Wow, its amazing, what? 5, reviews can up your confidence level lol. Another on-the-whim story I got from reading that foxes have close relationships with the dead then pictured Naruto saying "I see dead people" LOL , then totally formed a story around it, with absolutely no meaning or moral or point. I personally dont think its as good as "Dancing Fox", which probably wasnt that good in the first place so its saying something. Umm... the superstions or odd things poping up in the story will be explained toward the end. Apologies for any out of characterness, but Naruto couldnt really be hyper and loud in this one, and I tried to get Kakashi on key, but I dont think I quite have it just yet. Sakura and Sasuke are pretty easy though, considering in this story they're souless and underdeveloped in every area possible, lol. Apologies for spelling and grammer errors also. Got the name from an old fox legend, were a fox (whos name is Giovannuzza) helps make a man's fortune andget a wife, but the man was ungratefull and didnt grant the fox's wish, so it left forever, never seen again. A bit like this story, I suppose -wink- ok not really lol. Disclaimer: I own nothing lol. So finally... (god, Im so unoriginal with titles lol)...
Mirazhe Presents
Giovannuzza
11:58 p.m.
Naruto, if possible, only stared at the neon glowing numbers of his clock more intently.
11:59 p.m.
"Yes! One minute to go!" He cheered happily aloud. He fidgeted nervously, making no move to stop. This year he was going to do something about it (not fidgeting, obviously!), something that happened every year, and he had one minute to-
12:00 a.m.
Make that zero minutes.
"Yosh! One week to the festival! Time to get started!" He cried out loudly, ignoring the fact that his voice carried out his open window and down the road easily, even from inside his apartment. A few unhappy and now very awake neighbors voiced their complaints about 'The Demon' loudly into the night. Snickering like a madman, said Demon smiled his trademark foxy smile and leaped out his window into the night. For the first time in his life, as far back as he could remember, Naruto was happy for his birthday to come.
"Ne, Sakura-chan, is Kakashi-sensei here yet?" Said pink haired girl moaned and groaned for hearing the question for the millionth time.
"No, Naruto. Knowing him, he won't be here for another hour," Sakura answered, then added, "And quit pacing, its so annoying!"
Naruto, who was indeed pacing, ignored her, making frustrated sounds all the while. The sooner Kakashi got here, the sooner they could end their mission, and the sooner he could leave. The vexed vessel finally made an exasperated sound, throwing his hands in the air.
"Fine then! If hes not coming, then I'm not waiting!" He uttered loudly, crossed the bridge and made his way toward the woods. Sakura made an exasperated sound, rather similar to Naruto's, and if one listened carefully, could hear a small sigh of relief from Sasuke.
... Only to have Kakashi poof into existence as he left. Of coarse.
"Yo!" Team Seven's seemingly oblivious sensei said. As always, he was replayed by a grunt from Sasuke, but the usual cry of "LIAR!" was a good deal quieter than usual. "Eh? Where is Naruto going?" The Jounin asked lazily as he saw Naruto making his to a rather unused path in the distance.
"Dope got fed up with waiting," Sasuke answered slowly, as if even mentioning the Dope was degrading. Kakashi sighed.
"Ill go get him.." He drawled out, disappearing in a puff of smoke.
When he reappeared in a tree, Kakashi blinked down at his loud student. The vessel had made his way to a rather unvisited graveyard for civilians and ninja alike, weaving in and out of the gravestones with unnerving familiarity. He was slowly making a beeline for a overly large tombstone, most likely belonging to a ninja of great power or a well known, not to mention rich, civilian.
The Jounin was startled out of his thoughts when the beginning of a 'hoot', most definitely from an owl (oddly enough, since it was full daylight), came from behind him. Amazingly, his usually rather clumbsy student down below deftly grabbed and threw a kunai from his pouch, the weapon zooming past the teachers head and making a soft 'thump' behind him. Kakashi looked behind him in a slight daze to find a snowy white owl, its feathers beginning to stain scarlet red in lovely contrast, unmercifully stabbed through the breast and pinned to the tree.
"...Naruto?"
"Oi, don't ya know, Kakashi-sensei? Owls are known to eat souls," His student said with a foxy grin, eyes squinted to slits. Kakashi blinked his uncovered eye, wondering when his student had gone insane... er.
"Maa maa, Naruto, Don't come up with such things. Why don't we head to the training grounds?" Kakashi asked with practiced ease. Naruto's smile seemed to become a bit more forced at this, but nodded as he glanced at the large tombstone. The Jounin's eye curved upward and the two began trekking back to retrieve Sasuke and Sakura. Kakashi never did notice Naruto mouthing something wordlessly in the direction of the tombstone, but he did notice the name on it.
- Yondaime -
Naruto could do little but rub the back of his head at the moodier-than-thou look of Sasuke and the near flaming-in-anger form of Sakura. Poor vessel, to be on the receiving end of such a punishment from the raging girl. After greetings had been made (in the form of punches) and replies spoken (in the form of bumps and bruises), Team Seven headed out for their mission, Kakashi explaining as they walked.
"Now that we are all here," Inserting a meaningful look to Naruto here (rather ironic for the ever-prudent Jounin), "We have a rather dangerous mission today..." He noticed the slight perking of his student's attention. "...To exterminate a hoard of spiders from our clients house. D-rank payment." He also noticed the moaning and groaning, then the rather bored sounding "Hn." His usually most rebellious student looked thoughtful. Kakashi dismissed this quickly enough.
As they arrived, the Team spotted the client at his front door, apparently to afraid to enter his own home. Said client had mixed reactions upon seeing the team, beginning with relief, to confusion, to poorly hidden anger. Kakashi lazily raised an eyebrow at this as he noted the client continuously glanced at Naruto, but as he spoke, his voice and expression quickly changed to worry again.
"I don't know were they're coming from! The cracks in the walls, between the windows, I don't know but there are so many!" The man exclaimed desperately. Naruto once again looked thoughtful, and spoke.
"Did you.. Have a lot of relatives that have.. Died in the past? Most likely killed by... The Kyuubi?" He asked causiously, rather unusual for Naruto. The man's worry turned to anger again, borderline rage.
"Yes, yes I did, but of course you would know of that, wouldn't you, brat?" He answered in a shaky voice. As Kakashi was about to intervene, the vessel's causious look turned to a foxy smile.
"Ne, you guys don't mind if I take care of this mission do ya?"
"Che whatever." Dope'll probably get in trouble and we'll have to save him... Again. Idiot.
"EEK! I hate spiders! Ew ew ew!" Naruto looked to Kakashi.
"...Go ahead," Their teacher answered as he pulled out a familiar orange book and buried his face into the open pages. Naruto's smile broadened and he walked into the house briskly as the man protested loudly. As the man's protests died down and a few moments passed, Kakashi's keen hearing picked up the vessel's voice from inside.
"...into the jar... You'll get to come... ack soon...omise of a lifeti..." A few minutes later the seemingly one sided conversation died down and Naruto exited, his smile just as wide as before, with a jar full of spiders of various sizes and harry-ness in his hands. "Don't worry, I'll take these little guys off your hands, so don't worry!"
The man had a mixture of relief, confusion, fear, and still even a little bit of hate displayed on his face. Rather amazing, really.
"Ew ew ew! That's so nasty Naruto! Why don't you just squish them all, ewww!" Sakura screamed in obvious disgust.
"Sakura-chan! Don't be that way! Spiders have feelings too, don't ya, guys?" Naruto retorted as he lifted the jar up to his face to peer inside, his smile broadening. The spiders continued to scurry around every which way, seemingly oblivious to these words.
The village woke in the dawn, the sun lighting the day with deep oranges and reds. Spider webs hung between the shops jammed close together, dew clinging to the threads, glistening beautifully in the morning light. The last bats of the night quickly retreated to their dark abodes, fleeing from the dawn for their duty was done. The citizens drowsily opened their eyes then quickly awakened, like children on Christmas. Today was the day, the day celebrating the defeat of Kyuubi. Children ran into the streets, bubbling laughter as they dragged their smiling parents to the most appealing looking booths. Reenactments, be it on stage or with puppets, began telling of the heroic tale of Yondaime Hokage and the dreaded Kyuubi as the streets filled to the brim with the happy citizens. No one noticed the stealthy yet brightly clad form slinking through the residential areas, strategically placing letters or meaningful gifts on doorsteps, window sills, or even through mail slots. No one noticed, save one masked jounin, carefully balanced on an electric wire suspended above the city.
Unnoticed by any, he smiled knowingly down at the orange figure slinking between the houses and apartments. What an amazing person this boy must be to do all of this for the Kyuubi victims, not to mention on the day of the festival. The villagers were going to be in for a surprise If all went well, the boy could be acknowledged, revered even. If not... Well he might as well start digging his grave now since the villagers might kill him. The masked jounin snickered at this thought, and how ironic it was, as he thought back to the day before...
Kakashi sighed and looked up from the ever familiar Hero's Memorial, peering towards the village, just visible through the trees. The festival of Kyuubi's defeat was being prepared, ordements, streamers and banners hanging above the streets. Brightly coloured signs were hastily placed in shop windows, and a variety booths were quickly constructed in what little space in the streets was available. These booths ranged to hold foods, games, or even reenactments of the famous battle and the so called "Death" of Kyuubi. Oddly enough, many of the villagers had been having complaints of these booths, and every were else for that matter, being infested with either bats or spiders.
The Jounin sighed again, as the subject of Kyuubi ultimately lead his mind to wander to his orange clad student. For the past week Naruto's habits were rather... Unnerving. At the beginning the vessel either be even later than Kakashi (which was quite a feat), or completely absent for the entire day. As the week lengthened though, the days that he did show up, the poor boy was entirely exhausted, as if he had been up all night and then some. At first his teacher chalked it up as the stress of the festival coming, most likely a rather bitter-sweet event for the poor boy (actually, probably more bitter than sweet), but Kakashi's ninja intuition told him otherwise. Coming to this conclusion, the Jounin poofed away.
When he reappeared (coincidentally under the same tree in the graveyard from a week ago), Kakashi spotted Naruto at that same grave -Yondaime's grave he corrected himself- strangely trying to break up two hissing and spitting cats fighting on top of the gravestone.
"Idiots!" Naruto cried, apparently at the cats, "He isn't ready to go to the other side yet, bastards, so go back to were you came from!" The cats hissed at the vessel, calling a temporary truce and nimbly jumped off the gravestone, running in the forest. "Ne, you can come out now Kakashi!" Naruto yelled, looking over his shoulder at his sensei.
"Eh? What was that all about, Naruto?" Kakashi asked lazily, but his lazy facade seemed to let on more.
"You mean to ask why I've been acting oddly all week; If its the upcoming Kyuubi festival? Wondering if any of the villagers been troubling me?" Naruto's eyes squinted to slits as he talked slowly and he began to grin as Kakashi blinked. "Look underneath the underneath."
"...Have they?"
"No, no! Of coarse not. I've just been busy with.. A project," Naruto's grin widened slightly, and Kakashi's eye narrowed just as slightly.
"And what is this project, might I ask?" He queried suspiciously.
"Been writing letters for people. To the villagers who lost precious people cuz of Kyuubi."
"Who are you writing these letters for?" Kakashi asked, slightly confused. Why would Naruto do something so odd?
"The precious people who died cause of Kyuubi." For one of the few times in his life, Kakashi was stunned near speechless.
"H-how..?"
"Ne, don't you know Kakashi-sensei?" Naruto flashed a foxy smile. "I see dead people."
And for the very first time in his life, Kakashi was stunned completely speechless.
"Wh-ho-eh?" He asked, still unable to create coherent words.
"Heh," The vessel rubbed the back of his head, "Apparently kitsune have close relationships with the dead, at least that's how Kyuubi explains it." By now Kakashi was rather proud he hadn't turned his student over to the asylum by now... Or fainted.
"S-so can see and talk to dead people..?"
"Yup.. Sorta. I can only see and here them if they are ghosts and haven't gone to rest or around the day the person died, give or take a few days; when they can come back for those few days as ghosts." Naruto paused, then continued, "Obito's anniversary of death was a few days ago, wasn't it? Heh, he says hi, by the way, and that you did a good job protecting Rin. He also said that you turned out to be a lazy jack ass." The vessel laughed at how ironic this sounded, knowing full well what Obito's personality was like when he was alive. Kakashi chuckled softly.
"Then the owls, the spiders, the cats?" The Jounin asked after a moment.
"Ya know all those superstitions you've ever heard before? Yah, those are all true. Owls steal souls when they hoot at people, spiders hold the souls of our loved ones, so its bad luck -not to mention mean- to squish them, and two cats fighting over a dying person or a recently dead person are the Devil and an Angel fighting over the soul."
"Then is Yondaime going to.." Kakashi trailed off, fearful for his sensei's fate.
"Nope, Yondaime's not going anywhere because of the seal, so until either furball or me die, he gets to hang around his grave, don't you, ya old fart?" Naruto called seemingly to no one. Judging by the twitching of his eyebrow, he received just as a degrading insult. Crazy as it seemed, Kakashi found himself beginning to believe his insane student.
"But.. Why?" The vessel's grin slipped slightly.
"The villagers are still bitter and mourn for their precious people from the attack, obviously. Maybe, if they hear from their precious people that everything is OK and that even if they were killed, they accept it, so then.."
"... The living villagers would accept it too.. But you do know they could take this as a joke and take it out on you, Naruto." Kakashi concluded.
"Yah, I know," Kyuubi's Vessel said. "But that's a risk I'm willing to take." He smiled widely.
The festival was wearing down. The children, tired yet wishing the day to last, clung to their parents, their eyes heavily lidded. Their parents, also tired but smiling, lead their children on, silently happy there had been no sign of the Kyuubi brat to ruin the fun. As they arrived home, most absent mindedly grabbed their letters or gifts, while others, more sharp minded, noted that they received mail on a day were none should be delivered not to mention from their dead friends.
Naruto smiled down at the town from the Hokage Monument as they returned home, standing by Kakashi al the while.
"What will you do if they take it out on you?" Kakashi asked lazily. Naruto was silent for a moment before answering.
"It doesn't matter. Whether they believe me or not, they'll never forget, and always have that second thought that their precious people are really watching them. Plus, you remember that mission? With the spiders?" Kakashi nodded. "Yeah, all of them were that guy's loved ones... I'm sure he'll appreciate seeing them all on his doorstep tonight."
Even as the vessel said this, both ninja heard screams in a familiar voice, and Naruto broke into a large, foxy grin.
End
Woop, the end. Totally pointless, I dont think it even had a moral lol. Superstitions, if you didnt catch them, were:
Owls eat souls.
Spiders are the souls of one's loved ones - bad luck to squish em.
Two cats fighting over a dead person are the Devil and an Angel fighting over the soul.
Bats were mentioned in the story a few times. They bring ghosts with them were they go.
Anyway, hope you liked it. If you didnt, oh well. Review if you want, don't if you don't lol.
Edit: Gah sorry, forgot to tell you it was a one shot, sorry sorry! Many more apologies for the person (people) who wanted updates. Sorry!