'Where am I?' Sakura asked herself as she slowly opened her eyes, blinded by a bright light. 'How did I get here?' She tried opening her eyes again but used her arm to shield her eyes as they adjusted to the light. In the effort of moving it, she felt her arm connected to something.
"So you're awake. That's good." A strange voice said to her. It sounded like a woman closer to her mother's age than herself. Sakura's eyes continued to adjust until she could finally see her surroundings.
When she could see, she saw four people in her room. The only one of them she recognized was Ino, seated by the door looking at her with much concern. The other three were adults on the older end of their primes. "Who are all of you?" Sakura asked. In the corner of her eyes she could see she had an IV hooked up to her arm.
"We're some of the people who live in the Trashcan." A man told her. He had a slim face with grey eyes and black hair he kept mostly short but with a long low ponytail in the back. He wore an open grey jacket over a dark purple shirt and wore dark beige pants that had a green stripe going down each leg on the sides.
"Trashcan?" Sakura repeated.
"That's what we call our apartment complex. Fitting name for a rundown place most people felt they're too good to live near, let alone in." A woman answered. She had a youthful face despite her age with sparkling blue eyes and long brown hair with her bangs kept to her left by a clip shaped like a teal hibiscus flower. She wore a black tank top that covered her stomach but showed a small amount of cleavage, baggy red pants, and a green jacket tied to her waist with the sleeves.
"You would know it best as the place Naruto lived at." The last person there added. Sakura could tell right away this was the voice she heard when waking up. It belonged to a woman with green eyes, long wavy brown hair held back with a yellow ribbon, and a strong maternal look to her. She wore a simple lavender dress and kept a turquoise purse on her lap as she sat down. She smiled warmly at the pinkette. "We are some of the people who watched over Naruto as he grew up."
"You watched over Naruto?" Sakura asked.
The man nodded. "You didn't think a neglected child whom many in the village openly wished death upon could survive to his age without any guidance did you? Total neglect when he was a baby would have killed him in a single day."
"I... I guess I didn't think about that." Sakura shamefully admitted.
"Yeah, funny how people don't really think about such things. I'm Kosuke." The man told her.
"I'm Tsuyuko, the super of the building." The blue-eyed woman added.
"And I'm Chikoro." The green-eyed woman said.
"It's nice to meet you. May I ask why you came to see me?" Sakura asked.
"Hokage-sama asked us to see you. The rest of us couldn't as they were all busy, but we three were available." Chikoro explained, confusing Sakura and Ino.
"I hear you're trying to honor our favorite blonde prankster by living on your own. Am I right?" Tsuyuko asked.
Sakura nodded.
"Not as easy as it looks, eh kid?" Kosuke asked as he leaned forward.
Tsuyuko gave him a stern look. "Not now Kosuke-san."
"My point remains. It's not easy to live alone, even when you're an adult like us. People are social by nature. You need at least some interaction with others to stay sane. And judging by how you look kid, you lost your sanity or came pretty damn close."
"Stop it or I will turn off the power to your room for the next week." Tsuyuko growled, and that shut Kosuke up.
Chikoro looked back at Sakura. "We understand what you're trying to do, but Naruto didn't by choice deprive himself of human contact or interaction. It's not healthy for you to do that, so please stop."
Sakura looked down. "But I... I don't think I can handle this like Naruto did. I mean, it's been about a month and... look at me. How did Naruto survive like this? Nobody should be forced to live like this."
"You're right, nobody should. And yet there were plenty of people that wanted him to suffer even worse." Tsuyuko stated. "You'd be surprised how often I had to repair damage to his place and sometimes the entire building because of people like that."
"Why didn't you request a D-rank mission those times?" Ino asked.
Tsuyuko gave the platinum blonde a cynical glare. "Because, more than several acts of vandalism were done by a ninja. Probably acting on orders or just for fun. So I'd be damned before I paid any ninja to be in a situation where they'd have a clean shot at endangering Naruto like that. Hell I've evicted people for endangering him."
Kosuke nodded. "No one got away with hurting Naruto on our watch."
"Acting on orders?" Sakura repeated in horror. "Someone actually ordered ninja to try and kill Naruto in the past?"
"You didn't really think insults were the worst thing people did to him, did you?" Kosuke asked. "The Hokage may be the highest authority over ninja here, but she's not the only authority here. There are clan heads, Anbu leaders, jounin sensei, and patrol units just to name a few, who can give orders to ninja that rank below them." He counted the list on his fingers to emphasize his point. "More than a couple times some of these people have ordered their underlings to directly attack Naruto. And sometimes civilians paid some ninja to do it for them. That stopped quickly since the civilians began to see it as a waste of money when their hired goons kept failing."
"Fortunately Naruto was never completely unguarded, one way or another." Chikoro added. "And when he was hurt or depressed, we were there to pick up the pieces."
"And you were never scared of the kyuubi in him?" Ino asked, curiously.
"For the first year we were cautious, but not neglectful. You have to be pretty heartless to look at a lonely newborn baby and turn a blind eye to it." Chikoro answered, sounding a bit wistful as she was remembering caring for a baby Naruto. "We trusted the Fourth to know what he was doing, and the Third and Toad Sannin to verify the seal was sound, and that they would not put anything dangerous so close to ordinary people. After the first year, we decided the seal was indeed doing it's job and he had not done anything uncharacteristic of a baby. From there, we knew he was just a child and nothing more. But for some reason, almost everyone else refused to see it that way."
"Which is monumentally stupid if you think about it." Tsuyuko stated. "I mean, I understand being afraid in the beginning about the fox taking over or escaping. But after a few years you'd think the public would have taken the hint that the fox wasn't going anywhere or doing anything."
"I... I don't think people wanted to take the hint." Sakura offered. "Like my mother. She didn't know anything about Naruto and didn't want to know anything about him. She just wanted to hate him, and would probably believe anything as long as it allowed her to."
"Why?" Ino asked. "I mean, nobody hates someone without a reason. Your mother did have to have one even if it was faulty."
"I tried to find that out last time I saw her. I heard her go off on Naruto like he was evil incarnate, no matter what I said to prove her wrong. After a while I realized she didn't want to see reason. She had spent so long thinking of Naruto as a monster that she no longer could think of him as anything else. She had made up her mind and wouldn't consider the idea she was wrong. It sickened me."
"Not to be rude Sakura, but part of what I see of your behavior sickens me." Ino carefully stated, drawing everyone's attention. "I admit I don't know the entire story, but based on what I do know and see, I can't understand why you feel so bad for Naruto. I know he was your teammate and maybe he became a bit of a friend to you over time, but destroying your life like this doesn't make sense to me. You never tried anything like this for Sasuke, so why Naruto? The boy you once told me you hated simply because he wasn't Sasuke."
That reminded Sakura of something she was really not proud of. Back about a year before they graduated and Naruto was still trying to regain his lost friendship with the pinkette, she had gone off on him and hit him hard enough that he lost one of his baby teeth from it. Ino saw it and even though she didn't care much for Naruto if at all, she did admit Sakura was being unnecessarily cruel to a boy who was just trying to be nice. And not only that, but a boy Sakura herself used to be nice to a few years earlier. So Ino curiously asked why Sakura hit Naruto so easily and guiltlessly. Her answer? He wasn't Sasuke.
At the time neither girl thought anything of it, as if that reason alone more than justified why Naruto was the class pariah and Sakura's punching bag. Naruto was not the popular boy, the one who never failed a test, the one liked around school or even town. He was the person everyone either pretended didn't exist or wished would just go away, and ultimately it became too easy, even to the point of first response, to disregard his basic human rights as if they weren't worth the energy it took to think them over if you did.
"That's the problem Ino." Sakura made herself say. "Except for Hinata, Tenten, these folks, and a few others, we all proved to be bigger monsters than the very thing we feared. And people like you and I are even worse because we didn't even know why all that hate and hostility was aimed at him and we never once questioned if it was deserved. And because of that, we started acting like as long as Naruto was the victim, then it didn't really matter what happened to him. Adults hitting him in broad daylight, things stolen from him, even people vandalizing his house, all of it criminal acts worthy of arrest and we couldn't care less about it all only because he was the one it was all done to. When we hear about complete strangers in other countries suffering the same way we feel bad and want it to stop, but someone close to us we actually know and talk to suffers that way, and we act like it's no big deal at all? I think there's a level in Hell specifically reserved for people like us."
Ino was stunned and didn't know what to say, but Tsuyuko did. "What you've been doing isn't just as a sort of memorial to Naruto is it? This is a form of self-punishment for the crimes you believe you've committed against him."
Sakura hung her head, knowing everyone was giving her expectant looks but she was unable to meet their gazes. "Y-y-yes, you could say that."
"Sakura, don't you think you're taking it a bit too far?" Ino asked. "I mean, Naruto wouldn't want to see you like this. He wouldn't want you to make yourself suffer. I know you feel bad for him but what's done is done and this will not change that."
Sakura gave the platinum blonde a dead but hurt look. A look that said 'I'm offended' but contained no anger. "Ino, right now you just proved my point. You say 'what's done is done' like it doesn't matter. Like what Naruto experienced is an unpleasant thought but that's all it is. An unpleasant thought. And all because he's the one who experienced it. You alerted Hokage-sama over me, but would you have done the same for Naruto?"
Ino didn't respond, and that was all the answer Sakura needed. "I've only had a small sample of Naruto's lifestyle, and look what happened to me. He had to deal with all that and so much more. Probably even stuff I can't even imagine. Coming home to an empty house you know will never be full. Having to maintain everything by yourself, even if you don't know how to. Not having a shoulder to cry on or a warm comforter when you got sad or scared or lonely. Having nothing but your own will and determination to make you keep going on living. All that, I only sampled for a few weeks, and Naruto... Naruto..."
She started shedding tears little by little as she spoke, but by the time she got to the end, her tears were flowing stronger and her body was shaking. The pinkette pulled her legs up to her chest and wrapped her arms around them, burying her eyes into her knees as she unleashed a heartbreaking sob. Ino got up to rush to her side, but Chikoro shook her head not to, so Ino gave her a questioning expression.
"She's doing exactly what she really wants to." Chikoro whispered. "Up until now, she's likely been crying for Naruto out of guilt for her own actions and neglect. But right now, having experienced his suffering, she is truly mourning his leaving, not her own mistakes. Let her do this. Let her grieve for her friend as she wanted to."
Ino silently 'ahhed' and sat back down. While she still felt bad for her friend, she also felt a little relieved for her too, now that Sakura could start to handle her loss and recover from it.
Later that afternoon Sakura fell sound asleep, looking more comfortable than she had been in weeks, while her guests left to give her some quiet. Kosuke, Tsuyuko, and Chikoro headed home, but Ino didn't just yet. She had too much on her mind to just go home right away.
With that decided, Ino headed for Tenten's family forge and shop. It wasn't that hard to find since it was one of the more popular places for young ninja to shop for weaponry. The front for the place was a two story building, with the shop on the ground level and a living space on the second floor, not uncommon in Konoha. Behind this was a forge and a throwing range.
Since the shop had its open sign on display, Ino walked in. At the counter was a middle-aged woman with long dark brown almost chocolate-colored hair seated reading a book. She wore thin-framed glasses, likely reading glasses, that made her dark brown eyes stand out. She wore a shirt decorated with pink and white horizontal stripes, almost like a candy cane, and she wore a silver bracelet on her left wrist that looked like a kunai bent to form a loop with the tip pointed into the hole at the end of the handle. Not only that, she had a clip by her left ear holding her hair out of her face that looked like a six-pointed shuriken.
When the door opened a bell went off and the woman looked up at the newcomer. She saw the blonde girl and smiled, putting her book down. "Welcome to Higurashi Weapons. Pre-arranged or self-made?"
"Huh?" Ino asked, completely lost by the question. Now that the woman was looking at her, she could see an identical yet inverted silver kunai bracelet on the right wrist and a shuriken hair clip by her right ear too.
"Most customers either want an already prepared custom set of weapons, or they prefer to handle that part themselves from sampling the shelves. So we're in the habit of asking which they came for to make it easier for them."
"Sorry, but I'm not here to shop. I'm actually wondering if Tenten is here."
"Oh, sorry but my daughter's out with her team at the moment. I'm not sure when she'll be back." The woman replied.
"Okay, thank you for-" Ino started, but stopped when she noticed the older woman looking at a buzzing bee that had gotten into the store. Tenten's mother reached under the counter, brought out a senbon, and threw it towards the insect. The needle skewered it and impaled in on one of the wooden shelves.
"Damn bees. I just know there's a hive somewhere nearby on the neighbor's property. If only they'd get back and do something about it."
Ino was momentarily speechless. "Wow that was incredible. You definitely are Tenten's mother."
"Thanks, but Tenten was adopted, not born from me. And she actually used to have terrible aim."
"On yeah, I remember her saying something about that." Ino commented. "She said Uzumaki Naruto had something to do with her... getting... better?" After mentioning Naruto's name, the Yamanaka heiress saw the older woman look sad, almost remorseful. "You were one of those that cared for him, weren't you?" She asked sympathetically.
Tenten's mother frowned a bit. "Are you one of those that cheered when he died?" Her head went back under the counter.
"No! I didn't cheer at all!" Ino defended, making the shopkeeper's hand stop. "I didn't really know Naruto that well, and that's kind of why I want to see Tenten. I... I want to know more about him."
"Why?"
Right then, Ino found herself struggling to answer that. 'Why exactly do I want to know more about Naruto? Is it just so I can help Sakura? Is it because I want to prove Kiba wrong and I'm not disregarding his death? No, those can't be true. And yet, right now I can't really think of a good reason.' Not wanting to make this woman wait any longer, she cleared her throat. "Is there anything wrong in wanting to know more about a fallen comrade?"
"Only if you never bothered to want to know anything about him when he was alive." Tenten's mother replied, surprising the platinum blonde. "You ever hear the phrase 'You never know what you have until it's gone'? When that applies to people, and more than a few times it does, I personally feel it's rather offensive to wait until they're gone to truly appreciate what they were to you. Just shows how some people take others for granted."
"I didn't take Naruto for granted! I-" Ino defended, but quickly cut herself off before she said something in the heat of the moment.
Tenten's mother looked at her curiously. "You what?"
Ino tried to look away, look at anything but those scrutinizing eyes that could easily see her shame. "I didn't take Naruto for granted. But I... I..." Her throat suddenly felt dry, but she forced herself to continue. "I never really knew anything about him, good or bad. I was very quick to dismiss anything and everything about him, like he wasn't important enough to remember let alone know. Now I want to know more about him."
"What changed?" The shopkeeper asked. "What made you want to learn now?"
"My friends have all been mourning him these past three weeks, some more than others, but I... I haven't. I haven't because I can't. I didn't know Naruto well enough to really cry for him. Sure, I feel sad he died, I really do, but when I look at others, and listen to what they say about him, I feel like what I'm doing isn't enough."
Now Tenten's mother seemed to frown. "Not to be rude, but what I'm hearing is that you don't want to be seen as disrespectful among your peers. You've seen your friends crying for him but you can't, and you're afraid that makes you look heartless so you're hoping learning more will compensate and redeem you."
"No, you're wrong. I'm not doing this for that." Ino countered.
"Then why? What's the real reason?"
"I want to pay my respects to him, the right way. But I can't do that with what little I already know. If I did it would be insulting to his memory. Please help me." Ino pleaded.
Tenten's mother was silent, looking at the young mindwalker as if she was studying her. As if she was trying to determine if this girl was worth helping. And then she smiled. "Alright, I will help you. But first you have to do something for me."
"What? Anything, I will do it."
"You have to buy something. Might I suggest kunai? We are having a two-for-one special for today only."
Ino smiled.
Teuchi looked up from the vegetables he was chopping. He just stared at Naruto's usual spot and sighed sadly. '5pm and again we're empty. It still doesn't feel right.'
He missed the boy. Naruto had been his favorite and most regular customer. Naruto had always come to Ichiraku's Ramen Shop every day at 5pm on the dot, and would always order two bowls of beef ramen, sometimes more if he could afford it, but never less. And even after his death the cook was still making the order automatically, as if expecting the boy to suddenly appear. It would take him a while to fall out of the habit, and deep down, Teuchi dreaded the day that happened. It would be basically giving up on any hope Naruto was still alive out there, somewhere, trying to get home.
'We lost more than a customer, we lost a part of our lives.' The old man sighed again and returned to his vegetable chopping.
It was then that his daughter Ayame walked in. "Hey Dad, guess what I got?" She said happily. This was a surprise since Ayame had not smiled since she heard of Naruto's death. In fact, when she heard a civilian customer talk about him obscenely, she actually took a cleaver and chopped off his fingers right on the spot before he could react. The customer tried to get her arrested, but with no witnesses and Tsunade already pissed at anti-Naruto people, the Hokage dropped the case and told the fingerless bastard she could claim he was sexually harassing a woman who simply defended herself. Without witnesses or surveillance footage, it was just his word versus Ayame's after all. Not enough to convict anyone.
"Hmm, a new worker to help run the shop so I can take a vacation?" He said with a laugh.
Ayame giggled and rolled her eyes. "Oh come on Dad, a herd of wild horses could not drag you away from this shop."
"You're right, so what did you get sweetheart?"
Ayame reached into her pocket, withdrew something, and showed it to her father. Teuchi immediately smiled happily and nodded.
Several minutes later, drilled into the counter above the middle stool and by the mark left in the wood from Ayame's cleaver, was a small plaque that read
'Permanently Reserved for Uzumaki Naruto'
'Our Best Customer'