NARUTO © Kishimoto Masashi • Shueisha • Studio Pierrot • TV Tokyo. All
rights reserved. Non-profit fun ahead! Fanfic named by Iruka.
Warnings: Eventual fluffy friendship between the boys. Do not read if thou art not a fan of fluff!
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Crossroads
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Chapter One
At the age of five, Naruto woke up to a strange new room with no recollection of the previous five years of his life, except the feeling that they weren't something he had wanted to remember anyway. A rather young travelling merchant by the name of Iruka knocked on his door the very same day while he was yet wondering about the strangeness of it all and sold him some ramen.
He had smiled at Naruto, and Naruto felt warm and fuzzy inside. He didn't quite recall being smiled at so nicely ever before in his whole life of five years.
So Naruto decided that he was going to eat ramen for the rest of his life.
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By the time he was six, Iruka was dropping by almost every other day. It started when Naruto ambushed him with a pail of water while he was opening the door. When questioned the boy said he had read it from one of the scrolls lying around the house. At that moment, however, as Naruto stood by and laughed at his prank well pulled, Iruka twitched and promptly put Naruto over his lap to spank him. Thereafter Iruka swore he would be back to 'educate' Naruto about what he should and should not be doing to his elders.
And that was why Iruka made frequent appearances at Naruto's house, mothering over the boy with an iron rod.
Well, at least he always brought food and money.
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Seven years old was Naruto when he noticed something strange. A black cat perched atop the large tree outside his house every morning when he went out to take care of the garden Iruka had helped him plant for food. It would stare at him as he did his work. At first, Naruto thought nothing of it. But it was strange to have a black cat stare at you all day from atop a tree.
One day, he caught sight of a silver dog sitting beneath the tree the cat was perched atop, licking its paws, and that was when it dawned upon him.
The cat had been chased up the tree by the dog! Every morning! Poor cat! He got Iruka to bring the cat down and tried to get the cat and dog to shake hands. While the one-eyed dog very happily obliged, the red-eyed cat had glared and ran back to Naruto, crouching behind the boy.
Naruto had laughed. Genuinely happily. So genuinely happily, in fact, that Iruka insisted that he kept the animals as pets. The dog had not protested, walking straight into the house and sitting in front of the fireplace like he had always lived there - or at least, been inside enough to know it well. The cat looked like he was about to leap back into the tree when Naruto scooped him up and grinned at him. Without waiting for a reaction, he marched back into the house, and thus when the door closed, their fates were sealed.
Not like it wasn't their original mission to begin with, was it?
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It was an interesting if boring eighth year for Naruto, as he slowly began to feel the hatred behind the eyes of the villagers when they looked at him. He had asked Iruka, but the man waved it off everytime with a nervous snigger. Of course he was hiding something, but at least he was genuinely concerned about Naruto's welfare in spite of his knowledge of whatever secret lurked behind himself and this village, Naruto had thought. Otherwise, all was fine in Naruto's household of a boy, a stranger, a cat and a dog.
Speaking of which, Naruto had struck upon a revelation one fine day. The animals in his house did not have names! That was cruel! Even his plants had names! While he tried to come up with good names for the animals he loved with his life, the silver wolf-dog had gone into Naruto's room, made several minutes worth of brushing sounds, before returning to the living room, dragging a forlorn looking scroll behind him. There were just a few simple words written on it.
Inu - Kakashi
Neko - Itachi
When Naruto announced their names to Iruka the next day, the man almost choked on his miso. Asking Naruto how he had come up with those names, the boy simply replied that they had told him themselves. This caused the man to stare at the beasts with a strange, suspicious glow in his eyes.
Which was quickly dispelled when Kakashi leapt onto the man and slobbered him amidst loud protests. Naruto laughed, and Itachi sat there looking upon the scene with as much amusement as a black cat with red eyes could have.
All was calm in the family.
Just like the calm before the storm.
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During the ninth year of his life Naruto began showing signs of frustration about his situation. The villagers despised him for something he did not know. That in itself did not bother him. But when their emotions translated to action, Naruto found himself seething at his inability to defend himself.
In the day, he had Iruka, whose presence alone warded off any antagonistic stares. But in the night, things were just different.
Things would happen. And Naruto would stand before the closed door that was the only thing shielding him from the mob he had to face outside.
Naruto would always turn around to look behind him.
Kakashi would be lying peacefully by the empty fireplace, whereas Itachi would be sitting by the windowsill, staring at Naruto. Behind the threshold of the door, the angry shouts of the villagers would be heard. As long as there was some prickly crime in the day, the villagers would insist that Naruto was behind it, when all he had been doing was probably watering his wheat crop. Naruto ignored them for the most part. But sometimes, they would threaten to burn down his house and his garden, leaving him no choice but to defend himself. Before he faced his opponents, the boy would always turn around to glance at his friends, trying to draw as much courage as he could.
Never would he let them go homeless.
He would take a deep breath, and storm out of his house to confront the issues that would face him, bravely.
Because Naruto always locked the door, Itachi would watch quietly from the window. As quietly as Kakashi pretended to be asleep.
But when Naruto stumbled in later, bleeding in ten different places, one of the two would be missing while the other carefully followed the boy around as he tried to patch himself up.
By the end of that year, the night attacks had nearly all stopped.
Mainly because the persecutors either went missing, went mad, went on long journeys, or were killed.
Even those they blamed it on Naruto.
Things upheaved, climaxed, and then calmed down.
And by the time Naruto was ten, most of the villagers had become more accepting towards him, although they continued to ignore him.
Still, he did not hope against hope. And that was probably when the pranks were unleashed in full force, despite Iruka's horrified protests.
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The village was situated in the middle of the forest dividing Fire from Sand. It was a fairly large village by itself, and was allowed to operate as a normal civilian stronghold. An agreement between the Third and the council saw to it that no information was to be hidden by travelling merchants who were bound to want to hawk their wares in the streets. Only, no villager would be allowed to leave the village without the proper papers from the village chief, thus rendering the village a safe cocoon for the purpose of harbouring the child many feared unreasonably.
Five years had elapsed since then. Naruto was now ten.
Kakashi the human found himself staring at the round, unmoving moon in the sky.
In the five years that passed since they moved into the makeshift village, he could see that it was slowly developing a life of its own. Naruto grew up believing he was an orphan born and bred in the pseudo village. People had stopped pretending to be what they were not a long time ago, and settled naturally into their roles of normal civilians - not undercover ninjas, trying to get by their daily lives.
If Kakashi hadn't known any better, he would have been lulled into the false security of the superficial peace as well.
From where he stayed hidden in the trees, with the help of a camouflague and invisibility Jutsu, he could peer through the window of Naruto's house and keep watch over the boy. Too many times he had intercepted the manifestations of hatred the villagers had for the child, and knew better than to let his guard down for even a second.
Being with the boy through these tender years of his made him realise just how brutal human nature could be when blinded by poor reasoning. Although the hatred in the villagers' eyes was nothing he had never seen before, he did not believe that trained ninjas like them were willing to unleash that kind of emotion on a boy who did nothing to deserve the manner of treatment they were affording him.
Yet Naruto remained an enigma.
Throughout the period of unjustified persecution, the boy continued to grow mentally stronger than before. He would rise up to the challenge any unhappy villager threw in his way, and though he did not always walk away triumphant, he at least had had the courage to face the issue, rather than being content with running away and never managing to be true to himself. Of course, he had help from one undercover shinobi the Third had obviously sent - Iruka was the name. The man had played a huge role in helping the boisterous boy keep most of his innocence and determination intact throughout the years by being a living, human example to Naruto. Something neither Itachi nor Kakashi could do so long as they were under disguise.
The problem with Iruka was that he could only stay a few hours in the day and had to go by night - village rules. Besides, it took several hours alone to journey from the Leaf to this nameless village, even at top speed.
Despite having to endure the cold, lonely nights by himself, Naruto continued to shine brightly with character, making Kakashi marvel at how alike he was, to the Fourth.
As per their mission, Kakashi and Itachi stayed close by Naruto under the perfected Henge no Jutsu, which no shinobi could hope to see through or dispel unless they, the subjects, saw fit to do so. Although for Kakashi himself, he had grown to love the boy like he was his own little brother, and not just his mission objective.
He fiercely protected Naruto under the guise of a wolf-dog, sometimes so much so that Naruto would yell at him to mind his own business. But he knew that it wasn't what the blond really meant. After all, amongst all the peers and contemporaries in this fake village, Kakashi knew that Naruto cherished every little bit of solace, even if solace came in the form of two creatures who were less human in form, but every bit humane in fellow feeling.
Which brought him to his partner-in-crime.
Glancing out from the corner of his eyes, Kakashi could see the dark, brooding Uchiha staring into space. Itachi was an unusually quiet kid, but Kakashi's observation skills was surpassing, and he had long grown to have a mutual understanding with the dark-haired Uchiha. To say the least, all these years in their mission of Naruto caretaking, had forced them to have to know each other like the back of their palms.
It came in handy sometimes, although other times, it just made Kakashi frown with disapproval.
Especially when Itachi started staring at a kunai like that.
"Get a hold of yourself, Itachi," Kakashi's soft, barely audible voice sternly warned. "The villagers are not going to let it slide so easily if you do it again this time. You'll get Naruto into trouble."
The quiet teenager stared casually at his partner for a long time, then put the kunai away. "I'm sorry," he muttered. The silver-haired ninja knew, though, that he was anything but sorry.
"The last time," Kakashi decided to speak out again, his voice even more taut than before. He swear! Itachi was the worst kind of partner you could get stuck with for long missions like these! "... you killed those men for bullying Naruto, the entire village went into an uproar. Mostly because you left them in a heap of mangled, bloodied pulp. Some even thought it was the Kyuubi all over again. Naruto would have been executed if the Third hadn't issued a secret decree to shut everybody up. Have you forgotten?"
Itachi resumed staring at Kakashi. "I'll leave the corpse intact this time," he clarified blandly, like he was discussing yesterday's lunch. "This way, I won't get Naruto into trouble."
Kakashi's fist found Itachi's head before the boy could blink. "That was not my point, Itachi. And no, you may not kill anyone." He insisted, watching as the younger boy rubbed the sore part of his head with a flicker of unhappiness in his eyes. "Although I also know you're not going to listen to me anyway," Kakashi sighed.
"But you always try," Itachi stated rhetorically, pulling a kunai out and staring at it again. "It's been a long time since I last killed someone efficiently. I'm afraid my skills are deteriorating." He paused. "Although, to be fair, I'll probably only know how good I am by going up against the prestigious clans - the Hyuuga or the Uchiha..."
Rolling his eyes at Itachi's detached way of referring to his own clan, Kakashi almost kicked the morose boy off the tree. "If you're that keen, you can kill yourself and see if it works," he shook his head, and Itachi stared at him with interest. "I didn't mean it, smartass!" The silver-haired man whapped the boy on the head again. "If you die before we accomplish this mission, I will personally bring you back to life and kill you again myself, you hear?"
Itachi gave him a Look. "I'm only listening to you sometimes because you outrank me." He stated, again, with the tone of a man taking a walk in the park with a cane on one hand a leashed poodle on the other. "And because I haven't been able to go back to be promoted."
"You don't have to always look at things from that point of view, Chuunin," Kakashi turned his voice slightly school-teacher and mocked. "I've never ordered you to do anything, have I?" He waited for a response, and got none. "We're partners, boy. We need each other to pull this mission off successfully. And we really should try to stay out of trouble. You're a smart boy - smarter than me, maybe. I know the little blond means a lot to you as well, so just be careful, okay? Don't forget that though we've been classified as Abandoners for a long time already, they haven't forgotten to watch out for our heads, even in this village here."
"I am aware of that," Itachi responded coolly. "It's almost daybreak. Thank you for standing watch together with me, Kakashi-san." The darker-haired shinobi spoke no more after that, making a series of hand seals. He was promptly covered by a puff of transformation smoke.
A sleek, black cat with profound, pale red eyes sat where Itachi had been seated. He took one look at Kakashi, then turned his head away with aloofness and looked somewhere else. Kakashi almost laughed. This guy was such a natural kitty.
"All right, time for Naruto to wake up," Kakashi nodded, performing the same hand seals Itachi had and transforming into his wolf-dog guise, leaping off the tree and standing by near the trunk.
If dogs could grin, he would have done so maniacally.
So instead, Kakashi the dog howled.
The moon had vanished, and the sun was slowly climbing its way out of the mountain tops, but that did not stop the man in disguise. He howled again, when there was no movement from the house, looking up at the trees to see a bemused black cat dangling comfortably over one of the branches. Damned cats and their sloth-like abilities! He'd get that cat down from the branch if it was the last thing he-
His continued howling stopped when his head connected with something metallic and hard. The metallic and hard thing fell to the ground and clattered noisily. It was a mug, with the words NA, RU and TO scrawled messily over it with bright, red permanent marker ink.
And that would mean...
"Shut your trap, Kakashi!"
... that Naruto was awake.
The blond loudmouth was screeching from the window, even as he waved a fist threateningly. He was such a cute kid. Kakashi gave him one lazy glare, then returned to howling at the tree.
Officially pissed, the ten-year-old leapt out of the window and dove for the dog, tackling him to the ground. "What's your problem?! Want me to throw you into the fishmonger's pond again, huh? Huh? Can't let me have a good night's rest without howling for your life every morning, can you? Eh? EEHH??!"
Kakashi attempted to wriggle out of Naruto's grip. For a boy of his age, he sure was strong! After succeeding to a certain extent, he yowled again at the branch Itachi was perched on, determining that if he was not going to have a nice morning, then nobody else would.
Unfortunately, this action caused Naruto to stop trying to strangle the dog and to look up at the branches of the tree instead. He gave a yelp of surprise. "Itachi! What're you doing up there? Come down here at once!"
In response, Itachi swung a lazy tail.
"I know!" Naruto pointed. "You're too afraid to come back down! Kakashi must have chased you up there again, right? Don't worry! I'll go fetch you right away! Just stay calm and don't move..."
In the span of time he took to yabber all of that, Naruto had formed a chakra conjuring hand seal. And the two humans-in-disguise watched with half-veiled horror as he ran up the tall tree in a single breath.
"Told you I'd get you right away!" The blond lifted the black cat; who was too surprised to struggle, into his arms.
Did Naruto just /walk/ up that tree?! Kakashi's lazy look had developed into a full stare.
Did Naruto just... ?! Itachi's stare and thoughts were slightly more discreet. And disjointed, because in the middle of his train of thought Naruto leapt off the branch and landed on the ground with a loud noise and lots of rolling - and as Itachi could feel, a lot of chakra cushioning as well.
"Oops!" The boy regained his footing soon and scratched the back of his head sheepishly. Itachi quickly jumped out of his hands, and joined Kakashi in staring in bewilderment at the blond.
"Oh come on," Naruto pouted. "I'm not /that/ reckless. I was just following what that scroll said! And I've been practicing for months already! I'm pretty good at this, you know?"
Kakashi and Itachi exchanged a look of mutual dismayal. 'That scroll,' was probably the Forbidden Scroll the Third had ordered them to hide in Naruto's house to protect it, seeing that there were many who sought the secrets behind it. They had, of course, not counted on Naruto even bothering to stare at the difficult words inside. Apparently, though, the First must have included /pictures/ when he wrote and sealed the scroll, seeing how well Naruto had read and understood it.
"Come on! Ramen for breakfast today!" Naruto cheered, returning into the house he had came out from.
Again, Kakashi and Itachi looked at each other.
This mission was going to be a lot harder than they had thought.
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It was when he was eleven, that Naruto first heard the word 'ninja' from a shy little girl called Hinata, who was travelling through the village with her father. Said father then quickly led her away, frowning with disapproval at the blond boy, who stuck his tongue out at him. Hinata had looked back once, blushed a beetroot red, and hid behind her father's sleeve.
Naruto had always thought girls were strange things.
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By the time he was twelve, Naruto began getting the hint that he was not supposed to demonstrate the skills he had learnt from the scrolls he found around the house, in public. Every time he tried to pull a prank on someone by, say, walking upside-down a tree branch; Kakashi, in an incredible show of doggy stalkiness and doggy bounciness, would leap at him, catch him by surprise and knock him back to the ground.
Naruto wondered how dogs could be so light when trying to escape from their weekly showers, but so heavy when trying to pull you down to the ground. Really.
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At thirteen, Naruto finally got the full hint and absolutely stopped trying to use his newly learned skills to help him with his pranks - unless he was at a place where people could not see him. Mainly because Itachi followed him around like a leech and bit him whenever he tried to do a hand seal. And dammit, it hurt. And if he got anymore holes in his body he was going to die from haemophilia before he was legal to drink.
How in the world could the cat tell whether it was a hand seal or a hand shake? Itachi must have some really special eyes, Naruto concluded.
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By the time he was fourteen, he had already approached the village chief - the only person who was vaguely friendly to him in the whole place, besides Iruka and his two pets - countless times to ask if he could leave the village to become a 'ninja,' whatever that was. He had decided that since he had begun shouting to the villagers that he was going to become a 'ninja,' they had become more attentive to whatever he did, which was good. Because Naruto welcomed attention. Good or bad.
Somehow, though, the chief always managed to distract him with free ramen.
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And it was when Naruto was fifteen, that things started to happen.
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The paper man was late again - although that wasn't anything to be surprised about. He usually took his own sweet time in delivering the morning papers, making extra sure that by the time he reached Naruto's doors, it was already well into the afternoon. Sometimes even after dusk. That really meant nothing to Naruto, except that he would miss all the discounts they offered through the papers in the morning with their cut-out coupons - but he lived in a village which hated him after all; so why should a paper delivery man feel any less?
It wasn't /his/ idea that he got subscribed to the newspapers anyway. Iruka had been the one to insist, again and again. It did have its uses, though. After all, it was only through the papers that Iruka could teach Naruto how to read and write.
Nevertheless, the initial novelty had worn off, and Naruto no longer waited with abated breaths at the arrival of every new sheet. Currently, he was slogging over his little garden in the yard, digging up some ground with a small, sharp object that was shaped like a dagger but had no hilt. Iruka said it was a bunai... no, a gunai. Kunai, or something like that. As long as it was helpful for making edible food, Naruto didn't really care what it was called.
This month was potato month, the boy was grinning to himself as he extricated a few more plump looking roots. The sun was hot, but it wasn't crowding his mood out at all. Potato with ramen made the best meals, after all! Beside him, Kakashi had rolled onto his back and hung a dribbling tongue out, enjoying the late afternoon sun. Itachi was nowhere to be seen as usual, but the cat would pop out soon enough, when he felt like it.
After a few more potatoes landed in Naruto's food basket, he looked up to see that the entire village was awashed with a soft red glow. The boy's eyes sparkled, and he stood up, basket in hand. Dusk was always one of the most prettiest times of the day. The setting sun would light the small village on ethereal fire, a scene an article in the papers once described as 'the mark of the Fire/Sand Alliance,' whatever the Fire/Sand Alliance was. All Naruto knew was that he felt good watching the sunset from his house, and therefore tried to never miss any one of it.
After the last vestiges of the sun vanished behind the sand dunes in the west, and when Naruto was finally about to turn to retire for the night, the newspaper man came.
He threw the stack of crumpled newspapers at Naruto's head with much force, causing the boy to yelp and almost trip over in pain. Itachi had mysteriously appeared when the newspaper man came, and Kakashi was on his feet immediately, growling and snarling at the newcomer. The man immediately shrank back, having had nasty experiences with this particular canine before, but shot Naruto a hateful glare first.
"Watch it, mister!" Naruto yelled, waving a fist. In reply, the man glared even harder.
"Why should I be nice to monsters?" His voice was icy cold, almost nonchalant. "I keep doing it so I can knock the wind out of your throat. It's going to work one day, you lowlife. Just you wait."
Kakashi stopped growling and bent his legs. He was about to pounce on the man and bite the living daylights out of him when Naruto grabbed him by the tail and held him back.
The frowning grin on Naruto's face was what the wolf-dog saw when he turned his head around.
"Hey, asshole," Naruto bared some teeth at the man, who tilted his head in an arrogant pose of expectation. "You've been saying that since I was seven, and you've never come close to succeeding. Looks like I've either got a hard head, or your throw's more sissy than your face!" The boy struck a thumbs-down pose, sticking his tongue out for good measure.
That really did rile the man up, for he turned deep red in the face and was almost ready to climb over the fence to give Naruto a beating he'd never forget, had he not seen Kakashi waiting on the inside, baring his fangs sadistically.
"Just you wait, you little brat!" The man finally gave up and shook an angry fist, quickly escaping into the darkness of the night.
"I'm waiting, mister! Anytime, anyday!" Naruto shot back, a large, triumphant grin on his face. When he was sure he could no longer feel the man's aura, he turned to Kakashi and pat the dog on his head. "Good job, Kakashi! Come on, dinner time!" He cheered to nobody in particular, and made his way back into the house, Kakashi in trail.
Itachi was already inside when Naruto shut the door, and Kakashi tumbled casually to his usual spot in front of the fireplace. Naruto dumped the basket in a corner and quickly sat down on the floor by the window, spreading the newspapers out to try to catch the last rays of light to read a few words, or see a few pictures. Itachi sat near, staring at the papers with intense interest - as he always did. Together, the duo of boy and cat perused the overdued news.
"Hmm... missed another supermart sale again this morning - no surprise there," Naruto traced his finger along the columns, noticing with amusement that Itachi followed the finger. This cat could read, he swore!
Chuckling to himself, he browsed through a few more pages, until the light got too dim to look at it anymore. As he turned the final page, he noticed something and blinked.
"'Exclusive! Murderer of the night revealed!'" he read the headlines out loud, attracting the attention of Itachi as well as Kakashi, whose ears twitched. Itachi stared at the article with his pale, red eyes, attention seemingly apt. Naruto, on the other hand, having no natural nightvision, gave up after stealing a glance on the hazy picture splashed across the papers. "Argh! Too dark to read anymore!" He complained, standing up and stretching. Kakashi padded over quietly and sat down, staring at the newspaper as well, making Naruto grin. He must have the most intelligent cat and dog in his house!
Looking down again, he stared at the picture again. Dark and hazy, with grained quality though it was, he could see that the figure that stood against the full moon was a lean, good-looking man. He held a bloodied sword in one hand, and was slightly turned so that his thick, dark fringe parted in the centre could be seen, the rest of his hair held in a ponytail behind him. The glow of the moonlight against his cold figure made him look majestic and aloof. That alone, however, was not the most captivating part of the picture.
It was his eyes.
The moon's incandescence faded in comparison to the shocking red glow that burned with intensity from the depths of the person's eyes. Naruto knew that a man with red eyes was probably, above all things else, supposed to be eerie and unapproachable. Yet he felt inexplicably drawn to those eyes. So drawn he was, he didn't notice that he was no longer able to really see the picture and was just staring into space until Kakashi bumped into his ankle and whined softly for attention.
Snapping out of his reverie, Naruto looked down. "What?" He asked, just out of plain habit, when he saw the dog looking expectantly at him, panting away. Kakashi tilted his head in the direction of the kitchen and waited as Naruto blinked, then slapped his forehead. "Oh yeah! Right! Dinner! Ramen, ramen!" The boy was back to grinning, making his way easily over to the kitchen. "But really! This village is getting creepier every year! Almost every week the mysterious dark-haired killer strikes someone dead... how did he get so careless that somebody actually took a picture of him, though? The photographer must have gotten some good money for that shot..."
As the blond's rambling tapered off into the kitchen, Itachi shot an accusing glare at Kakashi, who leered as much as a dog could leer, back at the cat. They squared off for a while more, then both vanished from the room in two small wisps of smoke.
"... and like, you know, I really wonder who he'll kill next! I hope it's not me! I'm not going to die before I find out how to become a nin-... eh? Kakashi? Itachi?" The boy set his pet food bowls down on the ground and glanced around the bedarkened house. After a brief respite, he came to the sterling conclusion that Kakashi must have hackled Itachi's fur somehow and now they were on yet another one of their nightly dog-after-cat-after-dog chases. Naruto shook his head, bemused. It wasn't the first time such a thing had happened, so he didn't bother to think too much about it. Instead, he wandered towards the unlit fireplace, sitting down to stare at it mindlessly.
Outside, however, Kakashi and Itachi were doing anything but having a dog-after-cat-after-dog chase.
"Kakashi-san," Itachi's voice was admonishing. He turned to stare at the older ninja, perched atop the same tree trunk they often perched atop to watch over Naruto. "That was uncalled for."
"Hm?" The lazy drawl was unmistakably Kakashi's. "What was uncalled for? Please do elaborate."
"The photograph," Itachi was determined not to be baited. "You are the only one in this village who could have taken that without my knowledge. Why did you submit it to the press? What happened to always being discreet?"
The silver-haired Jounin sighed. "Itachi," he said in a gentle but firm voice, "I told you many times before /not/ to kill the people of this village. But lately you've been consumed with a strange kind of bloodlust I never thought you had in you. I don't even know if I should call it bloodlust, actually." He sighed. "The picture was just a warning. Expect it to go straight to the Hokage the next time it happens."
The darker-haired person nevertheless remained calm. "You would jeopardize the mission for a whim?"
"A whim that involves hundreds of human lives, yes," Kakashi rolled his eyes, "and the lives of our fellow ninjas at that. I've stopped asking why a long time ago, Itachi. Your life is yours, after all, but don't push it too hard," came the stern warning, even as Itachi looked away and shrugged.
"Whatever it is, that photograph will mean I have to lie low for at least a while," the Uchiha prodigy quirked his lips into a gangly semblance of a disappointed pout. "You really know how to grasp your time."
"How else did I get my Jounin license?" Kakashi stooped to about the same height as Itachi was stooping to on the branch, glancing into the dark house through the window. As if remembering something, he randomly blurted, "You know, Naruto has never ever gotten that fireplace to light up. It does get cold in the nights around here..."
"He does not know any Katon skills," Itachi offered. "And we never let him get any further in that Scroll than the Kage Bunshin no Jutsu."
"Maybe we should let him take a peek at some of the Katon Jutsu's," Kakashi thought aloud, "he keeps staring at the fireplace as if that if he stares hard enough, he'll get it to light up."
The Uchiha turned his head and stared at his companion. "I don't believe Iruka-san has managed to get Naruto to remember enough words for him to be able to decipher the Katon manual yet."
"Oh," Kakashi blinked, remembering that to be true, "darn. More sleepless winter nights for us then."
Beside him, Itachi continued staring at his superior wordlessly. Then he blinked and looked away, into the house where Naruto was just finishing up with his ramen. Shooting Kakashi another look, he quietly transformed into his animal form and leapt nimbly off the tree, sauntering easily into the house.
Even as Kakashi stared gape-jaw at the retreating form of Itachi, he heard a loud rumbling sound from his own stomach, signifying the end of lunch and tea and the beginning of dinner and supper.
If he could get his hands on it before Itachi did.
"Why that little-" The man swore and quickly leapt down, transforming in the middle of the leap and bounding into the house, howling away. After a few moments of silence, Naruto's loud, shrieking voice could be heard, when Kakashi likely began fighting with Itachi over the food, as they did every other night. Unusually quiet Itachi may be, but when it came to devising schemes and tactics, he certainly lost to nobody.
As the house continued in its rowdiness, two hate-filled eyes glared at scene from without. Accompanying it was a scowl, with almost fang-like canines protruding from the mouth. It had obviously been observing the scene for a rather lengthy period of time, for it was quiet and melded too well into the background to have been just passing by. The scowl line upturned and now was an evil grin. With a soft rustling of leaves the figure departed soundlessly.
Even the leaves knew how evil the aura that was left behind felt.
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Unbeknownst to the duo of dog and cat, though, Naruto /had/ already came into contact with the Katon skill scrolls. The Third had gotten Iruka to place some Jutsu scrolls around Naruto's house to see what became of it, and though the boy did not understand much of what went on, he still attempted to mimick some of the hand seals written about in the scrolls. Sometimes he was successful - like the Kage Bunshin; he /still/ hadn't managed to figure out /how/ he had managed to pull that one off, but he was proud nonetheless. He could never show what he had learnt to anyone but Iruka, though. Kakashi and Itachi would eye him carefully whenever he thought about any public demonstrations, and immediately the idea waned. Animal bites were painful!
Currently, as Kakashi and Itachi fought over their food, Naruto concentrated on the fireplace before him. Night had claimed the skies a while ago, and it was getting cold. Naruto was /sure/ that this time he would get the Katon Jutsu right. After all, if he didn't learn how to start that fire spark in the firewood Iruka had made him collect for who knows what reason soon, he and his housepets would freeze their asses off and nobody would find them until their corpses started rotting in summer. Shuddering partly at the concept, and partly at the biting breeze, he tried the hand seals again.
After a few more futile attempts, he sighed heavily and flopped against his bed, grasping the thin sheets in his hands and cuddling helplessly against it. Kakashi and Itachi were still fighting, but that would soon be over, and then they would wander off to wherever they usually wandered off to during the nights.
Occasionally Naruto would awaken to an entire mouthful of silver fur - when Kakashi chose to curl up beside him on the bed. The boy would then without fail scream at the dog; furred up blankets were a pain to wash, dammit! Of course, Naruto appreciated the warmth, comfort and security of having another warm body beside him in sleep, but being stubborn and independent, the boy absolutely refused to depend on his pets more than he should have to.
After all, he should be the one taking care of them, shouldn't he?
Anyway, they were too busy trying to snatch each other's food out of their respective bowls at the moment to bother about curling up to sleep, thought Naruto blandly to himself when he rolled over and saw the silver dog and the black cat in the middle of a heated staring competition. He smiled at the sight, then turned from the scene to face the wooden walls of his house instead.
Looks like it was going to be another cold, cold night.
For the next few minutes? Hours?, Naruto simply stayed in his curled position, shivering. Animal fighting noises had subsided, so Naruto assumed that the dog and cat had either came to a truce or had finally killed each other. Maybe he would find out tomorrow when he was more awake. Since his vulnerable stick house stood just by the main road, he thought he could hear muffled sounds of a mob shouting something to each other - followed by the constant flickering of fire torches by his window. When the noises got progressively louder, he attempted to stifle them out with his pillow over his head. He wondered which unfortunate house the village council was going to pillage tonight.
After all, Naruto the orphan was too unworthy to even steal from, wasn't it? Not like Kakashi or Itachi made it any easier, but still!
To his surprise, therefore, he heard from beneath his pillow sounds of a strong hand banging on his door. The boy stifled a sigh. He certainly needed no more disappointment to fuel his unhappiness tonight. Deciding it had to be a dream, or a hallucination, he pressed the pillow harder against his ears and silently willed the noise to go away.
But it didn't.
Groaning loudly, he flung his blanket off and glared through the darkness at the offending object, and whoever stood behind it, banging the door like there was no tomorrow to do it. Rubbing his eyes tiredly, he saw a flicker of movement from the corner of his room - a flash of darkness disappearing into his kitchen. Naruto blinked. Wondering which issue he should pursue first, he finally yawned, stretched and slowly hobbled to the door to confront the nemesis who stood on the other side.
"What do you want?" The blond boy was hardly able to keep the sleep and irritation out of his voice. He had grabbed the doorknob and swung it open with full force, trying to make it look like he was not afraid of anybody who stood outside.
Which he was not. That, however, did not stop him from being taken aback at the sight before him.
An angry mob stared down at the blond, and he suddenly felt much smaller than he already was. Cursing his momentary display of weakness, he frowned as angrily as he could and snapped, "Don't you know what time it is now? What the hell do you guys want this time?"
The torches they bore flickered and cast eerie, dangerous shadows along the dirt path outside Naruto's house, even as many of them sneered outwardly at the boy. Their spokesman, who although kept a poker-face, could not stop the hatred from seeping out from his eyes or tone when he asked, "Brat. You see someone come by?"
Naruto blinked - firstly, at the fact that the villagers were asking him a reasonable question and secondly, that they were not trying to scold his brains or beat his guts out while they were at it. For as long as he could remember, there were nobody in the village who cared if he lived or died. The only one who did was Iruka, and he was a travelling merchant who stayed in /another/ town! Daily, Naruto was made a mockery off and ridiculed for things he never even knew he did. He would shout, play pranks and generally try to get some attention that was not malicious, even if it had to be negative, but the villagers remained cold and distant.
Sometimes he debated as to whether it was the fact that he was always pulling quick ones on the villagers, since that was the reason they always used when unleashing their torrent of abuse on him. But that had not sounded logical - even to his own ears. There were many in the village who did much, much more heinous things - like that dark-haired red-eyed man, and still those enjoyed acceptance in the society, even if they had to bear the mark of a criminal. Apparently, Naruto wasn't even worthy of that. Why should he, a harmless youth playing harmless tricks on people, be treated any less?
What had happened, to make them hate him so much?
Sometimes Naruto thought he would die to know.
But most of the time, he would rather die to not know.
Trying to set his face into as normal a facade as he could while still in half-sleep mode, Naruto replied gruffly that, "You guys are the only ones to pass by in a long time."
The silence that followed after seemed to force the temperature even lower, when nothing but the cackling of fire upon wooden stake could be heard. The looks of sheer distrust on the mobs' faces was enough to break whatever hope Naruto held in his chest for the brief time that had passed that he was perhaps being treated like a normal person for once. Growling, he lashed out, "Look, I can't help it if you don't believe me. If you wanna, you can come in and turn the house upside down to look for what you're looking for, but I'd tell you not to waste your time because what you're looking for is not here - whatever it is!"
Another silence ensued - that of amazement this time. Did the boy just /dared/ to speak up against the council appointed search party?
In the blink of an eye, Naruto found himself being lifted into the air by a hand grabbing the front of his t-shirt, leaving him gasping and struggling. "Look here, brat," the spokesman sneered, the fire in his eyes rivalling that of his torch, "We're looking for disgusting murderer who's been killing the villagers in cold blood for years now. We finally caught him in the act, chased him, then he came by this way and disappeared. Why we had considered that he would be hiding in your pathetic excuse for a house," there was rancous laughter in the background, "is beyond even me." The man laughed in Naruto's face, and Naruto winced.
He was used to the verbal abuse, hell yeah.
But that didn't mean he couldn't abuse them right back.
"Hey mister," the boy's voice was calm but mischievious. "Did you brush your teeth today? Your breath stinks worse than the toilet at the back of my pathetic excuse of a house." For effect, the blond stuck his tongue out in royal defiance. "I could introduce some really good scrubbing detergent! Want a list?"
The man certainly saw red, for his face flushed a dangerous crimson. He threw Naruto back into the house with brute force, laughing mercilessly as the boy rolled uncontrollably around until his bedpost stopped his advance with a sickening thud. "Mind your manners, you prick! I don't know why the village head even keeps you around at all! One more word and I'll burn your house down, you hear?!"
Naruto coughed, feeling blood slowly oozing out of his mouth, unable to make a proper reply to wipe that smirk off the jerk's face. Slowly, the laughing asshole and his mob of followers departed from the door, and Naruto managed to sit up with much difficulty.
"Damn it," he cursed softly, wiping desperately at the trail of blood that now lingered by the corners of his mouth. After brooding for a while beside his bed on the floor, he realised that his already cold room was getting colder, and so rose up uncaringly to shut the door, still in a state of detachment.
When that was done, he sighed heavily and sank down into a crouch with his back behind the door. He stared ahead at nothing in particular, hand on the area near his ribcage where he had been hurt when the man threw him across the room. He was not overly concerned with the physical injury. After all, he healed at the speed of light - or at least, faster than any normal person he knew could. The blood would dry by tomorrow, and the wound; along with the superficial scars - closed and patched by daylight. It was never the skin-deep wounds that hurt, after all.
It was the hurt that resonated deep within his soul that truly did.
He vaguely remembered getting up and walking to the kitchen, where the only source of water was. Whether or not the wound was going to heal miraculously fast, it was still bad style to let blood dry against his face. If Kakashi saw it, he was going to howl all night again. No way was he letting /that/ happen!
Immediately upon stumbling into the kitchen, however, his hairs began standing on ends, and a strange feeling permeated his every fibre. Shuddering involuntarily - and this time not because of the wind, he allowed his eyes to fall upon a dark, hooded, spectre-like creature prowling the cabinets. The creature jerked stiffly to a stop in whatever he was doing when he sensed someone's eyes upon him, and turned around slowly.
/BLOOD!!/ was the first thing that ran through Naruto's mind. /BlOOD RED! SCARY! SCARY EYES! GLOWING! GLOW-IN-THE-DARK! WAAA!! HE'S GONNA EAT ME! EAT ME!! LIKE ALL THE OTHER GUYS HE KILLED!!!/
The flicker of fire torches began to resume outside his curtained window, indicating that the villagers were passing by again. Ignoring the little voice inside of him warning him that nobody would believe him anyway, Naruto prepared to launch himself at the window and scream the living daylights out of everybody about the red-eyed monster in his kitchen.
That is, until said monster tackled him from behind and clamped a strong hand over the boy's mouth, effectively sealing his voice. Not one to be defeated, however, Naruto thrashed, flailed, kicked, scratched, and punched. But the creature not only had a iron grip on his mouth, he also had a vice-like hold on his other limbs. Hopes of discovery flew further and further together with the rustle of footsteps echoing softer and softer down the dirt road. Though, that wasn't what was really bothering him.
What really was, was that he was starting to suffocate. The damned intruder had a hand over his mouth and half his nose, and urgh! It was getting hard to breath!
In a last, desperate bid to salvage his lost pride and get some fresh air, Naruto opened his mouth and bit down on the hand covering it. Hard.
"Ow!" A hiss came out from behind him, much to Naruto's satisfaction, and he was loosened immediately. Quickly scrambling to his feet, Naruto whipped around and pointed at the shadow.
"Who are you and what are you doing in my house?!"
"Keep it down, you blasted moron!" The shadow had snucked to the window deftly and peered cautiously out of the curtains, before replacing it. "You're going to wake the whole neighbourhood up!"
"Well you give me one damn bloody good reason why I should not when I have this strange monster with glowing-red-eyes thing stalking me and my house in the middle of the night, running away from the village council because he was killing people?! Come on! I'm waiting!" The blond taunted angrily. The nerve of this spectre thing! He barges in and he makes demands! The next thing you know he would be asking for a chocolate ice-cream sundae! How dare he!
The dark shadow opened his mouth to say something, then closed it. In the time that passed, Naruto swore the scowl on his opponent's face deepened. "Ever since I stepped into this stupid section of the village everybody's been pointing fingers. I hate to tell you but I did not kill anybody and have absolutely no idea what is going on," was the stranger's drawl. "I was just passing by... and why the hell is it so cold?" He glanced once in the direction of the unused fireplace, silently pondering his observation. "Do you ever use that thing at all?"
There was a deathly hush.
"Wh-What business is it of yours if I prefer the cold, bastard?" Naruto managed eventually, but he sounded hesitant even to himself. He only hoped the other party wouldn't catch on his word whiskers and use it to-
"... Little moron here can't light a fireplace to save his life, huh?"
Immediately, the blond bristled. "What's your problem already, bastard?! In case you haven't noticed, not everybody in this world has to /know/ how to light a fireplace, idiot!"
There was yet another bout of silence. "But you..." the stranger's voice was apprehensive, and his red eyes glowed with even more intensity, as if he was using it to scan through Naruto's very being. "But you're... you have..."
"What?" Naruto was nonplussed, but curious.
The dark shadow pondered his words for a while. "You have good chakra control." He admitted begrudingly. "Excellent control, actually. Doesn't make sense if you can't even call a small fire..."
Hearing those words caused Naruto to freeze on the spot. Nobody had ever said anything like this to him before - not even Iruka! He was torn between grabbing the stranger and twirling him down his room in a dance for joy and grabbing the stranger by his shoulders and shaking him until he admitted that he had just been pulling a lousy prank on the ostracised orphan.
"Really?" Was the only thing he could whisper after all other thoughts ran through his mind. "You... you mean it?"
The spectre snorted and moved towards where Naruto had gathered all the firewood. "Don't make me repeat myself, moron," he mumbled, before quickly summoning a small fire into the logs with a minor Katon Jutsu. "The Sharingan doesn't lie."
"Sharingan?" Naruto blurted out, confused. "What's that? And like woah! How did you /do/ that?!"
The fire was just starting to catch on the logs in the fireplace, but the stranger froze again. He turned to stare at Naruto incredulously. "You /don't/ know?"
Slightly thrown off guard by the unexpected question, Naruto balked slightly. "So what if i don't?" He quickly replied, heaving a fist into the air. "It's not a damned crime!"
"... you're not a ninja."
Naruto perked up immediately. "I'm going to BE one!" He grinned, then blinked in confusion when reality set in. "Wait - you know about ninjas?"
The other boy snorted. "The name's Uchiha Sasuke. I /am/ a ninja." He stated plainly, tapping his forehead protector while smirking at the other boy. "Couldn't you tell, moron?"
"ARGH!" The blond screeched. "Stop calling me a moron, bastard! My name is Uzumaki Naruto, and I'll have you know that I'm going to become the best ninja in all the whole world and when I do, I'm going to kick your ass so hard you'll be crying into next week!"
In one fluid movement, Sasuke stood and turned towards Naruto, eyes flashing. "Will you just keep it down, you loudmouth?! If you get those villagers back here and if they find me then I'll make sure I /really/ kill you before they drag me away, dammit! So shut up already! Just shut up, all right?"
Properly shocked at the darker-haired boy's sudden outburst, Naruto did keep his peace for a good few minutes, during which Sasuke returned to warming his toes by the fireplace.
The blond frowned at the person in front of him, using his fireplace. He should be more angry, and throwing this boy out at the moment, but he somehow could not bring himself to. It wasn't like Sasuke was /really/ going to kill him, was it? Besides, the fireplace was beginning to warm up the whole place, and it was a feeling Naruto missed very much. This Sasuke thing - he claimed, despite all obvious visual evidence, that he was not the one behind all the murders. But why was he running away then? He must have done something so wrong that the villagers were dying to get their hands on him even in the death of the night, right? Blowing some stray hair noisily away from his face, the blond sat down heavily on the floor and folded his arms around himself, scowling.
"I don't get it," he said, taking care to control his volume, just in case Sasuke got his pants in a twist about it again. "If you're not the killer, then why the hell are you running away from the villagers?"
The raven-haired boy sighed. For a few painful seconds he simply turned around and glared at Naruto with his creepy red eyes, as if daring him to continue. But Naruto wasn't in a patronising mood today and so he glared right back. Eventually, Sasuke turned back to looking at the fire. "I haven't killed anybody in this section of Konoha before, moron." He shook his head. "I'm running away because I don't want to be caught, obviously. You have some of the most unreasonable people around here." He stole a glance at the disbelieving look on Naruto's face and rolled his eyes. "I know you don't believe me, and I'm not expecting you to. Look, I don't want to be any trouble - tomorrow I'll go, and neither you nor your friends will ever see me again. Just let me lie low here for tonight, okay?"
Naruto grunted something akin to disagreement. "Why should I listen to you? What if you're really the killer?! Wouldn't I be helping a criminal? Then I'll get sentenced to death too!" He made a gasp of sudden revelation. "I still think it's not safe! I don't wanna be under the same roof as a murderer for one night! Of course the fact that you haven't killed me yet is besides the point - just what proof do you have that you're not the killer?" Naruto pointed dramatically. "Spill it and maybe I'll even help ya!"
Sasuke groaned, a hand on his forehead. He'd thought that throughout his long, outstanding ninja service, that he had seen all the idiots there were in the world. "I'd ask you the same question myself, dimwit," he muttered and glared at the blond from the corner of his eyes. "What proof do /you/ have that I killed someone?"
Taken aback by the counter, Naruto gaped. "It was in the papers!" He gestured wildly. "The guy looked just like you! Nobody else I know has super duper glow-in-the-dark red eyes like that!"
"Oh?" Sasuke was nevertheless unimpressed. "So if I didn't have super duper glow-in-the-dark eyes you'll gladly let me stay for the night?"
"Gladly!" Naruto grinned confidently. After all, nobody could change the colour of their eyes just like that, could they?
There was a brief silence, after which Sasuke 'hn'ed and turned from the fireplace to smirk at Naruto. "Well, do you see red eyes now?"
Naruto glanced once. "Nope!" And replied cheerfully. It was a few seconds later before the full import of the situation sank into his brain, in which he heaved a loud gasp and said, "You... you!! Your eyes! They... they're not red anymore! WOAH!! Like how?! How did you do that? You gotta teach me! I-"
"Naruto," the voice was terse, curt, and pained. The blond quietened down from his excitement and stared in wonder at the prodigy.
Nobody had ever said his name like this, with no trace of malice or a promise of a painful beating before! Although Sasuke did sound exasperated beyond compare, but still, it was something worth rejoicing over!
"Just shut up and go to sleep."
Even if it /is/ from a heartless stranger like Sasuke!
Naruto grinned besides himself. "This is /my/ house and I will go to sleep whenever /I/ feel like it, bastard!" He heard Sasuke sigh and saw him cringe, but decided he was having too much fun to stop. "And I'm only letting you stay here because you don't have red eyes anymore! And, anybody who is against the village council is my friend! And because you... you can put up a nice fire! Hahah!"
Sasuke shot him a Look. "/I'm/ only staying here because this is the only house along this stretch of road that looked like it was uninhabited! If I'd known I'd be running into a moron like you, I wouldn't have run in at all! And now will you please just shut up so that I can concentrate on figuring out my escape route already?"
The grin on Naruto's face stretched wider.
"You owe me one, Sasuke!"
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Meanwhile, high up in their usual tree, Kakashi was trying to stifle his laughter against all odds. Whereas beside him, Itachi kept shooting glares of disdain at the man.
"This is not funny, Kakashi-san," the Uchiha mumbled.
"Oh," Kakashi shook his head, laughing softly. "But it is. It really is.
"Things are going to get very interesting from now on."
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Part 2 of 7
11/5/2004
xdtougenkyou.net
Warnings: Eventual fluffy friendship between the boys. Do not read if thou art not a fan of fluff!
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Crossroads
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Chapter One
At the age of five, Naruto woke up to a strange new room with no recollection of the previous five years of his life, except the feeling that they weren't something he had wanted to remember anyway. A rather young travelling merchant by the name of Iruka knocked on his door the very same day while he was yet wondering about the strangeness of it all and sold him some ramen.
He had smiled at Naruto, and Naruto felt warm and fuzzy inside. He didn't quite recall being smiled at so nicely ever before in his whole life of five years.
So Naruto decided that he was going to eat ramen for the rest of his life.
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By the time he was six, Iruka was dropping by almost every other day. It started when Naruto ambushed him with a pail of water while he was opening the door. When questioned the boy said he had read it from one of the scrolls lying around the house. At that moment, however, as Naruto stood by and laughed at his prank well pulled, Iruka twitched and promptly put Naruto over his lap to spank him. Thereafter Iruka swore he would be back to 'educate' Naruto about what he should and should not be doing to his elders.
And that was why Iruka made frequent appearances at Naruto's house, mothering over the boy with an iron rod.
Well, at least he always brought food and money.
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Seven years old was Naruto when he noticed something strange. A black cat perched atop the large tree outside his house every morning when he went out to take care of the garden Iruka had helped him plant for food. It would stare at him as he did his work. At first, Naruto thought nothing of it. But it was strange to have a black cat stare at you all day from atop a tree.
One day, he caught sight of a silver dog sitting beneath the tree the cat was perched atop, licking its paws, and that was when it dawned upon him.
The cat had been chased up the tree by the dog! Every morning! Poor cat! He got Iruka to bring the cat down and tried to get the cat and dog to shake hands. While the one-eyed dog very happily obliged, the red-eyed cat had glared and ran back to Naruto, crouching behind the boy.
Naruto had laughed. Genuinely happily. So genuinely happily, in fact, that Iruka insisted that he kept the animals as pets. The dog had not protested, walking straight into the house and sitting in front of the fireplace like he had always lived there - or at least, been inside enough to know it well. The cat looked like he was about to leap back into the tree when Naruto scooped him up and grinned at him. Without waiting for a reaction, he marched back into the house, and thus when the door closed, their fates were sealed.
Not like it wasn't their original mission to begin with, was it?
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It was an interesting if boring eighth year for Naruto, as he slowly began to feel the hatred behind the eyes of the villagers when they looked at him. He had asked Iruka, but the man waved it off everytime with a nervous snigger. Of course he was hiding something, but at least he was genuinely concerned about Naruto's welfare in spite of his knowledge of whatever secret lurked behind himself and this village, Naruto had thought. Otherwise, all was fine in Naruto's household of a boy, a stranger, a cat and a dog.
Speaking of which, Naruto had struck upon a revelation one fine day. The animals in his house did not have names! That was cruel! Even his plants had names! While he tried to come up with good names for the animals he loved with his life, the silver wolf-dog had gone into Naruto's room, made several minutes worth of brushing sounds, before returning to the living room, dragging a forlorn looking scroll behind him. There were just a few simple words written on it.
Inu - Kakashi
Neko - Itachi
When Naruto announced their names to Iruka the next day, the man almost choked on his miso. Asking Naruto how he had come up with those names, the boy simply replied that they had told him themselves. This caused the man to stare at the beasts with a strange, suspicious glow in his eyes.
Which was quickly dispelled when Kakashi leapt onto the man and slobbered him amidst loud protests. Naruto laughed, and Itachi sat there looking upon the scene with as much amusement as a black cat with red eyes could have.
All was calm in the family.
Just like the calm before the storm.
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During the ninth year of his life Naruto began showing signs of frustration about his situation. The villagers despised him for something he did not know. That in itself did not bother him. But when their emotions translated to action, Naruto found himself seething at his inability to defend himself.
In the day, he had Iruka, whose presence alone warded off any antagonistic stares. But in the night, things were just different.
Things would happen. And Naruto would stand before the closed door that was the only thing shielding him from the mob he had to face outside.
Naruto would always turn around to look behind him.
Kakashi would be lying peacefully by the empty fireplace, whereas Itachi would be sitting by the windowsill, staring at Naruto. Behind the threshold of the door, the angry shouts of the villagers would be heard. As long as there was some prickly crime in the day, the villagers would insist that Naruto was behind it, when all he had been doing was probably watering his wheat crop. Naruto ignored them for the most part. But sometimes, they would threaten to burn down his house and his garden, leaving him no choice but to defend himself. Before he faced his opponents, the boy would always turn around to glance at his friends, trying to draw as much courage as he could.
Never would he let them go homeless.
He would take a deep breath, and storm out of his house to confront the issues that would face him, bravely.
Because Naruto always locked the door, Itachi would watch quietly from the window. As quietly as Kakashi pretended to be asleep.
But when Naruto stumbled in later, bleeding in ten different places, one of the two would be missing while the other carefully followed the boy around as he tried to patch himself up.
By the end of that year, the night attacks had nearly all stopped.
Mainly because the persecutors either went missing, went mad, went on long journeys, or were killed.
Even those they blamed it on Naruto.
Things upheaved, climaxed, and then calmed down.
And by the time Naruto was ten, most of the villagers had become more accepting towards him, although they continued to ignore him.
Still, he did not hope against hope. And that was probably when the pranks were unleashed in full force, despite Iruka's horrified protests.
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The village was situated in the middle of the forest dividing Fire from Sand. It was a fairly large village by itself, and was allowed to operate as a normal civilian stronghold. An agreement between the Third and the council saw to it that no information was to be hidden by travelling merchants who were bound to want to hawk their wares in the streets. Only, no villager would be allowed to leave the village without the proper papers from the village chief, thus rendering the village a safe cocoon for the purpose of harbouring the child many feared unreasonably.
Five years had elapsed since then. Naruto was now ten.
Kakashi the human found himself staring at the round, unmoving moon in the sky.
In the five years that passed since they moved into the makeshift village, he could see that it was slowly developing a life of its own. Naruto grew up believing he was an orphan born and bred in the pseudo village. People had stopped pretending to be what they were not a long time ago, and settled naturally into their roles of normal civilians - not undercover ninjas, trying to get by their daily lives.
If Kakashi hadn't known any better, he would have been lulled into the false security of the superficial peace as well.
From where he stayed hidden in the trees, with the help of a camouflague and invisibility Jutsu, he could peer through the window of Naruto's house and keep watch over the boy. Too many times he had intercepted the manifestations of hatred the villagers had for the child, and knew better than to let his guard down for even a second.
Being with the boy through these tender years of his made him realise just how brutal human nature could be when blinded by poor reasoning. Although the hatred in the villagers' eyes was nothing he had never seen before, he did not believe that trained ninjas like them were willing to unleash that kind of emotion on a boy who did nothing to deserve the manner of treatment they were affording him.
Yet Naruto remained an enigma.
Throughout the period of unjustified persecution, the boy continued to grow mentally stronger than before. He would rise up to the challenge any unhappy villager threw in his way, and though he did not always walk away triumphant, he at least had had the courage to face the issue, rather than being content with running away and never managing to be true to himself. Of course, he had help from one undercover shinobi the Third had obviously sent - Iruka was the name. The man had played a huge role in helping the boisterous boy keep most of his innocence and determination intact throughout the years by being a living, human example to Naruto. Something neither Itachi nor Kakashi could do so long as they were under disguise.
The problem with Iruka was that he could only stay a few hours in the day and had to go by night - village rules. Besides, it took several hours alone to journey from the Leaf to this nameless village, even at top speed.
Despite having to endure the cold, lonely nights by himself, Naruto continued to shine brightly with character, making Kakashi marvel at how alike he was, to the Fourth.
As per their mission, Kakashi and Itachi stayed close by Naruto under the perfected Henge no Jutsu, which no shinobi could hope to see through or dispel unless they, the subjects, saw fit to do so. Although for Kakashi himself, he had grown to love the boy like he was his own little brother, and not just his mission objective.
He fiercely protected Naruto under the guise of a wolf-dog, sometimes so much so that Naruto would yell at him to mind his own business. But he knew that it wasn't what the blond really meant. After all, amongst all the peers and contemporaries in this fake village, Kakashi knew that Naruto cherished every little bit of solace, even if solace came in the form of two creatures who were less human in form, but every bit humane in fellow feeling.
Which brought him to his partner-in-crime.
Glancing out from the corner of his eyes, Kakashi could see the dark, brooding Uchiha staring into space. Itachi was an unusually quiet kid, but Kakashi's observation skills was surpassing, and he had long grown to have a mutual understanding with the dark-haired Uchiha. To say the least, all these years in their mission of Naruto caretaking, had forced them to have to know each other like the back of their palms.
It came in handy sometimes, although other times, it just made Kakashi frown with disapproval.
Especially when Itachi started staring at a kunai like that.
"Get a hold of yourself, Itachi," Kakashi's soft, barely audible voice sternly warned. "The villagers are not going to let it slide so easily if you do it again this time. You'll get Naruto into trouble."
The quiet teenager stared casually at his partner for a long time, then put the kunai away. "I'm sorry," he muttered. The silver-haired ninja knew, though, that he was anything but sorry.
"The last time," Kakashi decided to speak out again, his voice even more taut than before. He swear! Itachi was the worst kind of partner you could get stuck with for long missions like these! "... you killed those men for bullying Naruto, the entire village went into an uproar. Mostly because you left them in a heap of mangled, bloodied pulp. Some even thought it was the Kyuubi all over again. Naruto would have been executed if the Third hadn't issued a secret decree to shut everybody up. Have you forgotten?"
Itachi resumed staring at Kakashi. "I'll leave the corpse intact this time," he clarified blandly, like he was discussing yesterday's lunch. "This way, I won't get Naruto into trouble."
Kakashi's fist found Itachi's head before the boy could blink. "That was not my point, Itachi. And no, you may not kill anyone." He insisted, watching as the younger boy rubbed the sore part of his head with a flicker of unhappiness in his eyes. "Although I also know you're not going to listen to me anyway," Kakashi sighed.
"But you always try," Itachi stated rhetorically, pulling a kunai out and staring at it again. "It's been a long time since I last killed someone efficiently. I'm afraid my skills are deteriorating." He paused. "Although, to be fair, I'll probably only know how good I am by going up against the prestigious clans - the Hyuuga or the Uchiha..."
Rolling his eyes at Itachi's detached way of referring to his own clan, Kakashi almost kicked the morose boy off the tree. "If you're that keen, you can kill yourself and see if it works," he shook his head, and Itachi stared at him with interest. "I didn't mean it, smartass!" The silver-haired man whapped the boy on the head again. "If you die before we accomplish this mission, I will personally bring you back to life and kill you again myself, you hear?"
Itachi gave him a Look. "I'm only listening to you sometimes because you outrank me." He stated, again, with the tone of a man taking a walk in the park with a cane on one hand a leashed poodle on the other. "And because I haven't been able to go back to be promoted."
"You don't have to always look at things from that point of view, Chuunin," Kakashi turned his voice slightly school-teacher and mocked. "I've never ordered you to do anything, have I?" He waited for a response, and got none. "We're partners, boy. We need each other to pull this mission off successfully. And we really should try to stay out of trouble. You're a smart boy - smarter than me, maybe. I know the little blond means a lot to you as well, so just be careful, okay? Don't forget that though we've been classified as Abandoners for a long time already, they haven't forgotten to watch out for our heads, even in this village here."
"I am aware of that," Itachi responded coolly. "It's almost daybreak. Thank you for standing watch together with me, Kakashi-san." The darker-haired shinobi spoke no more after that, making a series of hand seals. He was promptly covered by a puff of transformation smoke.
A sleek, black cat with profound, pale red eyes sat where Itachi had been seated. He took one look at Kakashi, then turned his head away with aloofness and looked somewhere else. Kakashi almost laughed. This guy was such a natural kitty.
"All right, time for Naruto to wake up," Kakashi nodded, performing the same hand seals Itachi had and transforming into his wolf-dog guise, leaping off the tree and standing by near the trunk.
If dogs could grin, he would have done so maniacally.
So instead, Kakashi the dog howled.
The moon had vanished, and the sun was slowly climbing its way out of the mountain tops, but that did not stop the man in disguise. He howled again, when there was no movement from the house, looking up at the trees to see a bemused black cat dangling comfortably over one of the branches. Damned cats and their sloth-like abilities! He'd get that cat down from the branch if it was the last thing he-
His continued howling stopped when his head connected with something metallic and hard. The metallic and hard thing fell to the ground and clattered noisily. It was a mug, with the words NA, RU and TO scrawled messily over it with bright, red permanent marker ink.
And that would mean...
"Shut your trap, Kakashi!"
... that Naruto was awake.
The blond loudmouth was screeching from the window, even as he waved a fist threateningly. He was such a cute kid. Kakashi gave him one lazy glare, then returned to howling at the tree.
Officially pissed, the ten-year-old leapt out of the window and dove for the dog, tackling him to the ground. "What's your problem?! Want me to throw you into the fishmonger's pond again, huh? Huh? Can't let me have a good night's rest without howling for your life every morning, can you? Eh? EEHH??!"
Kakashi attempted to wriggle out of Naruto's grip. For a boy of his age, he sure was strong! After succeeding to a certain extent, he yowled again at the branch Itachi was perched on, determining that if he was not going to have a nice morning, then nobody else would.
Unfortunately, this action caused Naruto to stop trying to strangle the dog and to look up at the branches of the tree instead. He gave a yelp of surprise. "Itachi! What're you doing up there? Come down here at once!"
In response, Itachi swung a lazy tail.
"I know!" Naruto pointed. "You're too afraid to come back down! Kakashi must have chased you up there again, right? Don't worry! I'll go fetch you right away! Just stay calm and don't move..."
In the span of time he took to yabber all of that, Naruto had formed a chakra conjuring hand seal. And the two humans-in-disguise watched with half-veiled horror as he ran up the tall tree in a single breath.
"Told you I'd get you right away!" The blond lifted the black cat; who was too surprised to struggle, into his arms.
Did Naruto just /walk/ up that tree?! Kakashi's lazy look had developed into a full stare.
Did Naruto just... ?! Itachi's stare and thoughts were slightly more discreet. And disjointed, because in the middle of his train of thought Naruto leapt off the branch and landed on the ground with a loud noise and lots of rolling - and as Itachi could feel, a lot of chakra cushioning as well.
"Oops!" The boy regained his footing soon and scratched the back of his head sheepishly. Itachi quickly jumped out of his hands, and joined Kakashi in staring in bewilderment at the blond.
"Oh come on," Naruto pouted. "I'm not /that/ reckless. I was just following what that scroll said! And I've been practicing for months already! I'm pretty good at this, you know?"
Kakashi and Itachi exchanged a look of mutual dismayal. 'That scroll,' was probably the Forbidden Scroll the Third had ordered them to hide in Naruto's house to protect it, seeing that there were many who sought the secrets behind it. They had, of course, not counted on Naruto even bothering to stare at the difficult words inside. Apparently, though, the First must have included /pictures/ when he wrote and sealed the scroll, seeing how well Naruto had read and understood it.
"Come on! Ramen for breakfast today!" Naruto cheered, returning into the house he had came out from.
Again, Kakashi and Itachi looked at each other.
This mission was going to be a lot harder than they had thought.
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It was when he was eleven, that Naruto first heard the word 'ninja' from a shy little girl called Hinata, who was travelling through the village with her father. Said father then quickly led her away, frowning with disapproval at the blond boy, who stuck his tongue out at him. Hinata had looked back once, blushed a beetroot red, and hid behind her father's sleeve.
Naruto had always thought girls were strange things.
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By the time he was twelve, Naruto began getting the hint that he was not supposed to demonstrate the skills he had learnt from the scrolls he found around the house, in public. Every time he tried to pull a prank on someone by, say, walking upside-down a tree branch; Kakashi, in an incredible show of doggy stalkiness and doggy bounciness, would leap at him, catch him by surprise and knock him back to the ground.
Naruto wondered how dogs could be so light when trying to escape from their weekly showers, but so heavy when trying to pull you down to the ground. Really.
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At thirteen, Naruto finally got the full hint and absolutely stopped trying to use his newly learned skills to help him with his pranks - unless he was at a place where people could not see him. Mainly because Itachi followed him around like a leech and bit him whenever he tried to do a hand seal. And dammit, it hurt. And if he got anymore holes in his body he was going to die from haemophilia before he was legal to drink.
How in the world could the cat tell whether it was a hand seal or a hand shake? Itachi must have some really special eyes, Naruto concluded.
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By the time he was fourteen, he had already approached the village chief - the only person who was vaguely friendly to him in the whole place, besides Iruka and his two pets - countless times to ask if he could leave the village to become a 'ninja,' whatever that was. He had decided that since he had begun shouting to the villagers that he was going to become a 'ninja,' they had become more attentive to whatever he did, which was good. Because Naruto welcomed attention. Good or bad.
Somehow, though, the chief always managed to distract him with free ramen.
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And it was when Naruto was fifteen, that things started to happen.
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The paper man was late again - although that wasn't anything to be surprised about. He usually took his own sweet time in delivering the morning papers, making extra sure that by the time he reached Naruto's doors, it was already well into the afternoon. Sometimes even after dusk. That really meant nothing to Naruto, except that he would miss all the discounts they offered through the papers in the morning with their cut-out coupons - but he lived in a village which hated him after all; so why should a paper delivery man feel any less?
It wasn't /his/ idea that he got subscribed to the newspapers anyway. Iruka had been the one to insist, again and again. It did have its uses, though. After all, it was only through the papers that Iruka could teach Naruto how to read and write.
Nevertheless, the initial novelty had worn off, and Naruto no longer waited with abated breaths at the arrival of every new sheet. Currently, he was slogging over his little garden in the yard, digging up some ground with a small, sharp object that was shaped like a dagger but had no hilt. Iruka said it was a bunai... no, a gunai. Kunai, or something like that. As long as it was helpful for making edible food, Naruto didn't really care what it was called.
This month was potato month, the boy was grinning to himself as he extricated a few more plump looking roots. The sun was hot, but it wasn't crowding his mood out at all. Potato with ramen made the best meals, after all! Beside him, Kakashi had rolled onto his back and hung a dribbling tongue out, enjoying the late afternoon sun. Itachi was nowhere to be seen as usual, but the cat would pop out soon enough, when he felt like it.
After a few more potatoes landed in Naruto's food basket, he looked up to see that the entire village was awashed with a soft red glow. The boy's eyes sparkled, and he stood up, basket in hand. Dusk was always one of the most prettiest times of the day. The setting sun would light the small village on ethereal fire, a scene an article in the papers once described as 'the mark of the Fire/Sand Alliance,' whatever the Fire/Sand Alliance was. All Naruto knew was that he felt good watching the sunset from his house, and therefore tried to never miss any one of it.
After the last vestiges of the sun vanished behind the sand dunes in the west, and when Naruto was finally about to turn to retire for the night, the newspaper man came.
He threw the stack of crumpled newspapers at Naruto's head with much force, causing the boy to yelp and almost trip over in pain. Itachi had mysteriously appeared when the newspaper man came, and Kakashi was on his feet immediately, growling and snarling at the newcomer. The man immediately shrank back, having had nasty experiences with this particular canine before, but shot Naruto a hateful glare first.
"Watch it, mister!" Naruto yelled, waving a fist. In reply, the man glared even harder.
"Why should I be nice to monsters?" His voice was icy cold, almost nonchalant. "I keep doing it so I can knock the wind out of your throat. It's going to work one day, you lowlife. Just you wait."
Kakashi stopped growling and bent his legs. He was about to pounce on the man and bite the living daylights out of him when Naruto grabbed him by the tail and held him back.
The frowning grin on Naruto's face was what the wolf-dog saw when he turned his head around.
"Hey, asshole," Naruto bared some teeth at the man, who tilted his head in an arrogant pose of expectation. "You've been saying that since I was seven, and you've never come close to succeeding. Looks like I've either got a hard head, or your throw's more sissy than your face!" The boy struck a thumbs-down pose, sticking his tongue out for good measure.
That really did rile the man up, for he turned deep red in the face and was almost ready to climb over the fence to give Naruto a beating he'd never forget, had he not seen Kakashi waiting on the inside, baring his fangs sadistically.
"Just you wait, you little brat!" The man finally gave up and shook an angry fist, quickly escaping into the darkness of the night.
"I'm waiting, mister! Anytime, anyday!" Naruto shot back, a large, triumphant grin on his face. When he was sure he could no longer feel the man's aura, he turned to Kakashi and pat the dog on his head. "Good job, Kakashi! Come on, dinner time!" He cheered to nobody in particular, and made his way back into the house, Kakashi in trail.
Itachi was already inside when Naruto shut the door, and Kakashi tumbled casually to his usual spot in front of the fireplace. Naruto dumped the basket in a corner and quickly sat down on the floor by the window, spreading the newspapers out to try to catch the last rays of light to read a few words, or see a few pictures. Itachi sat near, staring at the papers with intense interest - as he always did. Together, the duo of boy and cat perused the overdued news.
"Hmm... missed another supermart sale again this morning - no surprise there," Naruto traced his finger along the columns, noticing with amusement that Itachi followed the finger. This cat could read, he swore!
Chuckling to himself, he browsed through a few more pages, until the light got too dim to look at it anymore. As he turned the final page, he noticed something and blinked.
"'Exclusive! Murderer of the night revealed!'" he read the headlines out loud, attracting the attention of Itachi as well as Kakashi, whose ears twitched. Itachi stared at the article with his pale, red eyes, attention seemingly apt. Naruto, on the other hand, having no natural nightvision, gave up after stealing a glance on the hazy picture splashed across the papers. "Argh! Too dark to read anymore!" He complained, standing up and stretching. Kakashi padded over quietly and sat down, staring at the newspaper as well, making Naruto grin. He must have the most intelligent cat and dog in his house!
Looking down again, he stared at the picture again. Dark and hazy, with grained quality though it was, he could see that the figure that stood against the full moon was a lean, good-looking man. He held a bloodied sword in one hand, and was slightly turned so that his thick, dark fringe parted in the centre could be seen, the rest of his hair held in a ponytail behind him. The glow of the moonlight against his cold figure made him look majestic and aloof. That alone, however, was not the most captivating part of the picture.
It was his eyes.
The moon's incandescence faded in comparison to the shocking red glow that burned with intensity from the depths of the person's eyes. Naruto knew that a man with red eyes was probably, above all things else, supposed to be eerie and unapproachable. Yet he felt inexplicably drawn to those eyes. So drawn he was, he didn't notice that he was no longer able to really see the picture and was just staring into space until Kakashi bumped into his ankle and whined softly for attention.
Snapping out of his reverie, Naruto looked down. "What?" He asked, just out of plain habit, when he saw the dog looking expectantly at him, panting away. Kakashi tilted his head in the direction of the kitchen and waited as Naruto blinked, then slapped his forehead. "Oh yeah! Right! Dinner! Ramen, ramen!" The boy was back to grinning, making his way easily over to the kitchen. "But really! This village is getting creepier every year! Almost every week the mysterious dark-haired killer strikes someone dead... how did he get so careless that somebody actually took a picture of him, though? The photographer must have gotten some good money for that shot..."
As the blond's rambling tapered off into the kitchen, Itachi shot an accusing glare at Kakashi, who leered as much as a dog could leer, back at the cat. They squared off for a while more, then both vanished from the room in two small wisps of smoke.
"... and like, you know, I really wonder who he'll kill next! I hope it's not me! I'm not going to die before I find out how to become a nin-... eh? Kakashi? Itachi?" The boy set his pet food bowls down on the ground and glanced around the bedarkened house. After a brief respite, he came to the sterling conclusion that Kakashi must have hackled Itachi's fur somehow and now they were on yet another one of their nightly dog-after-cat-after-dog chases. Naruto shook his head, bemused. It wasn't the first time such a thing had happened, so he didn't bother to think too much about it. Instead, he wandered towards the unlit fireplace, sitting down to stare at it mindlessly.
Outside, however, Kakashi and Itachi were doing anything but having a dog-after-cat-after-dog chase.
"Kakashi-san," Itachi's voice was admonishing. He turned to stare at the older ninja, perched atop the same tree trunk they often perched atop to watch over Naruto. "That was uncalled for."
"Hm?" The lazy drawl was unmistakably Kakashi's. "What was uncalled for? Please do elaborate."
"The photograph," Itachi was determined not to be baited. "You are the only one in this village who could have taken that without my knowledge. Why did you submit it to the press? What happened to always being discreet?"
The silver-haired Jounin sighed. "Itachi," he said in a gentle but firm voice, "I told you many times before /not/ to kill the people of this village. But lately you've been consumed with a strange kind of bloodlust I never thought you had in you. I don't even know if I should call it bloodlust, actually." He sighed. "The picture was just a warning. Expect it to go straight to the Hokage the next time it happens."
The darker-haired person nevertheless remained calm. "You would jeopardize the mission for a whim?"
"A whim that involves hundreds of human lives, yes," Kakashi rolled his eyes, "and the lives of our fellow ninjas at that. I've stopped asking why a long time ago, Itachi. Your life is yours, after all, but don't push it too hard," came the stern warning, even as Itachi looked away and shrugged.
"Whatever it is, that photograph will mean I have to lie low for at least a while," the Uchiha prodigy quirked his lips into a gangly semblance of a disappointed pout. "You really know how to grasp your time."
"How else did I get my Jounin license?" Kakashi stooped to about the same height as Itachi was stooping to on the branch, glancing into the dark house through the window. As if remembering something, he randomly blurted, "You know, Naruto has never ever gotten that fireplace to light up. It does get cold in the nights around here..."
"He does not know any Katon skills," Itachi offered. "And we never let him get any further in that Scroll than the Kage Bunshin no Jutsu."
"Maybe we should let him take a peek at some of the Katon Jutsu's," Kakashi thought aloud, "he keeps staring at the fireplace as if that if he stares hard enough, he'll get it to light up."
The Uchiha turned his head and stared at his companion. "I don't believe Iruka-san has managed to get Naruto to remember enough words for him to be able to decipher the Katon manual yet."
"Oh," Kakashi blinked, remembering that to be true, "darn. More sleepless winter nights for us then."
Beside him, Itachi continued staring at his superior wordlessly. Then he blinked and looked away, into the house where Naruto was just finishing up with his ramen. Shooting Kakashi another look, he quietly transformed into his animal form and leapt nimbly off the tree, sauntering easily into the house.
Even as Kakashi stared gape-jaw at the retreating form of Itachi, he heard a loud rumbling sound from his own stomach, signifying the end of lunch and tea and the beginning of dinner and supper.
If he could get his hands on it before Itachi did.
"Why that little-" The man swore and quickly leapt down, transforming in the middle of the leap and bounding into the house, howling away. After a few moments of silence, Naruto's loud, shrieking voice could be heard, when Kakashi likely began fighting with Itachi over the food, as they did every other night. Unusually quiet Itachi may be, but when it came to devising schemes and tactics, he certainly lost to nobody.
As the house continued in its rowdiness, two hate-filled eyes glared at scene from without. Accompanying it was a scowl, with almost fang-like canines protruding from the mouth. It had obviously been observing the scene for a rather lengthy period of time, for it was quiet and melded too well into the background to have been just passing by. The scowl line upturned and now was an evil grin. With a soft rustling of leaves the figure departed soundlessly.
Even the leaves knew how evil the aura that was left behind felt.
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Unbeknownst to the duo of dog and cat, though, Naruto /had/ already came into contact with the Katon skill scrolls. The Third had gotten Iruka to place some Jutsu scrolls around Naruto's house to see what became of it, and though the boy did not understand much of what went on, he still attempted to mimick some of the hand seals written about in the scrolls. Sometimes he was successful - like the Kage Bunshin; he /still/ hadn't managed to figure out /how/ he had managed to pull that one off, but he was proud nonetheless. He could never show what he had learnt to anyone but Iruka, though. Kakashi and Itachi would eye him carefully whenever he thought about any public demonstrations, and immediately the idea waned. Animal bites were painful!
Currently, as Kakashi and Itachi fought over their food, Naruto concentrated on the fireplace before him. Night had claimed the skies a while ago, and it was getting cold. Naruto was /sure/ that this time he would get the Katon Jutsu right. After all, if he didn't learn how to start that fire spark in the firewood Iruka had made him collect for who knows what reason soon, he and his housepets would freeze their asses off and nobody would find them until their corpses started rotting in summer. Shuddering partly at the concept, and partly at the biting breeze, he tried the hand seals again.
After a few more futile attempts, he sighed heavily and flopped against his bed, grasping the thin sheets in his hands and cuddling helplessly against it. Kakashi and Itachi were still fighting, but that would soon be over, and then they would wander off to wherever they usually wandered off to during the nights.
Occasionally Naruto would awaken to an entire mouthful of silver fur - when Kakashi chose to curl up beside him on the bed. The boy would then without fail scream at the dog; furred up blankets were a pain to wash, dammit! Of course, Naruto appreciated the warmth, comfort and security of having another warm body beside him in sleep, but being stubborn and independent, the boy absolutely refused to depend on his pets more than he should have to.
After all, he should be the one taking care of them, shouldn't he?
Anyway, they were too busy trying to snatch each other's food out of their respective bowls at the moment to bother about curling up to sleep, thought Naruto blandly to himself when he rolled over and saw the silver dog and the black cat in the middle of a heated staring competition. He smiled at the sight, then turned from the scene to face the wooden walls of his house instead.
Looks like it was going to be another cold, cold night.
For the next few minutes? Hours?, Naruto simply stayed in his curled position, shivering. Animal fighting noises had subsided, so Naruto assumed that the dog and cat had either came to a truce or had finally killed each other. Maybe he would find out tomorrow when he was more awake. Since his vulnerable stick house stood just by the main road, he thought he could hear muffled sounds of a mob shouting something to each other - followed by the constant flickering of fire torches by his window. When the noises got progressively louder, he attempted to stifle them out with his pillow over his head. He wondered which unfortunate house the village council was going to pillage tonight.
After all, Naruto the orphan was too unworthy to even steal from, wasn't it? Not like Kakashi or Itachi made it any easier, but still!
To his surprise, therefore, he heard from beneath his pillow sounds of a strong hand banging on his door. The boy stifled a sigh. He certainly needed no more disappointment to fuel his unhappiness tonight. Deciding it had to be a dream, or a hallucination, he pressed the pillow harder against his ears and silently willed the noise to go away.
But it didn't.
Groaning loudly, he flung his blanket off and glared through the darkness at the offending object, and whoever stood behind it, banging the door like there was no tomorrow to do it. Rubbing his eyes tiredly, he saw a flicker of movement from the corner of his room - a flash of darkness disappearing into his kitchen. Naruto blinked. Wondering which issue he should pursue first, he finally yawned, stretched and slowly hobbled to the door to confront the nemesis who stood on the other side.
"What do you want?" The blond boy was hardly able to keep the sleep and irritation out of his voice. He had grabbed the doorknob and swung it open with full force, trying to make it look like he was not afraid of anybody who stood outside.
Which he was not. That, however, did not stop him from being taken aback at the sight before him.
An angry mob stared down at the blond, and he suddenly felt much smaller than he already was. Cursing his momentary display of weakness, he frowned as angrily as he could and snapped, "Don't you know what time it is now? What the hell do you guys want this time?"
The torches they bore flickered and cast eerie, dangerous shadows along the dirt path outside Naruto's house, even as many of them sneered outwardly at the boy. Their spokesman, who although kept a poker-face, could not stop the hatred from seeping out from his eyes or tone when he asked, "Brat. You see someone come by?"
Naruto blinked - firstly, at the fact that the villagers were asking him a reasonable question and secondly, that they were not trying to scold his brains or beat his guts out while they were at it. For as long as he could remember, there were nobody in the village who cared if he lived or died. The only one who did was Iruka, and he was a travelling merchant who stayed in /another/ town! Daily, Naruto was made a mockery off and ridiculed for things he never even knew he did. He would shout, play pranks and generally try to get some attention that was not malicious, even if it had to be negative, but the villagers remained cold and distant.
Sometimes he debated as to whether it was the fact that he was always pulling quick ones on the villagers, since that was the reason they always used when unleashing their torrent of abuse on him. But that had not sounded logical - even to his own ears. There were many in the village who did much, much more heinous things - like that dark-haired red-eyed man, and still those enjoyed acceptance in the society, even if they had to bear the mark of a criminal. Apparently, Naruto wasn't even worthy of that. Why should he, a harmless youth playing harmless tricks on people, be treated any less?
What had happened, to make them hate him so much?
Sometimes Naruto thought he would die to know.
But most of the time, he would rather die to not know.
Trying to set his face into as normal a facade as he could while still in half-sleep mode, Naruto replied gruffly that, "You guys are the only ones to pass by in a long time."
The silence that followed after seemed to force the temperature even lower, when nothing but the cackling of fire upon wooden stake could be heard. The looks of sheer distrust on the mobs' faces was enough to break whatever hope Naruto held in his chest for the brief time that had passed that he was perhaps being treated like a normal person for once. Growling, he lashed out, "Look, I can't help it if you don't believe me. If you wanna, you can come in and turn the house upside down to look for what you're looking for, but I'd tell you not to waste your time because what you're looking for is not here - whatever it is!"
Another silence ensued - that of amazement this time. Did the boy just /dared/ to speak up against the council appointed search party?
In the blink of an eye, Naruto found himself being lifted into the air by a hand grabbing the front of his t-shirt, leaving him gasping and struggling. "Look here, brat," the spokesman sneered, the fire in his eyes rivalling that of his torch, "We're looking for disgusting murderer who's been killing the villagers in cold blood for years now. We finally caught him in the act, chased him, then he came by this way and disappeared. Why we had considered that he would be hiding in your pathetic excuse for a house," there was rancous laughter in the background, "is beyond even me." The man laughed in Naruto's face, and Naruto winced.
He was used to the verbal abuse, hell yeah.
But that didn't mean he couldn't abuse them right back.
"Hey mister," the boy's voice was calm but mischievious. "Did you brush your teeth today? Your breath stinks worse than the toilet at the back of my pathetic excuse of a house." For effect, the blond stuck his tongue out in royal defiance. "I could introduce some really good scrubbing detergent! Want a list?"
The man certainly saw red, for his face flushed a dangerous crimson. He threw Naruto back into the house with brute force, laughing mercilessly as the boy rolled uncontrollably around until his bedpost stopped his advance with a sickening thud. "Mind your manners, you prick! I don't know why the village head even keeps you around at all! One more word and I'll burn your house down, you hear?!"
Naruto coughed, feeling blood slowly oozing out of his mouth, unable to make a proper reply to wipe that smirk off the jerk's face. Slowly, the laughing asshole and his mob of followers departed from the door, and Naruto managed to sit up with much difficulty.
"Damn it," he cursed softly, wiping desperately at the trail of blood that now lingered by the corners of his mouth. After brooding for a while beside his bed on the floor, he realised that his already cold room was getting colder, and so rose up uncaringly to shut the door, still in a state of detachment.
When that was done, he sighed heavily and sank down into a crouch with his back behind the door. He stared ahead at nothing in particular, hand on the area near his ribcage where he had been hurt when the man threw him across the room. He was not overly concerned with the physical injury. After all, he healed at the speed of light - or at least, faster than any normal person he knew could. The blood would dry by tomorrow, and the wound; along with the superficial scars - closed and patched by daylight. It was never the skin-deep wounds that hurt, after all.
It was the hurt that resonated deep within his soul that truly did.
He vaguely remembered getting up and walking to the kitchen, where the only source of water was. Whether or not the wound was going to heal miraculously fast, it was still bad style to let blood dry against his face. If Kakashi saw it, he was going to howl all night again. No way was he letting /that/ happen!
Immediately upon stumbling into the kitchen, however, his hairs began standing on ends, and a strange feeling permeated his every fibre. Shuddering involuntarily - and this time not because of the wind, he allowed his eyes to fall upon a dark, hooded, spectre-like creature prowling the cabinets. The creature jerked stiffly to a stop in whatever he was doing when he sensed someone's eyes upon him, and turned around slowly.
/BLOOD!!/ was the first thing that ran through Naruto's mind. /BlOOD RED! SCARY! SCARY EYES! GLOWING! GLOW-IN-THE-DARK! WAAA!! HE'S GONNA EAT ME! EAT ME!! LIKE ALL THE OTHER GUYS HE KILLED!!!/
The flicker of fire torches began to resume outside his curtained window, indicating that the villagers were passing by again. Ignoring the little voice inside of him warning him that nobody would believe him anyway, Naruto prepared to launch himself at the window and scream the living daylights out of everybody about the red-eyed monster in his kitchen.
That is, until said monster tackled him from behind and clamped a strong hand over the boy's mouth, effectively sealing his voice. Not one to be defeated, however, Naruto thrashed, flailed, kicked, scratched, and punched. But the creature not only had a iron grip on his mouth, he also had a vice-like hold on his other limbs. Hopes of discovery flew further and further together with the rustle of footsteps echoing softer and softer down the dirt road. Though, that wasn't what was really bothering him.
What really was, was that he was starting to suffocate. The damned intruder had a hand over his mouth and half his nose, and urgh! It was getting hard to breath!
In a last, desperate bid to salvage his lost pride and get some fresh air, Naruto opened his mouth and bit down on the hand covering it. Hard.
"Ow!" A hiss came out from behind him, much to Naruto's satisfaction, and he was loosened immediately. Quickly scrambling to his feet, Naruto whipped around and pointed at the shadow.
"Who are you and what are you doing in my house?!"
"Keep it down, you blasted moron!" The shadow had snucked to the window deftly and peered cautiously out of the curtains, before replacing it. "You're going to wake the whole neighbourhood up!"
"Well you give me one damn bloody good reason why I should not when I have this strange monster with glowing-red-eyes thing stalking me and my house in the middle of the night, running away from the village council because he was killing people?! Come on! I'm waiting!" The blond taunted angrily. The nerve of this spectre thing! He barges in and he makes demands! The next thing you know he would be asking for a chocolate ice-cream sundae! How dare he!
The dark shadow opened his mouth to say something, then closed it. In the time that passed, Naruto swore the scowl on his opponent's face deepened. "Ever since I stepped into this stupid section of the village everybody's been pointing fingers. I hate to tell you but I did not kill anybody and have absolutely no idea what is going on," was the stranger's drawl. "I was just passing by... and why the hell is it so cold?" He glanced once in the direction of the unused fireplace, silently pondering his observation. "Do you ever use that thing at all?"
There was a deathly hush.
"Wh-What business is it of yours if I prefer the cold, bastard?" Naruto managed eventually, but he sounded hesitant even to himself. He only hoped the other party wouldn't catch on his word whiskers and use it to-
"... Little moron here can't light a fireplace to save his life, huh?"
Immediately, the blond bristled. "What's your problem already, bastard?! In case you haven't noticed, not everybody in this world has to /know/ how to light a fireplace, idiot!"
There was yet another bout of silence. "But you..." the stranger's voice was apprehensive, and his red eyes glowed with even more intensity, as if he was using it to scan through Naruto's very being. "But you're... you have..."
"What?" Naruto was nonplussed, but curious.
The dark shadow pondered his words for a while. "You have good chakra control." He admitted begrudingly. "Excellent control, actually. Doesn't make sense if you can't even call a small fire..."
Hearing those words caused Naruto to freeze on the spot. Nobody had ever said anything like this to him before - not even Iruka! He was torn between grabbing the stranger and twirling him down his room in a dance for joy and grabbing the stranger by his shoulders and shaking him until he admitted that he had just been pulling a lousy prank on the ostracised orphan.
"Really?" Was the only thing he could whisper after all other thoughts ran through his mind. "You... you mean it?"
The spectre snorted and moved towards where Naruto had gathered all the firewood. "Don't make me repeat myself, moron," he mumbled, before quickly summoning a small fire into the logs with a minor Katon Jutsu. "The Sharingan doesn't lie."
"Sharingan?" Naruto blurted out, confused. "What's that? And like woah! How did you /do/ that?!"
The fire was just starting to catch on the logs in the fireplace, but the stranger froze again. He turned to stare at Naruto incredulously. "You /don't/ know?"
Slightly thrown off guard by the unexpected question, Naruto balked slightly. "So what if i don't?" He quickly replied, heaving a fist into the air. "It's not a damned crime!"
"... you're not a ninja."
Naruto perked up immediately. "I'm going to BE one!" He grinned, then blinked in confusion when reality set in. "Wait - you know about ninjas?"
The other boy snorted. "The name's Uchiha Sasuke. I /am/ a ninja." He stated plainly, tapping his forehead protector while smirking at the other boy. "Couldn't you tell, moron?"
"ARGH!" The blond screeched. "Stop calling me a moron, bastard! My name is Uzumaki Naruto, and I'll have you know that I'm going to become the best ninja in all the whole world and when I do, I'm going to kick your ass so hard you'll be crying into next week!"
In one fluid movement, Sasuke stood and turned towards Naruto, eyes flashing. "Will you just keep it down, you loudmouth?! If you get those villagers back here and if they find me then I'll make sure I /really/ kill you before they drag me away, dammit! So shut up already! Just shut up, all right?"
Properly shocked at the darker-haired boy's sudden outburst, Naruto did keep his peace for a good few minutes, during which Sasuke returned to warming his toes by the fireplace.
The blond frowned at the person in front of him, using his fireplace. He should be more angry, and throwing this boy out at the moment, but he somehow could not bring himself to. It wasn't like Sasuke was /really/ going to kill him, was it? Besides, the fireplace was beginning to warm up the whole place, and it was a feeling Naruto missed very much. This Sasuke thing - he claimed, despite all obvious visual evidence, that he was not the one behind all the murders. But why was he running away then? He must have done something so wrong that the villagers were dying to get their hands on him even in the death of the night, right? Blowing some stray hair noisily away from his face, the blond sat down heavily on the floor and folded his arms around himself, scowling.
"I don't get it," he said, taking care to control his volume, just in case Sasuke got his pants in a twist about it again. "If you're not the killer, then why the hell are you running away from the villagers?"
The raven-haired boy sighed. For a few painful seconds he simply turned around and glared at Naruto with his creepy red eyes, as if daring him to continue. But Naruto wasn't in a patronising mood today and so he glared right back. Eventually, Sasuke turned back to looking at the fire. "I haven't killed anybody in this section of Konoha before, moron." He shook his head. "I'm running away because I don't want to be caught, obviously. You have some of the most unreasonable people around here." He stole a glance at the disbelieving look on Naruto's face and rolled his eyes. "I know you don't believe me, and I'm not expecting you to. Look, I don't want to be any trouble - tomorrow I'll go, and neither you nor your friends will ever see me again. Just let me lie low here for tonight, okay?"
Naruto grunted something akin to disagreement. "Why should I listen to you? What if you're really the killer?! Wouldn't I be helping a criminal? Then I'll get sentenced to death too!" He made a gasp of sudden revelation. "I still think it's not safe! I don't wanna be under the same roof as a murderer for one night! Of course the fact that you haven't killed me yet is besides the point - just what proof do you have that you're not the killer?" Naruto pointed dramatically. "Spill it and maybe I'll even help ya!"
Sasuke groaned, a hand on his forehead. He'd thought that throughout his long, outstanding ninja service, that he had seen all the idiots there were in the world. "I'd ask you the same question myself, dimwit," he muttered and glared at the blond from the corner of his eyes. "What proof do /you/ have that I killed someone?"
Taken aback by the counter, Naruto gaped. "It was in the papers!" He gestured wildly. "The guy looked just like you! Nobody else I know has super duper glow-in-the-dark red eyes like that!"
"Oh?" Sasuke was nevertheless unimpressed. "So if I didn't have super duper glow-in-the-dark eyes you'll gladly let me stay for the night?"
"Gladly!" Naruto grinned confidently. After all, nobody could change the colour of their eyes just like that, could they?
There was a brief silence, after which Sasuke 'hn'ed and turned from the fireplace to smirk at Naruto. "Well, do you see red eyes now?"
Naruto glanced once. "Nope!" And replied cheerfully. It was a few seconds later before the full import of the situation sank into his brain, in which he heaved a loud gasp and said, "You... you!! Your eyes! They... they're not red anymore! WOAH!! Like how?! How did you do that? You gotta teach me! I-"
"Naruto," the voice was terse, curt, and pained. The blond quietened down from his excitement and stared in wonder at the prodigy.
Nobody had ever said his name like this, with no trace of malice or a promise of a painful beating before! Although Sasuke did sound exasperated beyond compare, but still, it was something worth rejoicing over!
"Just shut up and go to sleep."
Even if it /is/ from a heartless stranger like Sasuke!
Naruto grinned besides himself. "This is /my/ house and I will go to sleep whenever /I/ feel like it, bastard!" He heard Sasuke sigh and saw him cringe, but decided he was having too much fun to stop. "And I'm only letting you stay here because you don't have red eyes anymore! And, anybody who is against the village council is my friend! And because you... you can put up a nice fire! Hahah!"
Sasuke shot him a Look. "/I'm/ only staying here because this is the only house along this stretch of road that looked like it was uninhabited! If I'd known I'd be running into a moron like you, I wouldn't have run in at all! And now will you please just shut up so that I can concentrate on figuring out my escape route already?"
The grin on Naruto's face stretched wider.
"You owe me one, Sasuke!"
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Meanwhile, high up in their usual tree, Kakashi was trying to stifle his laughter against all odds. Whereas beside him, Itachi kept shooting glares of disdain at the man.
"This is not funny, Kakashi-san," the Uchiha mumbled.
"Oh," Kakashi shook his head, laughing softly. "But it is. It really is.
"Things are going to get very interesting from now on."
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Part 2 of 7
11/5/2004
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