Helloooooooo!
(starts singing) Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you, happy birthday dear Mi-chaaaaaaaaaaaaaaan! Happy birthday to you!
This little mini-series is created for and posted in honour of Mi-chan's birthday, April 6th 2005. Happy birthday! Til hamingju með afmælið! Grattis på födelsedagen! And so on and so forth... on with the fic! It's for you, birthday girl!
It is said that one can never forget the day they found love. That one, fateful moment when you realize that this, this is the one for you.
For some, that day is a blur. A string of events barely distinguishable from each other. All they can remember are the feelings of love, belonging, and happiness.
For others, that day is as clear as a summer night's sky, each memory standing out like a bright star.
Lucky for us, Uzumaki Naruto belongs to the latter category. Otherwise this story would end here.
Seeking out aforementioned blonde, we find him gazing out his bedroom window, staring at the midnight sky, remembering and thinking back to the day he found his very own special person…
"Man… this is some fucking weather…"
Early morning in the village of Konoha. One blonde, blue-eyed, orange-clad Konoha genin could not suppress his disappointment in Mother Nature's choice of mood today. He really couldn't help it, he loves the sun, he loves the rain. But the first thing you see when you step outside in the morning should not be heavy, dark grey stormclouds covering the sky. Not a speck of blue in sight. So, Naturally, Naruto's spirit was a little damped as he started strolling toward the bridge to meet up with the rest of team 7.
Walking along the streets of the village, he couldn't shake off his blue mood. Judging by the heavy clouds, a major storm was soon to come. Sighing lightly to himself, he made a mental note to ask Kakashi-sensei if they could cut training short. It's not that he didn't like the rain, quite the opposite actually. It was the thunder and lightning he wasn't too fond of.
Being so deep in thought, he never heard the footsteps approaching fast behind him.
"Good morning, Naruto!" came the happy greeting from his fellow team-mate, one pink haired Haruno Sakura. She was quick to notice her friend's glum mood.
"Oh, mornin', Sakura-chan…" he replied. Gone were the days of him pining over her, instead they had developed a very strong friendship. Sakura had even just recently confided in him that she was over Sasuke. Naruto was proud and very happy that she trusted him with her deepest secret, how her affections were now directed at someone else.
"Ne Naruto… what's wrong? You look a little depressed."
"Hmmm? Oh nothing, really, Sakura-chan. I'm just nervous, that's all. And the weather isn't helping much either."
"Oh, I get it…" a knowing smirk played on her lips. "You're nervous because we are training together with team 8 today."
A faint blush stained his cheeks, gone the instant it came.
"Well… yeah, something like that."
Suddenly he found the ground to be very interesting.
Sakura giggled. "I have to admit, I'm a bit nervous too. Isn't it kind of strange that both of our crushes are on the same team?"
"Since it's us, Sakura-chan, very few things can be considered strange."
At this she laughed. "Yeah, you're probably right," she replied. "We must be Lady Fate's favourite guinea pigs, the way she insists on toying with us.
He laughed a little, and was in a considerably lighter mood when they finally arrived at the bridge.
Surprisingly, they were the last to arrive. Sasuke, Kiba, Hinata, Shino and Kurenai were already there. Even the chronically late Kakashi-sensei.
"Finally you show up! I was thinking me and Akamaru were gonna have to come find you if you hadn't been here in 5 minutes." came the loud, somewhat annoyed greeting from Kiba. Akamary yipped in agreement.
"Well good morning to you too, Kiba" Sakura answered sarcastically. Her expression changed in a flash and she was her usual cheerful self when she greeted the rest of the group.
"G-good morning N-naruto-kun, Sakura-san" Hinata spoke softly, with a stutter, Sasuke 'hn'-ed, Shino inclined his head and Naruto responded with a loud "Mornin' everyone!"
Kurenai stod by patiebtly waiting for the group to turn to her. She really didn't have all day, and neither did Kakashi, if she'd understood him correctly. You just never knew where that man was involved.
All eyes finally on her and Kakashi, she took the opportunity to explain today's training.
"All right you six, listen up. Today you will be playing a game, and it will be unsupervised. I have a meeting to attend and Kakashi... well..."
"I promised Iruka that I'd help him grade some papers...amongst other things..." he trailed off, his visible eye going in a happy arc. Naruto got the feeling that there was more to that sentence than words, mainly because he knew that his former teacher and current happened to have a thing for each other. He chose not to voice those thought out loud, he valued his private parts far too much. Instead he opted for asking Kurenai about the training.
"What kind of game are we playing?"
"A special game of Hide and Seek, with some different rules."
"Different rules?" Sakura sounded sceptical.
"Yes." Kakashi said. "In normal Hide and Seek, one person seeks while the others hide. In our version, you are going one on one. Meaning three of you will search for the other three."
"Abd we decided to put one team against the other, so we needed some extra rules. Rule number 1: No Fighting."
"What!" Naruto and Kiba shouted in unison.
"No fighting" Kurenai repeated herself. "Once the Seeker finds the Hider they can both go home or do whatever. There will be no violence, understood?" She glared at the two boys, daring them to object. When nothing came, she took the silence as her cue to continue.
"Rule number 2: the Seekers are not allowed to co-operate with each other. Same goes for the Hiders, it's every person to themself."
"Rule number 3: the Hiders get a 15 minute headstart. Once the 15 minutes are up, the seekers will be told who they are looking for. Is everyone clear as far as the rules go?"
"Which of us are seekers?" Sasuke asked.
"Since it's our team 7 VS Kurenai's team 8..." Kakashi answered "Kiba, Hinata and Shino will seek. All you, Sakura and Naruto need to do is split up, hide, and avoid detection." His eye crinkled up into a happy arc again. "Should be easy enough, don't you think?"
"Hn." was all the reply he got.
"All right, let's do this! We're gonna find our hider first, right, Akamaru? Huh? Akamaru? Where d'ya go?" Kiba looked around, as did everyone else
Where the hell was Akamaru?
(A/n) right... like I said above, this is a mini-series. Although exactly how mini, I don't know yet. I do know where I'm going with it though, it's all in my head, I just haven't written it down yet. So expect an update 'bout this time next week. If not, then feel free to nag at me until I actually get it done and post it. Deal?
Once again, Happy birthday Mi-chan. I wish you happiness and good fortunes on your day of days.
