Disclaimer: The text below this line was formulated by my brain with characters that didn't belong to me.
Perspective is a very powerful word, and though it has two forms of meaning, it often boils down to one's perception of something's relationship to another. Whether this is difference in length, angle, or merely how much water in a glass is entirely up to the interpreting individual, but to Haku, it was a matter of several of these things. For example, the sitting position the young partner of Zabuza had occupied while treating Naruto's self-inflicted wounds was perfect for moving and bandaging the body of his patient. On a similar note, Naruto's position on the ground, set on his belly made for a muffled trajectory of a loud shout the moment he gained consciousness. The end of the matter had them share the same cognitive perspective in that they were both very disoriented and confused.
In Naruto's case, he was getting used to the feeing of utter bafflement, but not to the extent that he actually remembered a very philosophical conversation with the being that had made his life a living hell.
The area he awoke in was no different from the area he had managed to leave before. A few hours had probably passed, judging by the positions of the shadows. The dirt was reasonably soft and moist, and Naruto could tell his skin was getting all too familiar with the substance.
"What the-?" Naruto sputtered, feeling his head throb with a cringe. Haku stared at him seriously, his dark eyes unusually intense.
"You shouldn't be alive," the missing ninja told him curtly, not because of fear for what the Uzumaki might be, but because the boy had endangered himself in such a way to begin with. "You obtained massive trauma to the back of you skull, shattering it."
Naruto squinted, his eyes tender from the light. "…What are you talking about?"
"You toppled a living tree backwards with your head, little shinobi." Haku replied, flicking his head towards the grisly display of plant gore. The trunk had indeed been pushed backwards, splintered, and at one point, snapped. Reddish stains marred the lower sections of the bark like dried sap.
"I did that?" Naruto asked, slowly gaining a sense of how his meeting with the demon fox had come about. The blonde lifted a hand to the back of his head, finding it bandaged and sticky with dried blood. Curious, he felt the shape of his head and though it hurt incredibly, he felt no abnormalities. Somewhere behind him, Haku sighed.
"Did you use some sort of special jutsu or something, Haku?" he asked, wondering if the evasive fox had been multitasking during their lovely 'chat'.
Haku shook his head, the shock once again apparent in his eyes. "I did nothing but wash the blood off and put the bandage on. Your body, it… just mended on its own."
Naruto closed his eyes. He had thought that the Kyuubi had stopped giving him the wound-eradicating handicap for a while now. It wasn't something he had really dwelt on, but he had noticed that it took him longer to regain energy after the primary fight with Haku. Why would the nine-tailed fox be so inconsistent?
"I didn't feel like it." Naruto's mind replayed, causing him to give a bitter smirk. He might not have understood a lot of their internal conversation, but he did manage to round up the information that his demonic tenant was not to be counted on at all times. At least, he thought he did, but now he was just confused.
"Do you place no value on your own life, Naruto?" Haku asked, sounding dangerously like Sakura preparing to start a lecture. Circumstances aside, it was a welcome diversion to Naruto's inner turmoil. In fact, it fished out a subject he had pondered himself.
"Well, Haku, I will put this answer bluntly," Naruto stated, pushing himself until he was sitting up. Speckles clouded his vision momentarily, but he knew where his companion would be from memory and faced him until the sparkling blindness cleared. "This is a stupid question."
"Then enlighten me, Naruto-kun, as to why you would be so willing to take your own life when there is nothing for anyone to gain from the experience?"
"I wasn't trying to commit suicide, Haku." the blue-eyed boy replied enthusiastically.
Haku's fists clenched in spite of himself. "Then what WERE you doing?"
The young ninja from Konoha shrugged, causing Haku to ruffle him by his collar slightly. "Answer me!"
Naruto winced, his tender cranium agitated by the shaking.
"I was trying to escape!" he exclaimed, warding off the physical contact with a surprisingly agile bat of hand.
"By bashing your head against a tree?" Haku asked incredulously(well, for him, anyway).
Naruto nodded stubbornly in response and crossed his arms. "It seemed like a good idea at the time."
In that instant, Haku asked a question that would cause his blonde friend to have an epiphany of sorts.
"Why would that even occur to you as a good idea?" the mist ninja asked.
Naruto grew surprisingly quiet as he tilted his aching head from side to side before grinning widely.
Life really is pretty based on impulse…
"I guess I just felt like it!" the jinchuuriki finally responded with a carefree laugh, prompting even the stoic Haku to fall flat on his face in surprise.
Sakura Haruno didn't rifle through her bag the following morning. As the group was in a hurry, there was only enough time to drink some water and take a few bites of a Kakashi-provided rice ball before continuing their pursuit. Her legs ached, and her whiny aspects weren't too happy with the thought of another day of continuous sprinting. Sakura wasn't going to stand for her brain employing such an attitude and promptly informed her inner self to shut the hell up, which was unusually effective.
Sasuke Uchiha didn't need to talk to himself about discipline; he was used to going without and pushing himself to the limits. The run was challenging, but it wasn't going to kill him. If it did, how could he ever even dream of destroying Itachi? The second the name flew through his head, the adrenaline followed, and by focusing on his anger the physical fatigue was nullified.
Kakashi's running was automatic, he had done so much of it that his muscles could transport him like a machine. If it weren't for his assigned team, the Hatake probably could have continued his run for days. Eventually, the genins would be able to do this as well, but forcing it on them all at once would cause more trouble than good.
Iruka's consistent pace that was coming close to rivaling Kakashi's stemmed from two sources. The more obvious of the two lay in his fraternal relationship with their quarry, but the other was not common knowledge.
Iruka Umino, contrary to popular belief, worked hard when nobody was looking. If Sasuke had entered the man's apartment under more favorable circumstances, the floor would have been visible, as would the intents in it from the weight set the chuunin had formerly owned. Beyond weightlifting, the Umino had often made his rounds early in the morning under the henge of a student that was alternated every other day. In the early days of his teaching career, Iruka had used these forms for less admirable things than running laps, but since then he had grown out of the pranks. It was a good thing, too, because Naruto picked up where he had left off.
After a few hours, the waters that served as the natural barrier to Tazuna's native land stretched out before them. Kakashi spurred off to the left when the group reached the shore. Under better circumstances, he would have used that roadblock as a chance to teach his students about chakra control, but there wasn't time for training.
Twenty minutes elapsed while the group sprinted off the beaten path. No one asked any questions, as Sakura was beginning to recognize the lonely route they had taken home from their last trip to the island nation.
She glanced at Sasuke, who nodded in nonverbal agreement.
To nobody's surprise, Kakashi soon led them back to another footpath. It was in better condition then the one they had been using, but Kakashi hadn't brought the four of them there for comfortable feet. Continued travel revealed the true intention to be the use of a large bridge.
When they approached the structure, merchants began making their way past the shinobi, who were forced to slow to a walk to maneuver on the impoverished country's new trade route. Several villagers on the bridge attempted to halt Kakashi for some sort of conversation after recognizing his presence, but he just politely waved them off. Iruka watched these pleasant exchanges for a while, but eventually stopped pausing at every halt in their progress.
While Kakashi was supposed to be leading the team, there really was no need for direct need for guidance on a linear bridge over a body of water, so Iruka found himself wandering ahead for a majority of their stretch as bridge-pedestrians. The day was sunny, and the breeze mild, so it wasn't an unpleasant time for such a thing.
When a ninja's hiatae was in plain view, most people tended to leave them alone, so Iruka's trip was uneventful until he reached the other end of Tazuna's prized structure. The brown-haired teacher stood idly for a while, waiting for the Team 7 to catch up to him, but his eyes wandered. Eventually, they found a sign near the entranceway that bowled him over. It consisted of four words, but they really weren't something the twenty-three year old had been prepared for.
"The Great Naruto Bridge," he read aloud, approaching the sign with doubt. "No way…"
The Umino shook his head, the breeze shoving a few loose chocolate hairs in his face. The words remained unchanged.
"You see a bug on there?" a young boy's voice penetrated Iruka's concentration, causing him to turn. Tazuna's grandson regarded the hiatae and expression that was now visible on the chuunin's head idly before amending,"-or a ghost, maybe?"
Inari wasn't just loitering on the bridge. The child was dressed in his usual overalls, but they were considerably ruffled and moist with sweat. The builder's grandson was loading boxes onto a spacious wooden cart, and it appeared he had been doing so for a while now. The pile of cargo remaining to be placed into the wagon had dwindled to a single crate.
"I-it's nothing." Iruka stammered, taking his hand off the marked wood. The cap-wearing boy raised an eyebrow and placed another box in the cart, completing the load. An older villager thanked the child for his help and tossed him a coin.
His work being finished, Inari approached the shinobi from the Leaf village curiously. "Are you here all alone? I thought you guys came in groups of four."
The chuunin opened his mouth, "I, er… actually-"
"He's with us." Kakashi interjected, having finally caught up with his hasty comrade. Sakura and Sasuke followed close behind.
"Hello, Inari." Sakura was careful to avoid any eye contact with Inari, but Sasuke game an unenthusiastic wave before reentering his characteristic slouch.
Inari startled a little with the sudden intrusion, but Kakashi acted like the meeting was the most casual thing on earth.
"I need to speak with your grandfather," the gray-haired jonin announced.
Inari's face perked up curiously. "He's at work."
Kakashi put a hand to his chin. "Well, can you take us to the site? We're in a bit of a rush."
Inari nodded and motioned for the four shinobi to follow his lead. The boy was painstakingly slow compared to the pace they had been keeping.
"What's he building, anyway?" Sakura asked.
"A bathhouse." Inari replied.
Author's note: I recently replaced my heart with a baked potato. This arrangement worked out fine until I started getting hungry. My makeshift heart met the same fate as its predecessors, so if anyone has some random vegetable they could loan me, it'd be great.