"So, uh, here's the bathroom."

Haku nodded gently to Naruto, ignoring his awkward expression and the barest hint of a blush that he held on his cheeks, and instead stepped inside and looked about the room. She found that like most of his house, it was well lived in. Decent, rather dirty, but not truly terrible. A toothbrush cup with what had to be the most abused looking brush she had ever seen in her life, sitting beside a slightly chipped sink. A old but well used shower curtain, stained from years of use, and a toilet with a cracked, old seat. A counter with a very small and old looking washer and drier set underneath, held together with what seemed to be duct tape and the Gods' willpower alone.

A dirty mirror, where she could see her reflection. Bruised, her hair crusty and still somewhat stained with his blood, the few short chances she had at rivers on their rushed trip back not enough to properly cleanse her of it, even with her skills in subterfuge and disguise. He had always said that dried and clotted blood was the hardest to clean, and that it was best to not just get covered in it if it could be avoided.

Her outfit torn and cut in places; not enough to endanger indecent exposure, but too much to be able to repair adequately without a very skilled hand, one that she certainly did not possess. Small cuts and nicks and small dirt marks and large blood stains. Anything more and the outfit wouldn't be capable of being considered such.

"Kakashi-Sensei said that we'll get the rest of your... stuff back tomorrow, which really sucks, but take what ya want. The soap is in the shower, and uh... toilet is ya know, there... So... Take all the time ya need; the one thing this place has lots of is hot water."

And with that, she nodded once more to Naruto, getting closer to a bow this time, and he awkwardly closed the door behind her, and she was left alone. She only kept her gaze on her reflection for a moment, before turning away in a huff. She was a bride now, and remaining in such a unsatisfactory state was to be considered unacceptable. She was tempted of just tearing off her kimono, but decided against it simply out of pragmatism. She had no other means of covering her modesty as of now, and while she was a bride and had nothing to keep from he who was both her master and husband, she doubted she could do many duties while in her underclothes.

So instead, she disrobed carefully, making sure not to further damage her clothing, and turned on the shower.

The shower had been surprisingly pleasant. The soap certainly was a nice surprise; a rather nice-smelling cucumber for the soap bar and some unknown fruity scent that wasn't at all unpleasant for the shampoo itself, and the water, unlike most places she had used the showers in, was actually hot rather than vaguely luke warm. At some point, Naruto had left something inside the door, awkwardly mumbling before hastily rushing off, but she had paid it little heed; she'd deal with whatever it was once she had finished her previously assigned task, and whatever he had mumbled hadn't sounded like an order.

If he had considered it a priority, he'd have said so.

That didn't meant that she had took her time though; she rushed and scrapped and scrubbed herself nearly raw in an attempt to finish as quickly as she could; her arms were covered in scratch marks and her hair having been quite abused by the time she was done, her scalp sore and aching by the time she had deemed it fit. She scrubbed and scratched and rubbed until the water was no longer muddy, nor longer rusty, no longer soiled at her feet. Until any remnants of what had happened before were left.

She had to finish quickly; she refused to have Naruto out of her sight for long. She was his, and she couldn't serve, couldn't live or die for him if she wasn't beside him.

So, the very instant she was clean, she left the shower and found that Naruto had left one of his shirts and a towel for her on the floor. The towel was scratchy but clean, and the shirt was a bit small on her but she was able to wear it comfortably enough. It was probably oversized for Naruto, but she was admittedly a good 5 inches taller than him; the boy was small, even if he was strong in spirit and body. He hadn't left any pants though, so she considered this for a moment before she put on her underclothes and wrapped the towel around her waist.

And so, now that she was decent, she stepped out of the bathroom, and found that the living room was considerably cleaner. And that there was about nine different Naruto frantically scrubbing everything. It took a moment before one of them noticed her, stopped what he was doing and rushed over.

"Oh, uh, I thought you'd still be... ya know, showering? I mean, Sakura takes at least thirty minutes whenever she has to shower when we get done with a mission, and you're a ton more... yeah."

A ton more what? Larger? Taller? Older? She didn't begrudge him his comment, but now she was curious as to what he considered her more of than his teammate. But it was not her place to question her master; especially when she didn't know properly where they stood. Zabuza had always wanted her to question some things at any opportunity, such as observations or his random idle thoughts, but if she dared question others, things he did not clear, she'd be facing his wrath for several days at the least, with varying severity.

"I am a ninja."

She hoped that would be a satisfying answer.

Naruto seemed to think about that for a moment, before giving a smile and a nod.

"Yeah, that totally makes sense."

After that, a awkward silence fell over the both of them. Haku didn't really have anything to say; she didn't want to insult his home, nor spit upon his extreme generosity, nor did she want to speak out of place. So instead, she fell back on the skill that she had mastered with her previous holder; she held her tongue and sat in silence.

"So, uh... Yeah, the boss will be out in a minute."

Wait; Naruto had his own master? She hoped that he wouldn't demand that she answer to them as well; she couldn't properly handle losing one master and getting another, let alone finding out that there was another chain of command that she would be expected to follow.

"Boss?"

Naruto blinked, before shaking his head.

"Oh, uh, sorry. I'mma clone; The boss didn't want any of us to clean the bed room. Something about not trusting us."

All Haku could do was blink.

"But that's totally crap; he just doesn't wanna have us in there botherin' him while he panicked and crap."

Another blink. She could definitely understand the panic; he was both younger and dealing with a situation that very few could manage without at least some amount of mental turmoil, but the fact that his own clones gave him grief was a interesting bit of information. She knew not the clone technique he used; there was a great many with a great amount of variation to how they operated in general, but there were none she knew of that gave the physical clones their own semi-autonomy.

But she supposed that she should've expected nothing less.

"I shall help you then."

The clone looked at her wearily, and, to her surprise, shook his head.

"I have orders to clean the living room, and to let you relax. So, uh, no, I guess?"

She was unsure how to take being denied by a clone. She supposed that it was a clone of Naruto, and thus, she was to follow it as well, but on the other hand, she was not certain that these clones, the ones that apparently the original didn't even trust, were fully trustworthy of giving her commands that her new husband would approve of.

So, she tried to open her mouth, but before words could come forth, a kunai caught the clone she had been talking to in the back of the head, and for a short moment, she was frozen as she watched blood fly in slow motion from the impact point of the knife, frozen as the clone fell forward, the corpse of her new master pitching like a marionette without it's strings, and-

*Poof*

And like that, the clone was gone, along with the kunai.

"Don't listen to him; we could definitely use your help."

She definitely understood why the original didn't trust them now.

A/N A reminder that I still live, and am still trying to write, even if only a little.

I'll try to work on this more, alongside another story idea I have, if I can ever manage to make it presentable. I haven't given up on my other stories either, I'm just quite busy, and thus, having less free time to write in general, and stories that have less plot already planned are easier to pick up and work on without having to rememorize things I worked on previous. Maybe I'll get back into the swing of things soon; I think we've all been stressed and exhausted for too long, and maybe, even if things are hard in general, we can all try and enjoy ourselves a little.

If you have any complaints, constructive criticism, things you love/hate, or concerns, please leave a review. It's a bit hard to try and parse a subservient Haku alongside a culture I'm not totally familiar with, while also trying to make it realistic and not completely awful.