Chapter 4: Fuzzy Feelings
Chinami, Bunko, Eiko, and Michiya. These were the names of the 4 kids I hadn't known who had been playing ninja with us. Bunko and Eiko were brothers. Bunko was the eldest by one year. Michiya was the same age as Bunko, which was about 2 years older than Naruto and his friends. Michiya was the quiet socially awkward type, but he seemed kind and even sweet. He wasn't a ninja or trying to be one like the rest of us. Then there was Chinami, the other girl in the group. She was 3 years older than me and had a fiery and wild spirit. I liked her, but I didn't like the look on her mother's face. I had been playing with the 8 kids for a few months now and this was the first time we had played so long that parents started coming to collect their kids. Which is how I ended up looking into the hate filled eyes of Chinami's furious mother. Some of the other parents held similar disdain and suspicion, but none had as much hate in her eyes as this woman did. The looks weren't directed at me of course, but at the sunny haired boy next to me. Naruto was deflating as he looked into their eyes. I stepped in front of him. My smaller frame did nothing to block his view, but I gave an icy stare back at the hateful woman. She pursed her lips and after a second turned to leave, dragging Chinami with her. It was just Naruto and I left once they were all gone. My mom wasn't here yet, but she would have gotten off work a little bit ago even though it was one of her later shift days. I had never missed picking her up before. She would be worried about me. I had to go home so she'd know I was alright, but there was something I had to do first. I turned to the boy standing behind me. He looked hopelessly sad, lost, and desperate. I couldn't leave him like that. I tried to put my hand on his shoulder to reassure him, but I was too short and my hand only managed to reach his upper arm. I looked into his solemn eyes and gave a small smile.
"It was great playing with you again today, Naruto," I told him. "I'll come back again tomorrow." He smiled. It was a sad smile, but at least it was a smile.
"Yah," he said. "See you tomorrow." We waved to each other as I headed off for home. After I got out of the park I broke into a run. I barged into the house and faced my mom's worried expression, which quickly turned to relief.
"I waited for you at the hospital, but when you didn't show up I thought I'd check home. When you weren't here, I got worried. I was about to go looking for you," my mom said in a serious tone.
"Sorry mom, we played longer than usual at the park today," I told her. She already knew I had started playing with the other kids and had told me she was glad I had made friends. I didn't think she'd be too upset with me.
"It's fine," she replied. Her eyes migrated to the holes in the knees of my black jumpsuit that revealed my own knees which were scuffed and had traces of dried blood lingering on them. "What happened to your legs? They're all scraped up," She asked.
"Oh, I kinda fell when we were playing today and they got hurt. It's not bad though. Just scuffed up a bit." My mom frowned.
"Come here," she said. I went over to her. She kneeled down and placed her hands on my knees. Her hands lit up with chakra and the scuffs slowly started to fade. "Do you want to learn how to do this?" Mom looked up at me as she waited for my answer.
"Medical ninjutsu? Shure, I don't plan to be a medical ninja or anything, but knowing the basics could be helpful." I thought for a moment. "And it could help me learn better chakra control." Maybe it would help my clone jutsu and transformation jutsu.
"Ok, your first lesson starts tomorrow after dinner. So what should we make for dinner today?" She stood up smiling. My legs were once again smooth and happy. No scuffs marring the skin. I'd still have to wash the blood off though. Wow that's really cool, they are completely healed and it just took a few moments. I guess I shouldn't be surprised. Mom has been a medical ninja for a long time, this would have been easy for her, but still…
The next day I showed up at the park as promised. I was a bit early so I wasn't too surprised to find I was the only one there. I went through my stretches and then started going through some of the motions for practicing taijutsu. Eventually some of the other kids started showing up. Kiba was the first one to make it with Akamaru at his heels. Then Choji and Shikamaru arrived together. Finally Naruto showed up. We waited for the others but eventually it was looking like they weren't going to show up. Naruto looked quite sad at this, but he tried to hide it by being the first to start up the game. Most likely the other kids wouldn't be playing with us anymore. Their parents probably told them they couldn't play with Naruto after they saw him yesterday. I wonder how many times this has happened to him.
After dinner It was time for my lesson on medical ninjutsu. I was excited. Mom went over what medical ninjutsu was and why it was important. Then she gave an explanation of how it was used and how it worked. We had stopped at the store and library on the way home so she could get some of the stuff she wanted for the lesson. Using one of the books as a guide I had to attempt several different tasks involving medical ninjutsu intended for people just learning. I also was assigned quite a bit of reading to complete on my own. She gave me a sheet of questions to find the answers to as I read. My mom's teaching method is a lot like going to school. I studied studiously, determined to get something out of it. After one week I would be given a big test on everything I had learned so far. This time I was actually a little nervous about the test. Mom knew I was a fast learner and the medical field was her specialty so she was very excited to teach it to me. Maybe too excited. She had pushed me hard to learn it and set a fast learning pace, and it was a hard topic to learn. When I told her I wanted to learn the basics I was expecting to learn simple things not go all out. Regardless, I will do my best.
The day of the test came and I sat down to take the test. She placed the papers in front of me. There were 8 of them, with the test on both the front and back of each page. Seriously mom, this is overboard. I picked up the pencil and started the first page. After answering the 16 pages worth of test questions I sat my pencil down and looked up to her mom.
"I did horrible," I complained. Mom gave a little laugh.
"I'm sure you did better than you think," she said, scooping up the stack and placing it to the side. "Now for the practical portion. Let's see what you can do with all that learned knowledge." I groaned. After all that, and there's more?
After finishing the 'practical portion' mom sat down and looked over the answers I had put on the written one. I felt like I had actually done better on the practical portion. At least on all but the last part. I was able to eventually achieve everything she asked for in all of it but the last part. Reviving a fish. She said it was ok and that she didn't actually think I could do It yet, but she wanted to find out. I frowned at her as I watched her grading my test. When she looked up she had a big smile on her face.
"Wow, you did amazing, I can't believe you learned so much so fast. Then again you were always a quick study." I just frowned at her. She laughed. "Look, I know I've been pushing you hard and that this test was too hard for you, but you are doing a good job. Medical ninjutsu is hard and I wanted to see If you were up for It. I'm glad to see I was right." I calmed down a bit after that.
The next day I was back in the park playing with my friends. We were playing ninja again. Shikamaru and I were on one team while the other three were on the other. We had moved off to the side and Shikamaru was coming up with a strategy for us to win. As I waited I saw Bunko and Eiko enter the park for the first time since their parents had come to get them. I waved to them and they headed over to me.
"Hey guys, is Naruto still playing with you guys?" Bunko asked.
"Yeah, of course," I replied. The two looked a bit disappointed.
"We want to play with you guys, but we're not going to play with that kid."
"Let me guess, your parents told you you can't play with him anymore?" I asked.
"Yah, apparently he's a bad kid, we don't want to be around someone like him. Look, we want to play but Naruto's going to have to go," Bunko said. His brother nodded along with him.
"What, you think we'd just kick him out so you feel better about it? You've been playing with him for awhile now, you know he's not a bad kid so why are you going to believe your parents who don't even know him, over your own experience?" My tone was sharp.
"Look, our mom knows more than we do about this kind of thing. He's just acting like a normal kid so we'll keep playing with him. Don't let him fool you. Besides, we aren't the only ones who won't play with him. Chinami and Michiya are the same way. Who do you choose, Naruto, or the four of us?" Bunko looked confident as he said these words.
"Naruto," I replied. His face blanched in surprise. Eiko looked hurt. "You guys are choosing not to play with us cause he is here, but we aren't kicking anyone out. Not you, and not Naruto. It's your choice if you play with us or not, but he gets the same choice. No ones being kicked out. If you don't want to play with him then just don't. It's as simple as that." Bunko's face turned frustrated.
"It's not for you to say. The others will choose us over him. We'll even kick you out if we have to. It's two people for four people." Eiko nodded at his brother's words, his expression unsure.
"No ones getting kicked out," Shikamaru said from behind me. He had been silently listening to our conversation. "It's like Nokoribi said, you guys can play if you want, but we aren't kicking anyone out. If Naruto wants to play he can." Bunko looked livid.
"Fine, your loss," he said, turning to leave. "Come on Eiko, we don't want to play with losers like them anyway." Eiko just followed his brother silently. As they left the park a soft rustle of a bush behind us drew our attention. We had been here too long and Kiba's and Akamaru's noses had led them right to us. We still didn't have a strategy.
Over the next few months I noticed a large improvement in my ninjutsu. I got the hang of the transformation and clone jutsu after learning better chakra control. I had good enough control of my chakra now that I could walk up a tree just fine. I had some trouble with water however. It was going to be a while before I would be able to save any fish with my medical ninjutsu too. My footsteps were much quieter now. Ever since I had added stealth to my list of things to learn I had been trying to keep my footsteps quiet while not impending movement or looking too odd. It was paying off. I could walk or even run normally and my steps would be much quieter. Eventually they might even become almost silent, but that wouldn't be for quite a long time. I found the leg weights were good for more than just getting faster and stronger. They made my steps heavier which made them louder. That ment I had to step even softer to get them as quiet. Trying to juggle all my training and still make plenty of time to play with my friends was a very difficult challenge. I found there wasn't enough time in the day for everything I wanted to do. At the same time I wanted to learn even more. Especially when my mom decided to take a break from the medical stuff and see If she could teach me fire style jutsu. My mom had an affinity to both fire and lightning chakra. She figured she would teach me some of the fire jutsu she had begun with. So here I was learning to blow fire out of my mouth. I had expected it to take a while, but on the second attempt a small plume of flame billowed out, and now I had another thing I was obsessed with learning.
It was nearing my 5th birthday. My hair had grown down to my waist and was secured in a single braid down my back. My new arm weights strapped to my forearms and a heavy weight vest lying in the grass beside me. I only wore the heavy vest while training which I had just been doing. I had integrated a lighter weight vest and the arm weights to my outfit because I had had so much success with the leg weights. It definitely made my training more intensive. I was exhausted. I lay out flat on my back and watched the puffy white clouds float by in the blue sky. It was so relaxing. I held completely still and listened to the birds twittering away. My back tingled as I lay still. It had been doing that lately. Whenever I was meditating or lying still it would start to tingle. It wasn't painful or anything, just odd. If I had to guess it had something to do with the mark on my back. My mom had said it was something my dad had as well. I was curious to know what it was about. I had enough control of my chakra now to send some of it to specific parts of my body. I decided to focus my chakra to where the mark was. It began to vibrate. The vibrations spread through my whole body. Ok, that was weird. I backed off the chakra and tried to sit up. Something was wrong. My body didn't respond the way it usually did. I looked down at myself and gaped in shock. My legs and arms were now short and covered in black fur. My hands and feet were now tiny paws. An additional appendage was draped between my legs. A tail. I rolled to my stomach and stood slowly on all four legs. I had taken animal forms before using the transformation jutsu, but this was entirely different. I didn't just look like an animal. I was one. My nose brought scents I had never smelled before. My hearing had sharpened greatly. I wined, the noise coming out canid and puppy like. I was smaller than I had been before. Spun in circles looking as my legs moved. How do I get back? My tail tucked itself between my legs and the pointy ears which now rested on the top of my head flattened. I had stopped focusing my chakra and it hadn't stopped. There wasn't some natural jutsu release like when I cast a transformation jutsu. I had just turned into a dog. Not just a dog, but a puppy. And I didn't know how to turn back. This is bad. I panicked. What should I do? Ok, so it all started when I put chakra in the marked area of my back. I tried to focus my chakra away from my back. Nothing happened. I tried again to focus the chakra to my back. It vibrated again and the next thing I knew I was falling to the ground in my own body. Relief flooded me. Ok, lesson learned. Next time I go experimenting with things I don't understand I'll make sure to have my mom there with me. The situation had taken a lot more chakra than I thought I had used. I was very low on cakra and I was even more exhausted than before. I decided to call it quits and go home. I put the vest back over my shoulders and headed for my house. At home I switched out my vest for the lighter one and sat down on the couch with a book. I had checked out The Tale of the Utterly Gutsy Shinobi out of curiosity and decided to sit back and relax while reading it. I was too tired for anything else. Although It had such a weird name it ended up being a really good book. I finished it in time to go pick up mom. I filled her in on what had happened with my mark when we got home. She said she'd have a look at it at the hospital the next day.
The next day came and I was stuck in a hospital room as several doctors including my mother messed with the mark on my back to try and figure it out. Mom even had me show her what had happened the day before. I looked up at her with literal puppy eyes. All the doctors crowded around curious and excited at the mystery they were trying to solve. It was a slow day at the hospital today. Not very many patients and only one person had come into the ER all day. They were already taken care of which left almost all the doctors available to stare at me. They did tests and scans and their eyes bulged at the results. I just wished they would tell me what was going on. Even my mom was too absorbed in their findings to fill me in. I gave a small whiny bark to get her attention. She looked over at me.
"Oh, sorry, you can turn back now," She said. I did and found myself once again very low on chakra. Turning into a puppy had taken a lot of chakra. Turning back had taken just as much. There were a lot of questions shot at me from all the doctors. I tried to answer as many as I could. Finally I decided to find out what was going on.
"So what did you find? Did you figure anything out yet?" I directed my question to my mom.
"The mark on your back seems to function as some sort of storage seal for chakra. Specifically nature cakra. It absorbs nature chakra while you are still. That's what that tingling has been. Then it holds on to the chakra. When you feed your own chakra into it it activates some sort of hidden kekkei genkai, probably inherited from your father. It combines the proper amount of nature chakra with your chakra and lets you change form," mom explained.
"Is it safe? Can't nature chakra be really dangerous?"
"I don't know too much about nature chakra, but I do know it can be very dangerous if you don't know what you are doing with it. I think the mark minimizes the risks by storing it in itself instead of you and by only using it in the proper portions. It should be relatively safe." I sighed in relief. That actually sounds really cool. So I can shapeshift. Is it just into a puppy and back? Either way it's awesome.
I started practicing with my kekkei genkai when I had enough chakra that I thought I could turn back just fine. I found if I focused on a simple animal I could change into that animal. The animal I had been turning into was a wolf pup and it seemed to be my default form. I also could turn into a cat or a bird or a rabbit or a mouse or dog… Basically I could shift into normal animals, but the larger and more complicated the animal the more concentration and chakra it took to change. I would naturally be black unless I specifically considered the color when changing, and I couldn't change my eye color. No matter what I turned into or how much I focused they stayed the same dark purple. Which is my favorite color so I really don't mind too much. I can't wait to show my friends!
"Hey is it alright with you guys if I use my kekkei genkai today?" I asked the group as we finished picking teams.
"You're cocky what now?" Naruto asked, confused. There was visible confusion on some of the other faces as well.
"Kekkei genkai, it's a bloodline trait jutsu. Basically It's a special jutsu that you can only learn if you are born with it," I explained.
"What kind of kekkei genkai do you have?" Kiba asked.
"You'll see if you let me use it for the day," I say simply.
"Ok, sure…I wanna see it!" Naruto exclaims. I decided to turn into a cat since they can climb trees and sneak well and that will give me an advantage. Their mouths drop open as I sit in front of them on the grass, a black cat with purple eyes staring up at them where I had been standing seconds before. I think the most surprised of them all was Akamaru who was a dog. I purred and swished my tail as I looked at them, then turned and ran into the bushes. It was very interesting to play ninja as a cat.
I found there were a lot of pros and cons about my ability. For example I never had that problem you see in a lot of werewolf stuff where their clothes are gone when they turn back. Call it ninja magic if you want, but everything I'm wearing when I shift into an animal is still there when I shift back. I also get the senses of the animal I turn into, something that you can't get from a transformation jutsu. And unlike a transformation the jutsu doesn't take a continuous flow of chakra to keep up, you turn it on and off like a switch, no concentration required except when you are actively changing forms. However It takes a lot of chakra and if you aren't careful you might not have enough to turn back and you will be stuck in that form until your chakra refills enough. You also get the instincts of the animal which is both a pro and con. The cons include stuff like running after a squirrel when I'm in dog form or getting spooked and running from loud sounds when I'm a cat. It takes a deal of self control to stay focused and ignore my instincts. Especially when I'm not used to having them. I also have to learn to adjust to using a body I'm not used to using. Flying will definitely take some learning but I'll be able to fly as a bird. I have to be on the lookout for natural predators as I turn into animals, especially small prey animals. Also most people won't know I'm a person. I almost got taken to the shelter once. Getting a net thrown over me was quite the learning experience, and if I were to turn into a predator, especially while playing with other kids…I could be killed by someone who didn't understand the situation. There was a lot to consider about my ability when using it, and I had only scratched the surface.