Balancing the tray of tea, I walked slowly back to the guest bedroom. Knocking once, I slid the door open and stood there. Hound stared at me patient yet impatient at the same time and I looked down before walking in closing the door behind me. "I brought the tea," I said quietly as I set the tray on the bed. Pouring out a cup, I handed it to him and added, "It's yarrow so it's quite bitter, but it will bring your fever down. I brought honey in case you wanted to sweeten it."

He took the cup from me and glanced at it before taking a sip. Immediately, Hound drew back a bit and dipped his head. I gave a small side smile and took some honey from the tray and handed it to him then watched as he barely added any of the honey before tasting the drink again satisfied. Curious at this, I asked, "Do you not like sweet things?"

He set the drink down, "Not particularly."

"Really?" I was surprised. "Not even chocolate?"

He actually shivered. "No," he certified. "I do not."

I giggled at his reaction and smiled happily. The tension and worry I felt before had been relieved a bit. "Hound?"

He took another sip of the tea and gazed at me to show I had his attention. I stood there for a second before climbing up on the opposite side of the bed and sitting down next to him. "I want to tell you, but I can't," I said. He opened his mouth to retort but I continued, "At least not until Nii-chan comes home. We promised to keep it a secret and I refuse to break a promise with him."

His mouth closed again and he nodded in understanding. I smiled and we sat in a comfortable silence.

Then I got bored.


"Monoporii?" Hound questioned as I set the fancy wooden game board on the mattress and started pulling out game pieces from the drawers I had built into it.

"Monopoly," I corrected. "It's a board game."

He started looking at all the cards which had words in both English and Kana before he began examining the neatly designed game board itself. "And you made this?" he asked.

"Un!" I smiled proudly. "It took me a long time, but it's all finished now. It's boring to do nothing while Naruto-nii is at the academy so I started cooking, but then I couldn't eat everything I made so I started making this to pass time instead."

It was true; the game had taken me a long time to make—about a month and a half. Inoichi had a friend over one afternoon while Ino and I were working in the shop. They had been playing some board game called shogi or something. A chain broke when I saw them playing it and it brought to mind several games I had never seen before.

Later that afternoon, I decided to make my favorite one, Monopoly, which I carved and painted carefully over the past few weeks. I even went and bought some really nice paper to use for the cards in the deck. I was lazy on the game tokens though. I doubted I could carve a miniature car or train and I didn't think anyone would even understand what those things were; I barely understood what they were! So, I just used some flat marbles.

"This is very…descriptive," he commented as he read the direction book I made. "Did you really make this?"

I rolled my eyes and started handing out cash to each of us, "This is going to be your fake money that you start with. I'm going to be the banker since you don't know how to play yet and you need to choose what colored marble you want to have as your player piece."

He looked at them before mumbling blue and started inspecting the fake paper money I handed to him. I tossed him the blue marble and choose the red one for myself without another thought. I set a orange marble to the side as well as some start up cash for Naruto in case he wanted to join in when he got home.

"So what is the point of this game?" Hound inquired while leaning over for the direction sheet again.

"To win," I smirked. He sent me a small glower so I explained, "The basic idea of Monopoly is to buy properties and when somebody lands on your property, they pay you rent. If you have all of the properties of a particular color then you can start developing it with houses and then hotels, increasing the rent. There's a lot more involved, but you'll figure it out as you play. The cards are self-explanatory and you roll the dice to move forward."

"A game based off of business then," he muttered under his breath. "Where did you get the idea to make this from?"

"My head," I stated. "Where else would I get the idea from?"

He sighed and asked one last question about the gameplay, "How do you win?"

Grinning, I finished setting things up on the board and turned back to him, "The goal is to run all the other players into bankruptcy."

His eyebrows rose, "That's a little harsh."

"It's nothing personal," I quoted with a smile, "It's business."

"Uh huh," he looked at the board tiredly. "This seems somewhat complex; are you positive you made this?"

I flushed red this time and yelled, "Just because it's complex doesn't mean I didn't make it, damnit!"

He flicked his marble and it hit my forehead, "No cursing."

Rubbing the sore spot, I mumbled out sorry and blinked, abruptly turning my head towards the window seeing a flash of blonde hair. Grinning widely, I stood up and bounced off the bed and rushed out the room.

"I'm home!" I heard Naruto call as he entered the house.

"Nii-chan!" I threw my arms open and tacked him into a hug. We both fell with an oomph.

"I still haven't gotten my shoes off," he complained.

I laughed at this and climbed off of him. He took this chance to take off his blue sandals before walking inside. I followed with a smile then frowned and grabbed his sleeve, "I gotta tell you something. It's important."

Naruto stopped and tilted his head back then turned with a worried expression. "Have you been crying?" he asked and poked my cheek.

I nodded and looked down. "Hound, he's sick. He has a fever and is in the guest bedroom—"

"Eh?!" he exclaimed. "I didn't know ANBU could get sick! They're always so..."

I sighed exasperated, but gave a small smile, "Hound's different."

"True," he grinned. "He helped me with shuriken throwing yesterday."

"He did?" I asked excitedly. "How come I wasn't there?"

"You passed out at the kotatsu, remember?" he started walking to the living room. "I had to carry you to bed since you wouldn't wake up."

"I was wondering how I got to bed last night," I remarked.

Naruto tossed his school supplies on the table. "So why were you crying?" he turned and asked. "You said Hound had a fever, but you know how to fix that."

"That's not it. Hound…he…knows. Or he doesn't know everything; he's just suspecting some things."

"He knows? What are you talking about?" Naruto panicked. "If it's about the prank on the Nara clan, it wasn't me! It was Kiba! I might have dared him to do it, but still!"

"Uh," I stared at him confused. "I'm not talking about a prank, Nii-chan."

He gave a sigh of relief but then it was his turn to look confused, "If it wasn't a prank, then what?"

"Hound thinks someone is training us secretly. He said that we can't know the stuff we know without being taught by someone," I swallowed.

"That's stupid," Naruto scrunched his eyebrows. "We did teach ourselves."

I shook my head. "He saw the seal on our ankles and told me I shouldn't know how to do that. Apparently fuinjutsu's rare or something. He's suspicious!" I exclaimed. "He kept asking me questions; we have to tell him!"

"What?" his mouth dropped. "But…"

I shuffled my feet and grabbed his hand starting towards the guest bedroom. "We'll tell Hound-nii over Monopoly," I said. "Okay?"

"Hound-nii?" he questioned with a thoughtful expression. I blushed. That was twice today I slipped up, I chastised myself. Naruto then stopped and held me back, "Wait a minute, you got Monopoly out without telling me?"

"I just told you," I deadpanned.

He flushed and walked ahead of me, "I knew that."

I laughed lightly at his antics as we stopped at the door. With a quick knock, I opened it to see Hound look up from the game instructions. "Nii-chan's home," I said a little quieter than I intended. The nervousness from before was returning and I turned to Naruto for a bit of comfort, but he seemed just as nervous as well as in shock for some reason.

"Y-you're not wearing a mask o-or hiding your face!" he stuttered out and then covered his head protectively whispering, "The world must be ending."

After a moment, I burst out laughing and nudged his shoulder with mine, "You always know how to cheer me up."

"Huh?" Naruto scratched the back of his neck before grinning. "Uh, yeah, I guess I do!"

"I'm sick. I have an excuse not to wear it," I heard Hound mutter.

"Ha!" I pointed. "So you finally admit that you're sick!"

"Oh?" Hound smiled in a confused manner. "Did I say that? I don't recall."

Naruto snickered and I pouted as we both climbed onto the bed and sat around the game board. "So, you think someone is training us," Naruto got right to the point as he set his orange marble at the go space then sort his money.

"Isn't there?" Hound questioned as he mimicked Naruto by setting his blue marble at the go space as well.

"I already said there wasn't," I moped and added my red marble to the mix. "We really do teach ourselves."

"The village library does not supply the things to teach you fuinjutsu at your age, let alone supply teaching scrolls for your taijutsu styles," Hound countered. "And even if you did 'borrow' the fuinjutsu scrolls, they're all theories at best."

I looked away and muttered, "I'm not allowed into the village library anymore anyway."

Hound's hand clenched at this and he looked to Naruto, "Is this true?"

Naruto just shrugged in agreement with me and rolled the dice. "It's always been that way for me so it's no big deal," he stated then inspected his dice roll. "Four?! Income tax on the first turn," he muttered sadly while paying the bank.

"Do you even know what income tax is?" Hound asked while rolling the dice realizing he had to roll next.

"When you have a mission, part of your payment is given to the village, right? That's income tax," Naruto replied.

I nodded in agreement and whispered to Hound, "It's important future stuff to know for when he becomes Hokage."

Having heard me, Naruto grinned. Hound chuckled while moving nine onto Connecticut Avenue. "So, I just pay the price on the board and then I own the property?"

"You can't buy property the first time around," I replied while rolling the dice for my turn.

Naruto looked to Hound and changed the topic away from the game again by suddenly stating, "You'd have to be family."

I turned to look at Naruto surprised, but realized what he meant and silently agreed as I moved my red marble to Reading Railroad. Hound just looked over at him questioningly.

"If you want to know our secret, you'd have to be family," Naruto repeated with a sly yet hesitant smile. "Hoshi already calls you Hound-nii sometimes and…I wouldn't mind having an Aniki."

Silence surrounded us. Both Naruto and I looked to Hound expectantly while he sat wide eyed glancing between us probably from shock. It was a bit of an unpredictable declaration to ask Hound to become a part of the family, but that's Naruto for you. Hound started to open and close his mouth a few times with an unsure expression as if trying to decide what to say so I decided to try and help him along. "Family to me is unconditional," I supplied while smiling towards Naruto.

He nodded catching on and added, "Family is someone to protect no matter what and give comfort and love to," he grinned back at me.

"It's someone who will be there when you're down," I continued, "to help you get back up."

"Someone who won't judge you!" Naruto said firmly. "Even when you might have messed up 'ttebayo!"

"In the simplest of definitions, that is family to us. Naruto and I already started to consider you someone like this," I looked to Naruto and he nodded in agreement to what I said so I turned back to Hound. "The question is…do you consider us this as well?"

Hound remained quiet, looking down with his face unseeable for a couple minutes and we sat there hoping, pleading silently, that he wouldn't turn us away. And I was truly scared. What if he said no? What if he denied us and left our lives forever? I didn't want that, but we had just taken that risk.

Many more antagonizing minutes passed. And then, finally, Hound rasped out a quiet, "Yes."

Naruto suddenly hiccuped and I felt tears prick my eyes before both of us crashed Hound into a hug. Relief flooded my system and I cried whilst hearing Naruto do the same. Hound stiffened at to contact, but relaxed after a moment and pat both of our heads awkwardly muttering to himself, "What did I just sign myself up for?"

I choked out a laugh and muttered into his shoulder, "Family."


I had trouble writing this chapter. I hope this satisfies? Please review! I love reviews! :D