of him savagely, Guren's fist feeling like it touched his spine. First now managed to understand what appeared before his eyes again, Naruto found Guren standing up, shoving him back into the sofa and placing a crystal blade against his jugular.
"No." she told him, calmly and decisively, "that I will not do for you... not now." Naruto had landed with a near crash and still gasped for breath, feeling like he would vomit. He stared at Guren, feeling his eyes mist up from the shock, "You're not good for much other than lying there right now so listen up," Guren told him. In her voice was the old Guren, the blood thirsty and proud warrior who answered any slight with blood, "I want to help you," she told him, "but I won't let you fuck me with the only intent to escape your pain. Mitarashi was your friend, she deserves more than you throwing yourself at the first show of kindness like a randy dog."
"Then don't!" Naruto snarled with his breath back. "Throw me out of here! Don't try to give me something I can't even tell you what it is!" Guren didn't remove the blade from his jugular, yet in her eyes Naruto saw only more and more of that accursed pity and compassion.
"Just cry," she told him. "Think of when you first met her, when she begun to matter to you. Think of her last birthday, think of what was so special about her. Think of that, cry." Now Guren let go of him, stepping back and heading off. "I'll dry your clothes for you," she continued, "You can take the sofa tonight." With that she exited, giving Naruto some privacy.
Naruto, feeling the adrenaline in him mix with all the emotions that raged like a storming sea in his soul. Numbly, he sat up with a slight forwards hunch. All those things Guren had talked about came to him now, memory after memory parading itself in front of him. Feeling choked, Naruto took a deep breath only to realize that it shivered. With it came a pressure, a tingling feeling in his eyes. Reaching up, he put his face in his palms and gritted his teeth. A shiver came to his body, a jerk as his breath made a sharp intake. Soon Naruto found himself sitting there, silently shaking as his eyes flooded and his breath became ragged.
"Damn it..." he said quietly. "Damn it!" he couldn't say anything more as the grief overwhelmed him. For the first time in nearly eight years he cried, crying in pain, grief and loss.
The next morning Naruto awoke slowly. He felt exhausted despite the sleep he had gotten and felt like his eyes were swollen. Yet the most startling realization came after that when he realized he wasn't at home. Sitting up straight in bed, he realized it wasn't a bed but a sofa. He looked around at first, feeling a wave of distress, before the memories of yesterday came to him. After a few moments of stillness he sighed, realizing that it wasn't a bad dream. Anko was indeed dead and he...
Naruto groaned, remembering what an absolute fool he had made out of himself, both at the funeral and when Guren had found him in the rain. He had gone after the clients, quite intent on making them suffer,m and when Guren had gotten him indoors after his long trek through the rain he had tried to force himself on her! How humiliating... Naruto felt his guts churn as he wondered how he was going to be able to show himself in public after this.
"Good morning," Guren said from the doorway, Naruto slowly looking towards her. She seemed no worse for wear the woman, standing in the doorway, leaning against the door-frame with her arms folded. He couldn't see any disgust on her face however, that had to count for something.
"I was going to make a dry remark..." he begun, "but good morning to you too." Guren gave up a small "heh" at this and Naruto winced.
"There's breakfast if you want to," she said, "I'm heading down there in five too."
"You have breakfast together?" Naruto asked idly now. With some sleep between him and the funeral things seemed clearer. At least he wasn't going to randomly lash out at people now.
"Many in the clan wanted to keep that tradition," Guren said, "They always ate together in Oto and to suddenly make your own breakfast seemed so lonely."
"Where's my clothes?" Naruto asked now, not planning to go anywhere in the bathrobe he was wearing. Guren threw him a small bundle now and Naruto caught it. It was his clothes all right, dried and folded both. He put them down on the table in front of him and stood up, "Do you mind?" he asked Guren now as he planned to get changed.
"Actually yes," Guren said now, "I think I've earned a look at least, don't you think?" she gave him a sly smirk now and Naruto winced a bit. Was she referring to yesterday? He didn't quite know. If so it was a low blow, otherwise it was just a bad joke. With a sigh he discarded the bathrobe, he was after all wearing underwear. Guren chuckled as he without any real shame begun to don his clothes.
"You're not one to tiptoe around with what you've got I see," she remarked, "nice abs by the way."
"Since I became Orochimaru's apprentice there wasn't much room for modesty," Naruto said as he put on his trousers, "Especially not after he gave me the subdermal snakeskin. My epidermis is more or less just there for show as it is. I don't feel any real reason to be embarrassed."
"I understand," Guren said quietly now, some merriment gone from her voice. Naruto looked up at her now as he put on his shirt.
"Do you?" he asked, more curiously than anything else.
"I am the clan mistress of the Oto survivors," Guren reminded him, "I've seen nearly everything."
"Point taken," he said. That was true after all. Despite the new name this group was still the rag-tag collection of people who had survived Oto, they were mutants, maimed people, human labrats and all sorts of characters. An idle thought came to him about what kind of absurd end results they might see if this clan became an united bloodline due to all the various bloodlines and mutations that existed here. Most probably this clan would become a long-time favourite client of the medic nins and the R&D department both. He wondered what blood would carry through in the end. Of more interest however was whether there was any way of getting out of this. He didn't want to have breakfast with a hundred other people right now. Naruto didn't see any way out however and when it came down to it, did he have the right to say no after yesterday? Ugh... he winced once more at the memory of what he had attempted, he was disgusting...
Guren showed him to the larger building in the middle of the district and into what had to be the dining room. It was mostly empty at the moment, the low tables being put up with four long tables vertically down the length of the room and a fifth table horizontally along the short ends of the latter four. Guren took her seat at the horizontal table, motioning for him to come and sit down beside her. Naruto did so, realizing he was sitting at the place of honour, right next to the clan head. The whispers that came from the already present Tsubaki clan-members upon seeing him made him cringe, he hated these situations. Guren came to his rescue now however, clapping her hands to get their attention.
"That's enough," she said, "Naruto-san came here to eat breakfast, not to have people gossip about him to his face." The whispers stopped quickly, Naruto taking a small sigh of relief.
"Thank you," he said quietly, Guren not smiling as she looked at him.
"The worst is yet to come." she warned him, Naruto getting a sinking feeling in his stomach again. Only a few seconds later the door on the far end of the room was slammed open, Naruto watching in amusement how Sakon and Jiroubou came inside, both looking utterly exhausted. Sakon seemed to only have thrown his clothes on and had the shirt hiked open and hang off one shoulder while Jiroubou was yawning massively and scratching himself under the shirt.
"Morning..." Sakon muttered sourly.
"Ain't the food done yet?" Jiroubou added. Naruto decided to enjoy himself a bit and before they saw him he corrected his posture so he sat with a straight back and folded arms.
"How undignified," he said, letting his voice hold some disapproval in it. Sakon and Jiroubou both nearly leaped out of their skins from fright when they saw him. Sakon backed into the wall and Jiroubou didn't move a single muscle, instead looking like he was about to faint.
"Good morning to you too," Guren said with a small smile, there being something blood thirsty in it, "please, do take a seat and try not to embarrass the clan any more," she finished with a glacial tone in her voice. However, she then winked subtly at Naruto who found himself forced to suppress as smile. Sakon and Jiroubou both put their clothes into order and sat down by the tables, neither of them saying as much as a peep.
Naruto had to admit to himself, that was indeed entertaining. More and more people arrived and their dishevelled, sleepy appearances became a steady source of amusement. Dry remarks and disapproving stares made them nearly either break down and cry or run away in fear. He shouldn't take this much pleasure in it, should he? Within not too long time the room was filled and the mood suddenly was outright oppressive. He could tell they hadn't expected to see him here.
"The awkwardness is so thick one can cut it with a knife," he muttered to Guren, "it is almost pleasurable."
"Welcome to my life," Guren said, "Right everyone!" she now spoke out, "as I said earlier Naruto-san has come over to share breakfast with us. He's not here to investigate us or lead us into a hopeless battle, so let's just enjoy our breakfast as usual." With that it seemed that the signal to begin breakfast was given. Several people came out from one of the side rooms now, carrying with them large pots of what to Naruto's sensitive nose seemed to be fish of some kind. When one of said pots were put down in front of them he raised one eye. Indeed it was fish, soup more precisely. Quite interesting, he had never had that for breakfast. The set up became quickly evident. They seemed to take turns being the ones who made breakfast, Naruto wondered if they had set teams or randomly chose people to cook each day:
Still, the soup did taste good and from what he could tell it was nutritious too. Looking around, Naruto silently took in the sight of the Tsubaki clan at breakfast, analysing what he saw. Juugo sat some distance away with Isaribi beside him. Soon he would head out to work alongside his contact person and Isaribi would do whatever she did all days. Not ninja training, Naruto knew that Isaribi had blindly refused to have anything to do with it so what she did remained to be seen. Still, the two seemed very happy, talking about something he couldn't make out. Isaribi didn't even wear her bandages any more and Naruto could tell her scaly skin was steadily receding. Glad to see that Tsunade-sensei's experimental treatment worked. Zaku and Kin sat further away, Zaku having healed from his wounds, and beside them sat a third person, their team-mate Dosu who had been incapacitated and wrapped in bandages during the battle. How poor had medical treatment been at Otogakure Naruto wondered, the boy had been a scarred mess under the bandages covering his head but now his face was almost completely back to normal thanks to Tsunade as well. The three of them were silently eating, having a look of complete focus in their eyes. Seemed like they were taking the academy seriously. Yet in a way, the most curious thing he saw was that Tayuya was one of those who came with the food. To see the fierce and hostile woman do something like this voluntarily was strange.
"Can't believe your eyes I take it Naruto-sama," Sakon said now. Naruto looked at the man who currently was sitting two seats away from him, Kimimaro sitting between them.
"That would be a good description, yes.," he admitted, "to see Tayuya serve food makes me want to check for a genjutsu. Sakon grinned maliciously.
"You haven't heard the news then I take it," he said, "she's gotten the hots for her contact person and wants to become more feminine in order to..." No more was said for Tayuya was walking past them right then and without missing a beat she turned the pot over and shoved it down over Sakon's head.
"Shut your fucking mouth!" she snarled, beet red in the face, and the next second her eyes came to meet his. Naruto, sitting with the bowl in one hand and the chop-sticks in the other, raised an eyebrow as he looked at her, seeing how the embarrassment blazed in her face.
"Such massive response for so little, you only invite further teasing," Naruto said as Sakon begun to flail wildly with the pot still stuck on his head. Kimimaro wasn't even paying attention and simply ate.
"You're not leaving the district until you cleaned that up," Guren said, not having even looked at it either. Were these kinds of things standard? Naruto didn't know, only that Tayuya fled, taking the pot off Sakon's head and leaving him drenched in soup as she retreated out into the kitchen.
"Oh man, I just washed these clothes too." he sighed before he begun to eat again. Naruto felt a sinking feeling in his guts. So this kind of things were normal? The Tsubaki clan suddenly seemed less idyllic than it had initially appeared, even more so when suddenly a chop-stick came twirling through the air, Kimimaro catching it right before it hit his face. Looking down along the rows of tables, Naruto saw how a pair of the Tsubaki clan members had begun to fight over something and right now one of them was drenched in fish soup and was right in the middle of performing a suplex on the man responsible. This made a third one spill his soup all over himself and he got up as well, enraged. The whole situation was rapidly going south when Guren acted. Right before anything more could be made, a large crystal spike shot out from the floor under the table, piercing through it and rising all the way to the roof with a deafening crack. Everything fell silent and Naruto stared to his side at Guren, who had put her hands together in a seal and was currently glaring hopes at the two offenders.
"That, is, enough," she said, her voice quivering a bit. Yet it wasn't grief or embarrassment. No, right now Guren was smiling, that blood-thirsty smile she had when she was really worked up, really hungry for battle, and just begged the world around herself to give her a single reason to fight. If she got it, Naruto knew there would be little left of whomever she fought. Her smile was wide, maniacal and bared her teeth, the two shinobi who had begun to fight right now held onto each other with expressions of pure horror on their faces. "Go and help Tayuya-san in the kitchen," Guren continued, the two fighters both scrambling away with small yelps of fear. Naruto looked after the two in disbelief. Scratch everything he had thought about this clan, it was insane enough that Kimiko would take to these people like white to rice. Sighing, he went back to eating. It was best to pretend nothing was out of the ordinary, he was a guest after all.
Breakfast was soon done without any larger intermezzos and Naruto had work to do so without much further ado he got up to head out after the meal was finished. He got company to the edge of the district by Guren however.
"I can't say I was expecting a breakfast like that," he told her, "Yet for all the strangeness I saw little actually problematic dysfunction. You seem to have created a good home for them." He admitted that freely. The people here were strange, many of them had deep issues, yet what he had seen hinted that it was a good place for them.
"I'm doing my best," Guren said, "There's a lot of work, not the least with the team I'll probably get soon."
"Good luck with that," Naruto said as they reached the end of the district, "also, thank you for the breakfast... as well as other things." he added after a second, thinking of yesterday. He still was ashamed of himself, especially over his sexual harassment of Guren. He just hoped his apology would be enough for her, he knew it wasn't for him.
"You're always welcome here Naruto," Guren said and Naruto nodded.
"Thank you," he said once more, bowing to her. "Until later Guren-san." With that, he left the district and headed off. Sunday, that meant there weren't even any work to be done at the labs. He had nothing to do, nothing whatsoever, and in the end he headed home, not bothering to check the mailbox and instead just collapsing onto his bed when he got to the bedroom.
Several hours later found Naruto still lying on the bed, having remained there all this time. Everything had come crashing back for him when he had neared his home and the feeling of loss had nearly paralysed him. He hadn't even bothered answering his phone when it had rung a couple of hours ago, instead listening to the answering machine as it recorded the message. It had been from Rin. She had petitioned for him to get a week off from work and it had been approved. He still felt weak from everything that had happened, yet more than anything else he felt ashamed of himself. Threatening the farmers, trying to force himself on Guren... Was he really no better than this? Was he really nothing more than a broken little boy? It was so embarrassing, so shameful, to admit to these weaknesses. He couldn't ignore what had happened so that left him here with nothing to do but to stare up at the ceiling.
What the hell was he going to do now? Rin's message said that she would schedule appointments for him during the following weeks, she'd come over to him. In the meantime, she had urged him to take it easy, rest, give his submerged thoughts and ideas time to bubble up to the surface. Naruto was appalled by the idea however, he hadn't had "time off" longer than singular days before, what in the gods' names were he even going to do? Think of Anko most probably. Was that how this worked? Think enough of her and cry enough times that in the end it stopped hurting? He hated psychology, sitting up in bed, he let himself vent on that science. It was the single most ill-defined field of study there was, lacking any kind of overarching theory or paradigm. It tried to measure and comprehend internal processes, things that couldn't be quantified! How the hell did one make a serious science beyond the quack-stage when everything it dealt with were by definition abstract and subjective!
Sighing, he got up and walked over to his kitchen to get some tea to drink. Once again he was getting prejudiced. Pouring some water into the boiler, he reminded himself that he still had a language. Humans could communicate, they had languages with hundreds of thousands of words, what more the chemical reactions that created emotions and traumas were always the same, anger was the same for all even if it might manifest in various ways. Obviously there were grey areas and poorly defined parts of it but no worse than that they could be addressed with enough data, data that could be acquired via communicating with the subjects studied and then extrapolated upon. No, the issue wasn't that psychology would be a pseudo-science, it wasn't, it was him. He was put on edge like hell by what had happened.
So what to do? He needed to deal with this, the head of Research and Development couldn't walk around breaking down as soon as a trigger arose. Wait... triggers? An idea arose for Naruto, one inspired by his training with explosives. The best way get rid of volatile materials was to let them go off in a controlled environment. He wondered what exactly Rin would think of his amateur-psychology now that he tried to apply that to the human psyche but decided to act on it anyhow. He wasn't one for staring on the ceiling, instead he left the house and headed down town.
Thinking back on the times he had spent with Anko, he remembered many things, places and people and as he walked through Konoha he kept his eyes open, doing all he could to spot those places. He'd go there, recreate the circumstances of his last visit with Anko there and then he'd just see what happened. Amateurish as it might be, it was better than lying at home.
As chance would have it, his first stop became the teahouse into which Anko had dragged him that one time when he was being frustrated about the blood nins' secrets. He'd seem strange when he did this no doubt, but he didn't care. He instead walked up to the counter and begun talking with the woman behind it. a few minutes later he sat with a giant pile of dango, fifty ryos worth of them, along with a can of iced coffee. Anko had been too cheap to get actual tea that time. Cracking the can open, Naruto found himself freezing. How had he done that day? Had he taken a bite of dango or a swig of coffee first?
Okay what was this, was he getting that obsessive? Naruto grunted and took a swig of the coffee. Disconnecting his mind as well as he could, he sat there, slowly emptying the can as he chewed down on the dango. He could see why Anko had liked dango so much it was quite nice food. It came to him now, he could almost see Anko's face, the widest, most shit-eating grin ever on her face.
"Damn straight mister ice!" she seemed to say, "About time you acknowledge the food of the gods!" a single dango stick hung out from between her teeth as she said it, her voice somewhat muffled by that she spoke through clenched teeth. Happy, go-lucky, enthusiastic and random. That side of Anko was one it seemed had slipped most people by. Her promiscuity, arisen from her loneliness, overshadowed that and had made her been seen as a slut. But in truth, the real Anko had been a jokster more than a whore, she had always been in many ways a child, impulsive and carefree.
How had that happened? Anko had held onto her inner child through everything that she was put through. While it changed into something somewhat more sinister, it had still been there. He? He had shattered and been recreated as an Orochimaru-clone. Did that mean Orochimaru had not pushed Anko as hard? Or had he simply been weaker
"Mooo-rooon." He didn't need Anko to be here to know what she would have said in response to that. She'd even do that thing where she brayed like a sheep when saying it. Weakness and weakness, it must have been a matter of different coping mechanisms. To Naruto, obeying and becoming as Orochimaru wanted to was the easiest way. Anko had refused, lashed out and become more and more random and devil-may-care in her attitude.
What if he had gone down that route as well? As a child he had been in many ways like Anko, loving pranks and being infamously loud. How would that have looked? Orochimaru's two crazy students. They'd have wound each other up, daring each other to the level of absurdity, Naruto could tell that. Neither of them would ever have backed for challenges if the other one didn't. He could just imagine the two of them vandalizing the Hokage monument by painting the Hokages to look like transvestites and the likes. Shivering a bit, Naruto found himself glad that hadn't been the case. Still... if he had been that person he would no doubt have enjoyed it, massively. Two wild peas in a pod... If they had talked about this between the two of them Anko would have asked now why he had chosen to be such a damn bore instead.
"I don't think I chose," he thought to himself, leaning back as he looked up at the sky, "It just turned out that way." Orochimaru had set out to make Naruto a carbon copy of himself. Knowing what the man had known, the jutsu he had had at his disposal, it was a genuine question of what the man had planned. One of the most worrying jutsu Naruto had seen documented spoke of actual mind-transfer. The user pushed himself into the mind of the victim, sealed the victim's mind away and took over the body like a parasite. a technique disgusting beyond words but then again, that was a good description of Orochimaru. If it hadn't been for Anko, who had been there to throw monkey-wrenches into everything Orochimaru did, would he have stayed loyal to his master, in the end being used by the psychopathic man as his new body?
Anko had been his guardian angel. Through her random and stumbling methods she had saved him, once for certain, perhaps even twice over. And he hadn't even been able to help her to a better life... Why not him instead? He who wanted for nothing as it was? Why she who wanted so much more?
Survivor's guilt, Naruto's mind clasped down on that detail instantly. There he had it, he owed Anko so much and hadn't been able to do anything for her, there was a massive source of regret and angst. He'd have to remember that. Digging out a small note-block, he scribbled down the details and pocketed it.
Taking a stick from the pile of dango he still had, a good forty ryo's worth, he went on. The clients, that village who had li... who had not mentioned the a-rank missing nin. Forcing himself to be rational, he concluded bitterly that if the hokage, the administration and indeed Morino Ibiki himself hadn't concluded that the clients had lied then it was pretty rich that he would claim that they had. As rich as it would be out of him to speak of trust when doing that would show the lack of trust he had for his fellow shinobi. It tasted bitter, like ashes in his mouth, but the peasants had to be cleared of all charges. An errant thought crept into his head that perhaps he could at least do something, something small. Going to the village and threaten the villages with bloody murder for what they had caused perhaps. Naruto slapped himself in the face now, how asinine was not that? Petty, pointless and satisfying only his basest urges. That was not his role to do... bah!
It was what it was, the undeniable, unchangeable reality grinned him in the face. Anko, was, dead. There was nothing to do about it, no bargains to be made, no magical technique that... Naruto opened his eyes wide now, remembering something. His second visit to this teahouse ended as the first one had, with him leaving in a swirl of leaves as he headed home as fast as he could.
Reappearing right outside his apartment door, Naruto threw himself in and opened one of the lockers in the hallway. Behind a secret trapdoor in the wall there he had hidden one of the scrolls he had taken from Orochimaru before killing him. The scroll was about as large as his forearm and about as thick as well, with a protective seal on it and a red silk wrapping. It was a collection of Kinjutsu he had promised himself to go through one day. Today turned out to be that day and Naruto lit his workdesk lamp as he nearly flew into his chair, opening the scroll to begin to read it.
His eyes poured through it frantically and after about five seconds he saw it, something that made his heart pound. He had been wrong, there really was a magical technique that could bring her back. Edo Tensei, Impure World Resurrection. a summoning technique that brought people back from the dead if he read the scroll correctly. Taking several deep breaths, Naruto put up one hand to his mouth to bite down on the fist in a way to calm himself. He had to read this carefully, if he misread anything here it'd be catastrophic.
Carefully pouring over it, he saw how the technique would work. It was based around two things. Firstly the technique needed a DNA sample from the person who was going to be resurrected. Secondly, a human sacrifice. That made sense Naruto thought. Action and reaction, the effort you put into something defined the end result. The soul of the sacrifice was used as energy for the technique and was driven out of its body whereupon the DNA of the one to be resurrected could be used to implant that very soul into the body. Naruto had to stop again to breathe, leaning forwards he supported his forehead with his hand and tried to not hyperventilate. It was all there! Some bits were missing but it was really just to connect the dots to complete it!
Yet, despite Orochimaru's attempts to break him down and via Anko's constant meddling Naruto had acquired one specific trait that stood hard as steel in him, a trait that now clasped down on it all, locking it in a savage grip and refusing to let go. His ethical code. To be as thorough with everything as could be. To always strive for the fullest understanding of the implications and consequences of what he created. To make his discoveries with means other than human misery. It was iron clad and not even now could he abstain from considering those factors.
Firstly: the soul used to power this jutsu was explicitly stated to dissolve, being used as an energy source and falling apart when used. That not just implied the utter annihilation of that person, it outright stated it. It was murder beyond murder, for no higher cause than his grief.
Secondly: even if he did succeed with this, what would that lead to? The barriers of death broken, if that was not a can of worms to break then what would be? How sought after would not this jutsu be, now that every great leader or beloved companion could be brought back? And with the appendix to the notes in this scroll, the appendix detailing how the summoned soul could be controlled... That made it even worse. Not only could dead kings and the likes be brought back, they could even be controlled that way!
Thirdly: if this Jutsu did what it promised, that meant that the afterlife, in whatever shape, really did exist. He would be tearing Anko from the afterlife, from the place she had gotten there, bringing her back into a place where she no longer belonged for his own desires only. Knowing nothing else of the afterlife, Naruto would have to assume it was uniform for everyone, meaning Anko would be bereft the family that would be awaiting there.
Fourthly: Summoning the dead back to life... Konoha had banned even human experimentation. It would take days to finish this jutsu, days during which he'd be a giant target for Itachi's investigation. Naruto had only just now managed to build up a good reputation in Konoha, if he was caught with this all that would be forfeited, the Tsubaki clan would be irrevocably tainted by association with him too.
Damn it... Naruto stared down at the document, realizing slowly how much this jutsu could change. For good, and for evil. Orochimaru had cared not one whit for the repercussions, only for the gains when he did his discoveries. He was haphazard, single-minded and outright crude in his research, things that appalled Naruto thoroughly. Naruto wanted clean-cut research, as controlled as possible and performed in such a way that the consequences could and would be dealt with.
And this... truly this was the apex of his master's deranged research. But it could give him Anko back. It was really there, really possible. And besides, he could kill some deranged killer nobody would miss.
Wait what? When exactly had he allowed himself that kind of cretinous logic? A life was a life as far as his research went. The instant you started choosing which people that were more or less worthy of life you invited a whole scale of different peoples' values, a scale that would be made without any sensible overarching theory and thereby being nothing more than an arbitrary bullshit scale not worthy of be taken the least seriously. Slamming his hand into the table in a sudden explosion of anger, Naruto took some deep breaths before he rolled up the scroll completely and poured over the rows of text in their entirety. Yes, all of it was about the Edo Tensei. There was nothing more.
For a few minutes he sat there, holding a pencil in his hand as he tried to see what derivatives of this was possible. Five, ten and fifteen minutes passed, Naruto sighing in the end. No, there was nothing here, it was too much of a specialized spearhead jutsu. The research notes when it was developed would be a goldmine but the finished jutsu was near useless in terms of what could be derived from it. With that concluded, Naruto dug out another scroll from his workdesk, opened it and spread it on a table. This one was adorned with a series of complex rings made up out of markings and in the middle there was a small area untouched by ink. He rolled up the the Edo Tensei scroll and put it in there. He now made two seals, ending in the tiger seal, and the Edo Tensei scroll burst into flames in seconds, the smoke being sucked into the scroll as it burned fiercely, nearly explosively. Naruto sat with his back against the backrest as he watched the scroll explode only a few feet from his face, the shockwaves and the smoke being devoured by the scroll.
If he brought back Anko he'd sacrifice his standing in the village, the Tsubaki clan's frail future, his ethical code and most probably Anko would punch him in the face first thing she did. It'd open a can of worms unlike anything else and unleash something Naruto did not think he could truly control. No invention of his would ever rule over him. He was the master of his life and what came out of it, not some deranged creation left behind by his master.
"I'm sorry Anko," he thought to himself, "But I cannot do this... not for you." he watched with a numb sensation as his only hope of ever seeing her again was consumed and fell apart into ashes that eventually swirled around and vanished into the scroll as well. Yet, despite that, there was something that made him see Anko in front of his mind's eye, grinning at him with a dango stick in her mouth. He wanted her to be happy, and how could he do that by becoming Orochimaru? He found some comfort in this, even as the tears slowly started to run down his face once more.
It was a few hours later, the day had turned into afternoon moving towards evening, when it rang on the door. Naruto, who had spent the day reading a book, felt a sudden sting of reluctance to open at first. Whoever it was it wasn't anyone he wanted to see. Yet, he closed the book and hit himself once in the head with it. He was being irrational again. Getting up from the bed, he walked over to the door and opened it, seeing little before he was pile-dived by his little sister. Kimiko crashed into his mid-section, wrapping her arms around him even as he stumbled backwards.
"Are you okay oniisan?" she asked, Naruto hearing the urgency in her voice, "Is there anything I can do for you? I'm so sorry she's dead, I wish there was anything I could do.." Kimiko's mouth continued babbling and Naruto found himself groaning. For the love of...
"Get off me!" he said, pushing her off him and landed her on the floor. Leaning down to grab her head, Naruto looked right into Kimiko's eyes, seeing that they were red. Had she been crying? All over her face were the marks of the kind of stupidly genuine and thorough sadness only she could show seemingly. What he was going to say died in his mouth and he eventually sighed. "Come here Kimiko," he said, ushering her into the kitchen where he sat down on a chair and motioned for her to sit down on another. For a second his little sister hesitated, then she sat down as well. "What are you talking about?" he asked her, "tell me outright."
"I, I mean Anko-neechan's death," Kimiko said, "I heard about it yesterday and I came here but you weren't here and I got scared and thought..."she was beginning to babble.
"Quiet." Naruto told her forcefully, Kimiko flinching and quieting down. Naruto sighed once more, leaning back as he rubbed his eyes with one hand. This was going to be complicated. "You don't need to worry about me Kimiko," he said eventually, leaning forwards again, "I'm a grown man. What's happened is painful, very much so, and I feel as if everything is pointless. But I don't need you to take care of me. You hardly even knew Anko, so why are you so upset?"
"She was important to you!" Kimiko said, "I, I know I didn't like her very much in a way. I actually wished sometimes that she would die, I felt like she was taking my big brother from me," she looked down at her feet now. Naruto knew well that it was just a child talking, an ignorant child whose words shouldn't be taken that seriously. Never the less, it felt like a stab in the guts when he heard what Kimiko had wanted. It took him some effort to remain calm. "But now..." Kimiko continued, "I feel like a horrible person for ever wanting that, I feel like I'd do anything to get her back so you wouldn't have to deal with all this." By all gods, she really was broken up about all of this and Naruto was once again reminded of the massive abyss between her and him emotion-wise. And what was he going to do? He didn't have the strength to yell at her now and after a while he spoke up.
"Don't worry Kimiko," he told her, "I won't berate you for anything. But this is something I'll have to deal with on my own. You don't need to get involved in this, you shouldn't. But still, thank you for coming over." Kimiko looked up at him now, with eyes still tear-filled, and after a while she got off her chair and almost ran around the table, crawling up into his lap where she proceeded to hug him.
"Can I at least hug you?" she asked and Naruto found the sudden embrace, not rough like her entrance, making him flinch almost. Her small arms were warm and she made sure not to hold him too hard. It did something, indeed it did a lot, and Naruto found himself almost overwhelmed by the feelings that flooded him. In the end, he returned the embrace, wrapping his arms around his little sister and holding her close, one arm holding her head and the other under her arms.
"You can..." he whispered quietly, not able to say much more and instead holding onto his sister, his grip tightening for a couple of seconds as he bit back his tears. He found himself presented with an undeniable fact, one that had been true all along but which was possible for him to realize only just now. He loved his little sister, this tiny, impulsive and at times dumb as a rock girl Kimiko, he loved her so much that he all of a sudden did not know what to do with it all. Naruto realized in that moment what overflowing with emotions meant, there was no way for him to channel it, no way to truly express how much the little girl now curled up in his lap as she hugged him meant to him in this moment. He was no longer alone, no he hadn't ever been it. For all this time, ever since she had first begun to harass him, she had been here, fumbling and clueless but nevertheless she had, with a loyalty and love firm as steel, been here for him.
"Thank you Kimiko..." he thought to himself, "I love you." They were words he couldn't speak, things he perhaps never would be able to express, but Namikaze Naruto in this moment understood that he cared for her as much as he ever had cared for anything or anyone. He'd do anything for her, he could shamelessly admit that right now.
The brother and sister remained like that, holding onto each other for a long time, Kimiko being clueless about what she had taught her brother in that moment.
A/N: I know I'll get hate-mail for this.
On another note: As many of you might have seen the internet is at the moment abuzz with news about the two acts trying to be passed in the US congress, SOPA (Stop Online Piracy Act) and PIPA (Protect IP Act). Plainly: these acts are both utter travesties bankrolled by big money interests that MUST NOT PASS. Why? Because they give copyright holders the right to shut down internet sites at the least infringement.
To put in in perspective, if ANYONE ANYWHERE on FF puts up ANY kind of copyright protected material SOPA and PIPA allows for this website to be shut down, permanently. Not because what the staff did or the site did, but merely because of what one user did. As you can tell, that's not okay: in fact is it's bullshit of the highest order. Being Swedish, my hands are tied since I'm not a US citizen, I have no congressman to call or e-mail, besides foreign people should stay out of a sovereign nation's politics as a rule. You however, my US readers, have. Each of you have a voice in this. If SOPA/PIPA passes the internet as we know it will DIE and never come back.
Why do they do this? They want to stop online piracy, a cause I can respect. Will this work? Fuck no, the pirates will survive, they are like cockroaches. Those who suffer for it will be sites like megaupload(already gone), Fanfiction, Youtube. At the least hint of copyright infringement they can be shut down.
You do not want that. This concerns you and what you love. You HAVE a voice, you CAN speak up and you SHOULD. Call your congressman, mail him, tell your friends and family, sign these petitions:
www .eff .org
americancensorship . org
www .google .com /landing /takeaction
There are others out there as well so out you go and search for them. Apathy is the bane of democracy and freedom, will you fight to protect what you love? Some might say the battle is already won but it's only the battle, not the war. This fight needs to continue to ensure SOPA is driven into the grave permanently with a stake through its heart.
Peace
PS: As an added incentive because I'm a bastard like that, each of you who signs all those petitions and mail your congressman can send me a PM and get a preview of what will happen later in the story. I'll need you to include the mail address to said congressman as well as the "thank you" messages those petitions gave you. The more evidence of your participation the bigger your preview will become. If pleading to the good in you doesn't work I'll simply plead to the fan in you :P