NARUTO © Kishimoto Masashi • Shueisha • Studio Pierrot • TV Tokyo. All rights reserved. Non-profit fun ahead!
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Against the Tide
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Chapter Seven
"But why does Sasuke seem so afraid of getting bitten?" Naruto wondered aloud, adjusting his forehead protector while looking in the mirror of the changing room. "He didn't even flinch when I clawed him across the face from temple to chin. Oh yeah, I gutted him in the ribs too... err," he flashed the increasingly alarmed Iruka a quick glance, "... anyway, I don't see how a bite should differ from my other attacks. Am I missing something here, Iruka-sensei?"
Eventually, the pony-tailed caretaker came out of his induced shock. "Funny you should ask," Iruka murmured, "I was wondering how to broach the subject to you, too."
"The subject?" Naruto turned around from looking at Iruka in the mirror to facing Iruka in the face instead.
"Come on," Iruka gestured towards the door, "we'll talk while we walk back."
Nodding, Naruto followed his caretaker, curious about what Iruka had to tell him.
"Hmm..." Iruka began, after they had walked a short distance away from the changing room and were now rounding some corners. "How many of those mission reports did you read?"
"How many?" Naruto was confused. "I read them all!"
Shocked into a slight stumble, Iruka gaped at the blond. "You read them /all/?!"
"... You mean I'm not supposed to?" Naruto meeped in a quiet, frantic voice.
"Err, no no," Iruka quickly corrected his tone, coughing into his fist. "I mean... oh well. Naruto, there are five years worth of mission reports in that shelf - some of which were massive B-rank missions spanning 20 pages or more. And you read them all."
"Well I got carried away after a while..." Naruto sheepishly admitted, rubbing the back of his head. "I'm just jealous that I never get sent to exciting missions like the ones Sasuke always gets sent to. And he does them all /alone/, too!" Naruto stuck his tongue out at nothing in particular.
"That's not what I was surprised about, Naruto," Iruka's hand came down on the blond's head again. "It's the fact that you, Uzumaki Naruto - the boy who couldn't even stay still enough to read a simple one line mission statement - actually read a whole shelf of top-ranked mission reports within one night." He sighed. "Why didn't you put half as much effort in some of your classes back in your school days? You would've gotten to Tokubetsu Chuunin by now!"
"I /told/ you, Iruka-sensei, those judges have /something/ against me, damned if I knew what it was!" The blond swatted his caretaker's hand away from his head. "Speaking of ranking, why is Sasuke still a Genin, sensei?" Naruto's innocent curiosity struck again - and he looked at Iruka, hoping to get a straightforward answer this time. "Genins don't do B-rank missions... all by themselves, too! Is he actually an ANBU in training or something? He can't still be Genin with his track record!"
"Hmmm..." Iruka pondered on how to answer that. "It's true that Sasuke's skill level and track record obscenely disqualifies him from being Genin - but he cannot rise to Chuunin. He has never taken the Chuunin examinations before..."
"Because he doesn't have a team?"
"... because he doesn't have a... how did you know about that?" Iruka frowned at his charge. "I don't think the mission reports mention things like that?"
Naruto shrugged. "Sasuke told me."
Once again rendered speechless, Iruka gaped. "He... Sa... /Sasuke/ told you?"
"Yeah, he just mentioned it in passing when I asked him about it," Naruto waved nonchalantly. "Is he such a jerk that nobody wants to pair up with him at all? Shikamaru and Chouji seemed really interested in joining the Taiyoubu, though they say it's impossible for them. Aaah, dammit, I don't understand, sensei!" He grabbed his hair in self frustration. "I don't understand anything anymore!"
"Do you really think Sasuke is so hard to work with, Naruto?" Iruka asked tersely.
"Yes! He's an asshole and a jerk and won't stop making fun of me!" The blond instantly snarled.
Iruka looked at him strangely. "Come on, Naruto. Be honest. Is he really so hard to work with? Does he hinder the mission in any way? Leak out secrets he's not supposed to?"
There was a short pause. "Well... no," Naruto admitted. "He's quiet enough... and does his job really well."
Iruka smiled.
"So there's another reason then?" Naruto glanced at his caretaker hopefully.
"Maybe he'll tell you about it one day, when he feels like it," Iruka nodded. "But have you ever heard about the curse of the Hebi-Youma?"
Naruto's face darkened immediately. "Of course! Those evil foul-faced things are infamous even among the Younin!"
"Sasuke," Iruka sadly replied, "has been cursed by one of those demon."
Out of the two sets of footsteps making their way down the aisle, one set stopped abruptly. Iruka was obliged to stop as well, turning around to look at Naruto's incredulous face, having half expected it.
"From..." Naruto managed to sputter after a while. "... from since when?"
"Seven or eight, I'm not too sure myself," Iruka smiled warmly and gestured for Naruto to continue walking along beside him. "I think you know better than anyone else what happens to someone who's been cursed by the Hebi-Youma, don't you?"
"Well, ugh... I..." Naruto complied by quietly stepping forward, then continuing alongside Iruka in their trek back to the office. For a while there was nothing but silence. Then, "I promise I won't try to bite him again."
Trying hard not to fall over in exasperation, Iruka eked a smile out at Naruto. "I don't think that was the point I was trying to make..."
"I'll try not to punch him or anything when he's being too much of a jerk either, then," Naruto hastily added. He pouted when Iruka's expressions did not make a turn for the better. "That's the best I can do, Iruka-sensei! I can't stand that jerk and you know it! Just 'cause he has a fear of being /bitten/ because of some stupid Hebi-Youma doesn't mean he has the right to be a jackass! He's not the only one who's had to live with a goddamned curse in this village, okay? I won't let him walk all over me just because--"
A few loud, lone claps sounded out from beyond the dark corridors. Both Naruto and Iruka stopped and tensed, Iruka's hand going towards his shuriken pouch and Naruto crouching to the ground with a low growl in his throat. "Well said, Naruto, my boy," the voice belonging to the person clapping said, and he stepped towards them, allowing the dim lights to finally fall upon his visage. "I couldn't have said it better myself."
"Kakashi-sensei!" Naruto's eyes widened and his body instantly relaxed. He broke into a wide grin a moment later. "Really? You really think so? Cool!! Finally someone agrees with me that Sasuke is an asshole! Yes!" He began to dance around.
"Naruto, behave yourself!" Iruka quickly grabbed him by the head, and turned to Kakashi, smiling sheepishly. "Sorry. Naruto is sometimes a bit too hyperactive."
"Boys should be hyperactive. It makes them more lovable," Kakashi smiled back, and pat Naruto on the head. Naruto grinned widely. "I wish Sasuke had half your enthusiasm."
"Yeah! I'm the best!" The blond struck a fist into the air.
"Anyway, your mission objective for today is over." Kakashi continued. "Sasuke'll be submitting the report, as he always does - that little perfectionist," he shook his head. "But I thought I'd ask you about it too. Is there anything extra you may want to tell me before I return to my volumes of Icha Icha?"
There was a pause. Then Naruto nodded while blabbering, "Yes yes yes! Kakashi-sensei, there's this folder that this nurse passed to me..." Naruto felt around himself. "... Oh shit. Sasuke took the folder," he grumbled, "... anyway! This nurse... her name was Hyuuga... Hinata? Yeah, something like that - she told me that there's a certain chakra that's suppressing Sakura-chan's memories so that Sakura-chan can't remember a thing about her life, or the night the attack happened. It's a pretty common demon trick," Naruto flashed a bit of chakra with his hands. "It's not usually used, though - it's a pretty high level demonic Jutsu that eats slowly away at the victim's memories. They not just risk losing all their memories, but losing their mind altogether."
Kakashi frowned. He touched his temple with an index finger. "Hmm..." He made a sound. "Still, I haven't seen many instances of active memory blockage in all my years in the Taiyoubu." He frowned. "This Jutsu is not often used even among demons who know it, since the way I see it, the preferred method of attack is usually mass mayhem. It makes me wonder what this Mizu-Youma really wants..."
"Maybe he doesn't want people to find him out?" Naruto suggested.
"That's not possible," Kakashi shook his head, "Youma are identified instantly by their attack style."
"Well, I don't know," Naruto looked at his feet, frowning deeply. "Maybe it seemed like a good way to keep himself from getting arrested?"
Kakashi thought for a while more quietly. "Whatever it is," the Jounin pointed at Naruto, "I think we'd better try to find out more before we start anything new. Naruto, you join Sasuke in the office and tell him that both of you will be using the department library to find out more about the Mizu-Youma. I'll be forwarding you some related information from among the classified files I can get my hands on. Iruka-sensei," he glanced at the caretaker, who nodded in acknowledgement, "I may need your help in that area."
"Of course, sir," Iruka said, while standing at attention.
"So that's it for now," Kakashi pat Naruto on his blond head. "Get going. Try not to kill each other this time, okay?" He smiled knowingly at the boy, who looked away in embarrassment. "As much as I would like to see Sasuke finally get out of his shell, I really don't wish to see him out of service for a few weeks just so it can happen. You got that?"
"Yes, sensei..." Naruto mumbled. He edged his way around the two adults and broke into a run down the corridor, towards his assigned destination.
As soon as the retreating figure of Naruto vanished into the gloomy darkness, Kakashi turned and walked slowly away. "Let's go," he said sombrely to Iruka, who nodded and followed, after throwing one final, worried glance down Naruto's general direction.
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"Hey, asshole," Naruto declared loudly upon sliding the door open. "Kakashi-sensei asked us to go do some research on the Mizu-Youma in the library. Get your lazy ass out of the office and lead the way there!"
A surprised Sasuke, halfway through bandaging his swollen midriff, jerked his head upwards quickly. He frowned when he saw that it was Naruto, and turned so that his back faced the blond.
"Wait a bit, idiot," he mumbled, continuing with his bandaging. "Still trying to clean up the mess you gave me, in case you haven't noticed."
Quietly, the blond padded closer to Sasuke, who flinched at the invasion of personal space but could do nothing to drive the curious boy away. "... was it really that bad?" Naruto eventually asked, staring with great amazement at the patch of bluish-purple decorating a huge area across Sasuke's stomach.
"Yes, moron," Sasuke snapped, tearing a strip of banadage and handing it to Naruto. "And didn't you get slashed across the arm too? Use that. It's unhygenic to walk around dripping blood all over the place."
Taken aback by the sudden gruff gesture of kindness, Naruto accepted the bandage wordlessly. The room continued in silence as Sasuke finished his last round of wrapping and put his shirt back on. "Where did Kakashi ask us to go to again?" He stood and walked towards the exit. After a few steps, he noticed that Naruto wasn't following, but just staring into space. "Hey, total moron! I'm asking you a question!"
"I heard you the first time, bastard," Naruto frowned, turning to glare at Sasuke. He stood as well and trailed behind Sasuke, who had already began moving. They exited the office and started down the long, lonely corridor, for once in each other's presence but not trying to shout each other down. Sasuke was mildly disturbed, to say the least. It was just unlike Naruto to be this calm and quiet.
"How do you..." a worried sounding Naruto voiced out, suddenly lifting the tension between the duo. "How do you..." he repeated, as if unable to find the right words to continue with his question.
"What?" Sasuke prompted, glad that at least there was some sound in the eeriely quiet corridor.
Naruto turned to look at Sasuke pleadingly. "How are you supposed to use this strange piece of white paper?" He wailed, managing to somehow tie his two hands together with the bandage. "Is this some sort of flag you give to disobedient Younin? You could at least teach me how to use it! It's just getting my hands all tied up!"
Properly stunned into silence, Sasuke gaped openly at the blond.
"Well?" Naruto pressed on, frowning at his companion.
For his part, Sasuke had so many things to say, that he didn't know where exactly to start.
He sighed.
Grabbing a loose end of the bandage, Sasuke tugged a bit, and the long strip of bandage fell away. "Come on," he shook his head, and continued towards the library. "We can bandage your utterly moronic hand up as we walk."
"My hand is not moronic!" Naruto yelped, quickly chasing after Sasuke. His energetic shouts and protests eventually was engulfed by the silence that by now characterised every thing and being within the Taiyoubu.
Although with Naruto, who knew how long it would stay that way.
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After getting Naruto's hand properly bandaged up, noticing with half relief and half envy that the deep gash on Naruto's arm had rapidly healed to nothing more than a surface scar now, Sasuke led them both to the police department's huge and ominous looking library.
Unlike the usual rooms in the building, the doors to the library were towering blocks of transparent glass. They were heavy enough that Naruto had to use real effort to push them open, and once inside, he gasped at how high the ceiling was. They traversed the thin strip of corridor that led towards the inner room, the librarian behind the counter by the side staring at Naruto with slight suspicion. Naruto stuck his tongue out at her and felt himself instinctively walking closer to Sasuke. In a room full of strangers, a Younin was only safe beside his signatory - was the principle Iruka had hammered into his head about the outside world.
After rounding a few shelves, Naruto and Sasuke stepped into a rather large space occupied not by bookshelves - but by large tables and some chairs. There were a few tables already occupied by some serious looking officers, but otherwise, the library was deathly deserted.
Sasuke gestured Naruto to a corner table by the far end of the space. He whispered, "Stay here. I'll go pull some books out. Don't make loud noises and don't attract too much attention!" He hissed as a warning, earning him a glare of rebellion from Naruto.
"I know what to do, jerk-face!" Naruto whispered harshly back. Sasuke shrugged and walked towards the shelves of books.
In the silence of the hall, where nothing but the turning of pages could be heard, Naruto could feel the glances of other people more distinctly than ever. Every time he turned to try to pinpoint who exactly was staring at him, he found that everybody else had returned to looking at the pages of their books - like they hadn't been the one to be staring. Reasonably uncomfortable, he started to fidget. He knew he was all tensed up, just in case somebody lunged at him with a lethal weapon from behind. It had happened before, after all. The outside world was just not safe.
Therefore he almost jumped out of his skin when he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"YIKES! GET AWAY GET AWAY!! I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING TO YOU! GO THE HELL AWAY DAMMIT!" He shrieked, standing up, toppling the chair he had been sitting on, and turning around while slapping the hand away frantically. It was then that he found himself face to face with an astonished Sasuke. "Oh," he muttered, after a long, stunned silence had transpired between them. "It's you."
Sasuke's eyebrow twitched. He was about to launch into a massively scathing monologue on how much of an idiot Naruto was when a librarian stormed up to them as quietly as she could and put a finger to her lip.
"Silence, the both of you!" She glanced her old, wrinkled eyes at Sasuke, then at Naruto. Momentarily surprised at seeing Naruto, she nevertheless continued sternly, "If you can't keep it down, I suggest you get out of here, as quickly as possible!"
Naruto rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, though Sasuke was the one who eventually muttered, "Sorry..." Sort of appeased with that show of apology, the lady snorted and stormed off, after wagging a disapproving finger at the two boys. As soon as she left, Naruto and Sasuke exchanged bored glances.
"It's all your fault!" Naruto whispered to Sasuke. He lifted the toppled chair and sat back down on it.
"I'm sorry you feel that way," Sasuke sighed, his tone unapologetic. He slammed a few books down on the table, earning him some unhappy glares from the people who were reading nearby. "Okay, these are some reference books that can't be borrowed out. We'll start with these." He pulled a book out from the stack and started to look through the contents page.
"Mizu-Youma, huh..." Naruto glanced up at the ceilings, not attempting to get a book at all. "Never met one of them in the lab I'm always at, though. Otherwise I could be of some real, practical help here..."
"...You know, Naruto," Sasuke replied with a nice tone and a sweet smile, "you /can/ be of some real, practical help if you just put a hand out and pull a book from the stack, open it and try to see if you can find any information on that little water demon?"
Snapping his eyes away from the ceiling, glared at Sasuke with almost slitted irises. "Do you get up from the wrong side of the bed every day?! I have a good mind to reach over indeed and pull your throat the wrong way ou--"
"SHHH!!!" The entire area reverberated with the collective sounds of annoyed readers trying to appreciate the silence. Naruto quickly ducked and waved apologetically at the onlookers, who then mumbled and returned to their books. After which, the blond whipped around to glare at Sasuke. The Uchiha was scribbling things in his notebook and ignoring Naruto by this time, and that really did make the blond angry. Still, he knew he had a job to do, and therefore opened up a book to see what he could glean from it.
The peace only lasted two minutes.
"WAIT! I REMEMBER SOMETHING!!"
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A few minutes later, Naruto and Sasuke were now walking along the streets of Konoha, washed aglow with an orange-red in the approaching sunset. Naruto had his arms folded over the back of his head. Sasuke's head was hung low, his shoulders hunched. They continued that way for a while more, until finally, Naruto broke the silence.
"Are we going to go get ramen?" He grinned at his companion.
"No." Sasuke immediately shot a reply. "For the last time, no!" He added, looking up at Naruto. "It's enough that you got us thrown out of the library, now you want to get us banned from the ramen shop as well?"
"What do you mean?" Naruto pulled a mock fist at Sasuke. "I'm the ramen store's most loyal client! They wouldn't ban me for anything in the world!!"
"No, no, really, nevermind," Sasuke rubbed his temple tiredly and told Naruto. "Let's just go to my house and we can continue the research from there. I think Kakashi should have sent us some information by now as well." He glanced around the crossroads they had reached while walking about aimlessly. Nodding towards the right, he continued, "This way, idiot. Follow me real closely so you don't get lost along the straight path, clueless."
"HEY!!" Naruto instantly screeched, taking off after Sasuke in a run. "Take that back!"
"Maybe I will, once you actually develop a brain."
"I do have one!"
"Hah. I couldn't tell."
"Why you-!!"
The scuffling continued throughout the rest of their journey. So childish they were, that even the sun set behind the mountains in shame.
Gloomy grey clouds gathered over the rustic village once the sun was gone - crowding out any view of the night sky. The moon and stars were not visible that night yet again, but the village was no longer concerned.
After all, it had been that way for months already.
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8/9/2004
Part 8 of 16
(email XD!) XD (at) tougenkyou (dot) net
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Against the Tide
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Chapter Seven
"But why does Sasuke seem so afraid of getting bitten?" Naruto wondered aloud, adjusting his forehead protector while looking in the mirror of the changing room. "He didn't even flinch when I clawed him across the face from temple to chin. Oh yeah, I gutted him in the ribs too... err," he flashed the increasingly alarmed Iruka a quick glance, "... anyway, I don't see how a bite should differ from my other attacks. Am I missing something here, Iruka-sensei?"
Eventually, the pony-tailed caretaker came out of his induced shock. "Funny you should ask," Iruka murmured, "I was wondering how to broach the subject to you, too."
"The subject?" Naruto turned around from looking at Iruka in the mirror to facing Iruka in the face instead.
"Come on," Iruka gestured towards the door, "we'll talk while we walk back."
Nodding, Naruto followed his caretaker, curious about what Iruka had to tell him.
"Hmm..." Iruka began, after they had walked a short distance away from the changing room and were now rounding some corners. "How many of those mission reports did you read?"
"How many?" Naruto was confused. "I read them all!"
Shocked into a slight stumble, Iruka gaped at the blond. "You read them /all/?!"
"... You mean I'm not supposed to?" Naruto meeped in a quiet, frantic voice.
"Err, no no," Iruka quickly corrected his tone, coughing into his fist. "I mean... oh well. Naruto, there are five years worth of mission reports in that shelf - some of which were massive B-rank missions spanning 20 pages or more. And you read them all."
"Well I got carried away after a while..." Naruto sheepishly admitted, rubbing the back of his head. "I'm just jealous that I never get sent to exciting missions like the ones Sasuke always gets sent to. And he does them all /alone/, too!" Naruto stuck his tongue out at nothing in particular.
"That's not what I was surprised about, Naruto," Iruka's hand came down on the blond's head again. "It's the fact that you, Uzumaki Naruto - the boy who couldn't even stay still enough to read a simple one line mission statement - actually read a whole shelf of top-ranked mission reports within one night." He sighed. "Why didn't you put half as much effort in some of your classes back in your school days? You would've gotten to Tokubetsu Chuunin by now!"
"I /told/ you, Iruka-sensei, those judges have /something/ against me, damned if I knew what it was!" The blond swatted his caretaker's hand away from his head. "Speaking of ranking, why is Sasuke still a Genin, sensei?" Naruto's innocent curiosity struck again - and he looked at Iruka, hoping to get a straightforward answer this time. "Genins don't do B-rank missions... all by themselves, too! Is he actually an ANBU in training or something? He can't still be Genin with his track record!"
"Hmmm..." Iruka pondered on how to answer that. "It's true that Sasuke's skill level and track record obscenely disqualifies him from being Genin - but he cannot rise to Chuunin. He has never taken the Chuunin examinations before..."
"Because he doesn't have a team?"
"... because he doesn't have a... how did you know about that?" Iruka frowned at his charge. "I don't think the mission reports mention things like that?"
Naruto shrugged. "Sasuke told me."
Once again rendered speechless, Iruka gaped. "He... Sa... /Sasuke/ told you?"
"Yeah, he just mentioned it in passing when I asked him about it," Naruto waved nonchalantly. "Is he such a jerk that nobody wants to pair up with him at all? Shikamaru and Chouji seemed really interested in joining the Taiyoubu, though they say it's impossible for them. Aaah, dammit, I don't understand, sensei!" He grabbed his hair in self frustration. "I don't understand anything anymore!"
"Do you really think Sasuke is so hard to work with, Naruto?" Iruka asked tersely.
"Yes! He's an asshole and a jerk and won't stop making fun of me!" The blond instantly snarled.
Iruka looked at him strangely. "Come on, Naruto. Be honest. Is he really so hard to work with? Does he hinder the mission in any way? Leak out secrets he's not supposed to?"
There was a short pause. "Well... no," Naruto admitted. "He's quiet enough... and does his job really well."
Iruka smiled.
"So there's another reason then?" Naruto glanced at his caretaker hopefully.
"Maybe he'll tell you about it one day, when he feels like it," Iruka nodded. "But have you ever heard about the curse of the Hebi-Youma?"
Naruto's face darkened immediately. "Of course! Those evil foul-faced things are infamous even among the Younin!"
"Sasuke," Iruka sadly replied, "has been cursed by one of those demon."
Out of the two sets of footsteps making their way down the aisle, one set stopped abruptly. Iruka was obliged to stop as well, turning around to look at Naruto's incredulous face, having half expected it.
"From..." Naruto managed to sputter after a while. "... from since when?"
"Seven or eight, I'm not too sure myself," Iruka smiled warmly and gestured for Naruto to continue walking along beside him. "I think you know better than anyone else what happens to someone who's been cursed by the Hebi-Youma, don't you?"
"Well, ugh... I..." Naruto complied by quietly stepping forward, then continuing alongside Iruka in their trek back to the office. For a while there was nothing but silence. Then, "I promise I won't try to bite him again."
Trying hard not to fall over in exasperation, Iruka eked a smile out at Naruto. "I don't think that was the point I was trying to make..."
"I'll try not to punch him or anything when he's being too much of a jerk either, then," Naruto hastily added. He pouted when Iruka's expressions did not make a turn for the better. "That's the best I can do, Iruka-sensei! I can't stand that jerk and you know it! Just 'cause he has a fear of being /bitten/ because of some stupid Hebi-Youma doesn't mean he has the right to be a jackass! He's not the only one who's had to live with a goddamned curse in this village, okay? I won't let him walk all over me just because--"
A few loud, lone claps sounded out from beyond the dark corridors. Both Naruto and Iruka stopped and tensed, Iruka's hand going towards his shuriken pouch and Naruto crouching to the ground with a low growl in his throat. "Well said, Naruto, my boy," the voice belonging to the person clapping said, and he stepped towards them, allowing the dim lights to finally fall upon his visage. "I couldn't have said it better myself."
"Kakashi-sensei!" Naruto's eyes widened and his body instantly relaxed. He broke into a wide grin a moment later. "Really? You really think so? Cool!! Finally someone agrees with me that Sasuke is an asshole! Yes!" He began to dance around.
"Naruto, behave yourself!" Iruka quickly grabbed him by the head, and turned to Kakashi, smiling sheepishly. "Sorry. Naruto is sometimes a bit too hyperactive."
"Boys should be hyperactive. It makes them more lovable," Kakashi smiled back, and pat Naruto on the head. Naruto grinned widely. "I wish Sasuke had half your enthusiasm."
"Yeah! I'm the best!" The blond struck a fist into the air.
"Anyway, your mission objective for today is over." Kakashi continued. "Sasuke'll be submitting the report, as he always does - that little perfectionist," he shook his head. "But I thought I'd ask you about it too. Is there anything extra you may want to tell me before I return to my volumes of Icha Icha?"
There was a pause. Then Naruto nodded while blabbering, "Yes yes yes! Kakashi-sensei, there's this folder that this nurse passed to me..." Naruto felt around himself. "... Oh shit. Sasuke took the folder," he grumbled, "... anyway! This nurse... her name was Hyuuga... Hinata? Yeah, something like that - she told me that there's a certain chakra that's suppressing Sakura-chan's memories so that Sakura-chan can't remember a thing about her life, or the night the attack happened. It's a pretty common demon trick," Naruto flashed a bit of chakra with his hands. "It's not usually used, though - it's a pretty high level demonic Jutsu that eats slowly away at the victim's memories. They not just risk losing all their memories, but losing their mind altogether."
Kakashi frowned. He touched his temple with an index finger. "Hmm..." He made a sound. "Still, I haven't seen many instances of active memory blockage in all my years in the Taiyoubu." He frowned. "This Jutsu is not often used even among demons who know it, since the way I see it, the preferred method of attack is usually mass mayhem. It makes me wonder what this Mizu-Youma really wants..."
"Maybe he doesn't want people to find him out?" Naruto suggested.
"That's not possible," Kakashi shook his head, "Youma are identified instantly by their attack style."
"Well, I don't know," Naruto looked at his feet, frowning deeply. "Maybe it seemed like a good way to keep himself from getting arrested?"
Kakashi thought for a while more quietly. "Whatever it is," the Jounin pointed at Naruto, "I think we'd better try to find out more before we start anything new. Naruto, you join Sasuke in the office and tell him that both of you will be using the department library to find out more about the Mizu-Youma. I'll be forwarding you some related information from among the classified files I can get my hands on. Iruka-sensei," he glanced at the caretaker, who nodded in acknowledgement, "I may need your help in that area."
"Of course, sir," Iruka said, while standing at attention.
"So that's it for now," Kakashi pat Naruto on his blond head. "Get going. Try not to kill each other this time, okay?" He smiled knowingly at the boy, who looked away in embarrassment. "As much as I would like to see Sasuke finally get out of his shell, I really don't wish to see him out of service for a few weeks just so it can happen. You got that?"
"Yes, sensei..." Naruto mumbled. He edged his way around the two adults and broke into a run down the corridor, towards his assigned destination.
As soon as the retreating figure of Naruto vanished into the gloomy darkness, Kakashi turned and walked slowly away. "Let's go," he said sombrely to Iruka, who nodded and followed, after throwing one final, worried glance down Naruto's general direction.
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"Hey, asshole," Naruto declared loudly upon sliding the door open. "Kakashi-sensei asked us to go do some research on the Mizu-Youma in the library. Get your lazy ass out of the office and lead the way there!"
A surprised Sasuke, halfway through bandaging his swollen midriff, jerked his head upwards quickly. He frowned when he saw that it was Naruto, and turned so that his back faced the blond.
"Wait a bit, idiot," he mumbled, continuing with his bandaging. "Still trying to clean up the mess you gave me, in case you haven't noticed."
Quietly, the blond padded closer to Sasuke, who flinched at the invasion of personal space but could do nothing to drive the curious boy away. "... was it really that bad?" Naruto eventually asked, staring with great amazement at the patch of bluish-purple decorating a huge area across Sasuke's stomach.
"Yes, moron," Sasuke snapped, tearing a strip of banadage and handing it to Naruto. "And didn't you get slashed across the arm too? Use that. It's unhygenic to walk around dripping blood all over the place."
Taken aback by the sudden gruff gesture of kindness, Naruto accepted the bandage wordlessly. The room continued in silence as Sasuke finished his last round of wrapping and put his shirt back on. "Where did Kakashi ask us to go to again?" He stood and walked towards the exit. After a few steps, he noticed that Naruto wasn't following, but just staring into space. "Hey, total moron! I'm asking you a question!"
"I heard you the first time, bastard," Naruto frowned, turning to glare at Sasuke. He stood as well and trailed behind Sasuke, who had already began moving. They exited the office and started down the long, lonely corridor, for once in each other's presence but not trying to shout each other down. Sasuke was mildly disturbed, to say the least. It was just unlike Naruto to be this calm and quiet.
"How do you..." a worried sounding Naruto voiced out, suddenly lifting the tension between the duo. "How do you..." he repeated, as if unable to find the right words to continue with his question.
"What?" Sasuke prompted, glad that at least there was some sound in the eeriely quiet corridor.
Naruto turned to look at Sasuke pleadingly. "How are you supposed to use this strange piece of white paper?" He wailed, managing to somehow tie his two hands together with the bandage. "Is this some sort of flag you give to disobedient Younin? You could at least teach me how to use it! It's just getting my hands all tied up!"
Properly stunned into silence, Sasuke gaped openly at the blond.
"Well?" Naruto pressed on, frowning at his companion.
For his part, Sasuke had so many things to say, that he didn't know where exactly to start.
He sighed.
Grabbing a loose end of the bandage, Sasuke tugged a bit, and the long strip of bandage fell away. "Come on," he shook his head, and continued towards the library. "We can bandage your utterly moronic hand up as we walk."
"My hand is not moronic!" Naruto yelped, quickly chasing after Sasuke. His energetic shouts and protests eventually was engulfed by the silence that by now characterised every thing and being within the Taiyoubu.
Although with Naruto, who knew how long it would stay that way.
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After getting Naruto's hand properly bandaged up, noticing with half relief and half envy that the deep gash on Naruto's arm had rapidly healed to nothing more than a surface scar now, Sasuke led them both to the police department's huge and ominous looking library.
Unlike the usual rooms in the building, the doors to the library were towering blocks of transparent glass. They were heavy enough that Naruto had to use real effort to push them open, and once inside, he gasped at how high the ceiling was. They traversed the thin strip of corridor that led towards the inner room, the librarian behind the counter by the side staring at Naruto with slight suspicion. Naruto stuck his tongue out at her and felt himself instinctively walking closer to Sasuke. In a room full of strangers, a Younin was only safe beside his signatory - was the principle Iruka had hammered into his head about the outside world.
After rounding a few shelves, Naruto and Sasuke stepped into a rather large space occupied not by bookshelves - but by large tables and some chairs. There were a few tables already occupied by some serious looking officers, but otherwise, the library was deathly deserted.
Sasuke gestured Naruto to a corner table by the far end of the space. He whispered, "Stay here. I'll go pull some books out. Don't make loud noises and don't attract too much attention!" He hissed as a warning, earning him a glare of rebellion from Naruto.
"I know what to do, jerk-face!" Naruto whispered harshly back. Sasuke shrugged and walked towards the shelves of books.
In the silence of the hall, where nothing but the turning of pages could be heard, Naruto could feel the glances of other people more distinctly than ever. Every time he turned to try to pinpoint who exactly was staring at him, he found that everybody else had returned to looking at the pages of their books - like they hadn't been the one to be staring. Reasonably uncomfortable, he started to fidget. He knew he was all tensed up, just in case somebody lunged at him with a lethal weapon from behind. It had happened before, after all. The outside world was just not safe.
Therefore he almost jumped out of his skin when he felt a hand on his shoulder.
"YIKES! GET AWAY GET AWAY!! I DIDN'T DO ANYTHING TO YOU! GO THE HELL AWAY DAMMIT!" He shrieked, standing up, toppling the chair he had been sitting on, and turning around while slapping the hand away frantically. It was then that he found himself face to face with an astonished Sasuke. "Oh," he muttered, after a long, stunned silence had transpired between them. "It's you."
Sasuke's eyebrow twitched. He was about to launch into a massively scathing monologue on how much of an idiot Naruto was when a librarian stormed up to them as quietly as she could and put a finger to her lip.
"Silence, the both of you!" She glanced her old, wrinkled eyes at Sasuke, then at Naruto. Momentarily surprised at seeing Naruto, she nevertheless continued sternly, "If you can't keep it down, I suggest you get out of here, as quickly as possible!"
Naruto rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, though Sasuke was the one who eventually muttered, "Sorry..." Sort of appeased with that show of apology, the lady snorted and stormed off, after wagging a disapproving finger at the two boys. As soon as she left, Naruto and Sasuke exchanged bored glances.
"It's all your fault!" Naruto whispered to Sasuke. He lifted the toppled chair and sat back down on it.
"I'm sorry you feel that way," Sasuke sighed, his tone unapologetic. He slammed a few books down on the table, earning him some unhappy glares from the people who were reading nearby. "Okay, these are some reference books that can't be borrowed out. We'll start with these." He pulled a book out from the stack and started to look through the contents page.
"Mizu-Youma, huh..." Naruto glanced up at the ceilings, not attempting to get a book at all. "Never met one of them in the lab I'm always at, though. Otherwise I could be of some real, practical help here..."
"...You know, Naruto," Sasuke replied with a nice tone and a sweet smile, "you /can/ be of some real, practical help if you just put a hand out and pull a book from the stack, open it and try to see if you can find any information on that little water demon?"
Snapping his eyes away from the ceiling, glared at Sasuke with almost slitted irises. "Do you get up from the wrong side of the bed every day?! I have a good mind to reach over indeed and pull your throat the wrong way ou--"
"SHHH!!!" The entire area reverberated with the collective sounds of annoyed readers trying to appreciate the silence. Naruto quickly ducked and waved apologetically at the onlookers, who then mumbled and returned to their books. After which, the blond whipped around to glare at Sasuke. The Uchiha was scribbling things in his notebook and ignoring Naruto by this time, and that really did make the blond angry. Still, he knew he had a job to do, and therefore opened up a book to see what he could glean from it.
The peace only lasted two minutes.
"WAIT! I REMEMBER SOMETHING!!"
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A few minutes later, Naruto and Sasuke were now walking along the streets of Konoha, washed aglow with an orange-red in the approaching sunset. Naruto had his arms folded over the back of his head. Sasuke's head was hung low, his shoulders hunched. They continued that way for a while more, until finally, Naruto broke the silence.
"Are we going to go get ramen?" He grinned at his companion.
"No." Sasuke immediately shot a reply. "For the last time, no!" He added, looking up at Naruto. "It's enough that you got us thrown out of the library, now you want to get us banned from the ramen shop as well?"
"What do you mean?" Naruto pulled a mock fist at Sasuke. "I'm the ramen store's most loyal client! They wouldn't ban me for anything in the world!!"
"No, no, really, nevermind," Sasuke rubbed his temple tiredly and told Naruto. "Let's just go to my house and we can continue the research from there. I think Kakashi should have sent us some information by now as well." He glanced around the crossroads they had reached while walking about aimlessly. Nodding towards the right, he continued, "This way, idiot. Follow me real closely so you don't get lost along the straight path, clueless."
"HEY!!" Naruto instantly screeched, taking off after Sasuke in a run. "Take that back!"
"Maybe I will, once you actually develop a brain."
"I do have one!"
"Hah. I couldn't tell."
"Why you-!!"
The scuffling continued throughout the rest of their journey. So childish they were, that even the sun set behind the mountains in shame.
Gloomy grey clouds gathered over the rustic village once the sun was gone - crowding out any view of the night sky. The moon and stars were not visible that night yet again, but the village was no longer concerned.
After all, it had been that way for months already.
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8/9/2004
Part 8 of 16
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