Betrothal
A Naruto fanfiction. By Lackey H
Chapter 13 - Words
"What!?" Sakura rose from her seat, slamming her hands flat upon the table between herself and Temari. "There's no way Naruto could perform a summoning! That's a jounin level jutsu!"
"Isn't the Kage Bunshin a jounin level jutsu as well?" Asked the, now slightly smug, brown-haired girl. "And Naruto can pull that off with ease, the same ease any jounin could possibly perform it with I expect." Her words caused Sakura to pause for a moment before slowly returning to her seat with a speculative look on her face.
"Well... I suppose that's true, he performed it at least as well as I've seen Kakashi-sensei perform it. Though I suppose Kakashi-sensei would have done better if he hadn't been injured and exhausted at the time." Sakura nodded at her words even as she did her best to ignore her inner-Sakura, who was quite happily pointing out that Naruto, too, had been injured and exhausted at that time on what was now called the Great Naruto Bridge.
"He's strong... As strong as, no, maybe even stronger than my brother." Whispered the ex-sand girl, "It's terrifying, that such abnormal powers can exist in this world, and people used to believed that advanced bloodlines were terrifying enough." Temari smirked slightly and leant back in her chair, tilting her head back so that she could stare at the ceiling. "Hey..."
Sakura, who had been thinking about Naruto and his almost miraculous ability to advance in skill and power, popped out of her thoughts and stared at her companion. "What?" She asked as Temari fell forwards until she was leaning on the table between them.
"Why is Naruto so strong anyway?" The girl with dyed hair asked, "Is it an advanced bloodline or something? I mean, there's no way any normal genin could be that strong... Well, except for Gaara, but then he has reasons for it." Yes. Reasons, very terrifying reasons no less. Reasons that, frankly, Temari didn't want to think about any more than she had to.
The pink haired genin-turned-teacher frowned at the question. "I have no idea." She stated, "If he was so strong, then we would have known about it – but he wasn't, he was a screw-up from the first day I met him an the academy. And now..." She trailed off as her eyes met Temari's and both girls gave each other a slight nod.
"... Now he's incredible." Finished the older of the two. She seemed ready to say something else, but a flicker of movement near the door to the small tea-house they were sitting in caught her attention. "Ah," She sighed, "I have to go, I have some training I want to get in before it starts to get dark."
At this, Sakura frowned again. Watching Temari stand up and stalk out of the building she could only wonder why she seemed to be spending almost all her free time training, what she was training in and, more to the point, who was actually training her.
Well, she'd probably find out sooner or later. Besides, it wasn't like she didn't have any training of her own to attend to. Of course, her training was... unusual, so it was probably vastly different to what Temari was up to. Either way, Sakura was beginning to get mixed feelings about the sand- nin girl. At first she had thought as bad of her as almost everyone else in the village did, that of course had begun to change during their time working together. Now Sakura was finding it hard to understand just why people didn't like Temari.
Oh, sure, she was a sand-nin still - but that was just a mere technicality really, until she married and donned the mark of the leaf, she would remain a sand-nin amongst leaf-nin. Once she married Naruto however...
Well, Sakura always did think that the leaf had too few female ninja, another one such as Temari would be most welcome.
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Naruto screamed various obscenities as he was dragged, quite painfully, over rooftop after rooftop. He had lost count of how many roofs he'd been dragged over some time ago but he was pretty sure that he had been over some roofs more than once or twice. Evidently Jiraiya, the person dragging him around in this most painful manner, was looking for something.
Naruto had already guessed what the open-pervert was looking for and, frankly, wasn't happy about it. It was bad enough when Jiraiya went off peeping alone – now the old pervert had decided to have some company on this trip, namely himself.
"A-ha!" Naruto winced as Jiraiya let lose with a loud laugh of excitement. "Jackpot!" Lifting his arm, he raised Naruto into what was more or less a standing position and let go. The poor boy, already tired and now battered a bruised to boot, collapsed forwards as his legs gave out on him. Jiraiya merely nodded in approval. "Now Naruto," he began, "I know you're enthusiastic about this, but control yourself. We don't want to be discovered after all."
"Who's enthusia-i-ai-ai..." Naruto's eyes threatened to pop out of their sockets as they took in the scene that this particular rooftop perch offered. Below them, and a little of to the side, a trio of young women were quite happily getting undressed ready for a dip in what looked like a small hot spring bath. The blonde boy gulped, his throat dry and his face burning. Admittedly the woman were still covered - barely - but just looking at them bought one particular memory of a certain sandy-blonde girl.
Jiraiya knelt down next to Naruto and peeked over the edge of the roof, grinning wildly. "Ahhh..." he sighed, "Just perfect, they're well built, have lovely hair and faces as radiant as -oof!" The old man doubled over slightly due to Naruto's elbow being rammed into his stomach. Granted, it didn't hurt simply because he was much to tough for that, but it had taken him by surprise as he had been fairly sure that Naruto would be so entranced that he wouldn't have been able to move if he had wanted to. After all, had not he himself been a raging ball of male hormones when he was Naruto's age?
Well. Actually the whole raging hormones thing had come a year later than that, but to him it seemed that Naruto had matured to that point a little early – possibly due to the presence of the kyuubi within him.
It was only at this point that Jiraiya noticed that Naruto's eyes were screwed shut. His face was covered with a bright red blush, so obviously he was thinking along the lines that Jiraiya expected he would be thinking but... well. Jiraiya wasn't too impressed with the fact that Naruto's eyes were closed. How, after all, was the boy supposed to learn to appreciate the female form if he kept his eyes shut all the time? It was just mind- boggling, after all, what teenage boy didn't want to stare at semi naked women?
"Boy," He began to say, "How do you expect to learn with your eyes closed? How do you expect to follow the graceful curves of a beautiful woman's body, how will you marvel at the way their hair falls across their skin, how will you..." Jiraiya frowned as he watched Naruto cover his ears with his hands. "I see." He murmured, "Well, we can do this the hard way if you want."
Reaching up behind the boy, Jiraiya extended two fingers and concentrated for a moment, grinning madly as two tiny orange symbols appears on his fingertips, both etched out in burning chakra.
"Double open eyed seal!" He muttered as he rammed his two fingers down against Naruto's backbone – the boy's eyes snapping open with an almost audible sound.
Naruto suddenly found himself staring down at three women who were, to be blunt, less than decently attired. Assuming that Jiraiya had just used some fancy pressure point blow to force his eyes open, the young genin tried to shut them once more – and promptly found that he couldn't.
"What..." he growled, "What did you do!" He yelled, rolling over onto his back and pulling his hands from his ears. Jiraiya merely nodded as Naruto tried, without much success, to close his eyes.
The open-pervert nodded, his eyes closed, and spoke in a low, lecturing, tone of voice. "A two part seal of my own design, one that makes it possible to keep one's eyes open for incredibly long periods of time – meaning that they won't miss a single thing that could slip past them if they were to blink!" He nodded and leaned forward, "It also means you won't be able to close your eyes for a while so..." The old man grinned a grin that chilled Naruto to the bone. "... Enjoy." He stated as he quite casually kicked Naruto off of the building.
"Damn yooooouuu open peerveeeert!" Naruto screamed as he fell, the air whipping past him and causing his eyes to sting since he just couldn't close them.
Back up atop the building, Jiraiya peered over the edge and frowned slightly as he noticed something he hadn't noticed before. "Damn," he muttered, "Best to get out of here before I get spotted..."
A quick glance down at the various beauties below, however, made his decision to leave waver.
And... was that woman going topless? No? Well even so, the two-piece she was wearing could easily have been mistaken for something else – cotton thread maybe.
Grinning to himself, the self proclaimed super pervert sat down and peered over the edge of the building. As he sat he made sure to be as quiet as he possibly could, so as not to attract attention to himself.
Fortunately the sound of Naruto screaming insults on his way down to meet the earth below should be perfect at drawing attention, thus allowing him to peep in relative safety.
Okay, so sure they'd beat Naruto senseless when he landed but hey, in perversion there are times sacrifices just have to be made.
Besides, better Naruto than himself after all.
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A ramen stand was not, exactly, the best place to hold a secretive meeting. Then again, in a village full of Ninja, Kunoichi and other Shinobi, very few places were good for holding secret meetings. Still, of the available locations this particular ramen stand was the best of what was a pretty pathetic selection. It wasn't too busy, but there were enough customers around to mask a quite conversation with their own sounds. At least, as long as no-one was specifically listening for that particular conversation anyway.
Fortunately there were only a handful of people in the entire village who would take an interest in such a conversation and the two people involved in said conversation had already made sure that those people didn't visit this particular place very often. At the present moment only one of the two conspirators was present, waiting for her companion. This particular day she had foregone her usual attire for a much more nondescript orange T- shirt and dark shorts. Grumbling to herself she idly poked at a bowl of shrimp ramen that she had ordered a short while ago.
"Ah... Yamanaka-san?" A soft voice pulled her out of the boredom she had been experiencing and caused her to turn and look at the speaker.
"Hinata!" She exclaimed, "You took your time, didn't you? And how many times do I have to tell you to just call me 'Ino', it is my name after all!" The Hyuuga girl merely bowed her head and whispered a quick, yet polite, apology - which caused Ino to slap one hand against her forehead in exasperation. "And don't keep apologizing either! You need to grow a little backbone right?" When Hinata nodded, Ino continued, "Then you have to stop backsliding like that - speak a little louder, don't apologize if you don't have to and, most of all, don't let anyone push you around. Right?"
The black-haired, white-eyed Genin blinked and nodded silently before sliding over and sitting on a stool next to Ino. "R-right." She agreed, "I'm so- no. No, I don't have to apologize do I?"
Her blonde companion smiled and nodded, "Ha! Maybe you are improving more than I thought after all." She ginned and placed one arm around Hinata's shoulders in order to pull the quiet girl a little closer. "So..." Ino glanced around to make sure no-one was listening in on them before she continued, "Did you... you know?" The white-eyed girl nodded at the question. Ino just grinned and pressed a little further. "All of them? Even the pigs?"
"Th-the dirtiest ones I could find yamana-... Ino." Came the reply, along with a slightly mischievous grin. "I even managed to find... well..." Hinata leaned nearer to Ino and whispered into her ear for a few moments. Suddenly Ino pulled away and stared at Hinata in shock.
"No way!" She exclaimed, causing more than a few patrons of the ramen stand to glance at her for a moment before turning back to their own food and conversations. "How did you even manage to find one of them!?"
"Not one, several of them." Hinata replied, causing Ino to pale somewhat. Admittedly the whole string of pranks had been Ino's idea originally - the plan being to maybe scare Temari away so that Hinata could swoop in and take Naruto for herself.
Well. Alright, Hinata wasn't exactly the sort of person who would 'swoop in' and take anything, but at least Naruto would be promptly unattached and therefore there would still be a chance for Hinata to catch him for herself.
But... this... This was possibly going a little further than Ino had expected.
No. That wasn't quite right.
It was, in fact, going quite a lot further than Ino had expected. Evidently, under that calm, shy and polite exterior, Hinata appeared to have one heck of a mean streak. Years of repressing her negative feelings were behind that no doubt.
"Are... are you sure that's even safe?" Ino mumbled, somewhat weakly. "I mean... farm animals are one thing but those... aren't they a little too much?"
Hinata grinned, a grin that made Ino slide away from the quiet girl. "No, not at all." She replied.
For the first time since she had begun to hang around with Hinata, Ino wondered if making the girl more independent was actually a good idea...
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Naruto snarled in annoyance and pushed chakra into both his hands and feet as quickly as he could as soon as he felt them tingle with power he reached out and smacked them against a windowsill that he had managed to get himself within reach of. There was a dull crack followed by a bass explosion as Naruto discovered first hand the effect of trying to grab hold of something when one's hands were filled with way too much chakra for the object to support. The effect was somewhat like when he had trained in running up trees in the wave country, and Sasuke had shattered part of a tree trunk by using too much chakra in his feet. The only difference being that Naruto had, in panic, used way more chakra and had also hit the object he was trying to stick to at far to high a speed.
As Naruto fell the last few floors towards the ground, he flung the two chunks of windowsill that he had snagged, moments before they promptly snapped off, to one side being careful to make sure that they would not hit anyone below.
A female scream alerted him to the fact that he had been spotted and, regardless of what he did to stop the fall, he would be seen and recognized. Since he was going to get in trouble anyway, the blonde genin rationalized that he may as well save himself some of the pain of landing by hitting the water instead of the concrete and rock flooring around it.
Thus it was that Tsunade was treated to the sight of an orange blur slamming into the hot spring pool next to the one she was in with enough force to send a plume of water up into the air, where it then soaked everyone around the pool. Her mind working quickly she glanced up to see a certain, familiar, white-haired man snigger in amusement at Naruto's predicament.
"Ah!" Tsunade's gaze snapped downwards as she heard the sound of someone gasping for air as they surface - Naruto most likely. She began to rise from the water, prepared to defend Naruto from what evidently was a situation that wasn't his fault. As soon as she saw who had surfaced, she paused and blinked in confusion.
"Gyaaaa..." In the middle of the pool a blonde haired girl floated, her legs and arms working hard to keep her from sinking under the weight of a waterlogged orange outfit. Naruto, with the sheer ingenuity of a super prankster, had managed to use his sexy no jutsu moments before the impact with the hot springs surface had forced the air from his, now her, lungs.
There was a series of splashes around the pool as more than a few girls hopped into the water to drag 'that poor young woman' away from the danger of imminent drowning. Up until that point Tsunade had been convinced that Naruto would be rumbled the moment the women attempted to drag 'her' to the side of the pool.
"O-ho." She whispered when what she had predicted failed to happen, "So he knows the advanced henge too? Well now, isn't he just full of surprises?" She grinned and sank a little deeper into the warm waters, not wanting the watching Jiraiya to notice her presence and flee.
Not that it really mattered if he did of course, as she could just beat him senseless when their little group continued on the last stretch of their journey back to the leaf village in the morning.
Smirking slightly she leant back, resting against a warm rock, and listened to what was going on just out of her sight.
"Oh you poor, poor thing!" Squealed one woman as she assisted another in pulling off Naruto's shirt and draping a soft towel across his - or rather her - shoulders. One or two women blushed slightly or muttered amongst themselves when they saw that Naruto was obviously bra-less.
"Just relax, perhaps you could tell us what happened?" One older woman, who had wandered off as Naruto was being pulled from the spring, asked as she returned with a small mug and a pot of steaming tea upon a plain tray. "Here, get some of this inside you, poor dear."
Naruto nodded in acceptance and lifted one shaking hand to accept the mug before eventually bringing it to her lips and sipping at the hot, almost scalding, drink it contained. Inside her head, however, her mind was racing for a plausible explanation as to... what... happened...
It was lucky that Naruto had an almost god-like poker face, otherwise his features would have been split by a grin that just promised vast amounts of mayhem. Instead of this, however, Naruto started to cry instead. "Th- there," She began, "There whu-whu-was a muh-mean man!"
The moment she said those words the women around her erupted into angry muttering. The older woman patted Naruto on the shoulder and urged her to continue with her explanation. Slowly Naruto stammered and sobbed her way though her explanation, claiming to have seen Jiraiya peeping then tripping off the edge of the roof after trying to confront him and his evil lecherous ways.
When she had finished her story, the collection of women all turned to glare up at the top of the building Naruto had fallen from. Unfortunately for him, Jiraiya had remained where he was to observed how Naruto would react to being dropped into a crowd of mostly naked women.
Needless to say, this meant that the aforementioned collection of women had just spotted him.
"Well," Spoke the old white haired man as he jumped from his peeping spot to the branches of a nearby tree then from there onto a different roof. "Crap" Below him the crowd of women surged out of the hot springs area, grabbing clothes and changing as the went through the changing rooms and finally chasing after the fleeing sennin as best the could. Whilst they weren't a serious danger to him, they would prove to be rather... tenacious in their pursuit.
Naruto, meanwhile, merely smirked as the horde chased after his teacher.
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Jump. Kick. Land.
Jump. Kick. Land.
Jump. Kick. Land.
Gods...
Jump. Kick. Land.
This repetition was really starting to get to her...
Jump. Kick. Land.
Why did these damn training sessions all have to be the same!?
Jump. Kick. Land.
This was all she had been doing for the past week now, jump kicks - one of the most basic aerial Taijutsu techniques there was!
Jump. Kick. Land.
And her she was, performing them again and again under the supervision of her trainer, like some child at school learning to write kanji like some kind of repeat-y thing.
Jump. Kick. Land.
Parrot. Yes, that was the word. Learning like a parrot, by just repeating the same thing over and over and over and...
Jump. Kick. Land.
Look at him! Just look at him! That smug look he wore as he watched her train!
Jump. Kick. Land.
Was he getting some kind of cheap entertainment out of this? Making her repeat basic moves hour upon hour upon hour?
Jump. Kick. Land.
"That was sloppy, bend your knee a bit more next time."
Jump. Correct. Kick. Land.
And now he was correcting her! The nerve!
Jump. Kick. Land.
Why was he being so damned picky about her technique? Her kicks were just fine, hell they were perfect! They had to be! Mostly because she was, after all, a full-fledged Genin level ninja, not some child learning the basics!
Jump. Kick. Land.
Oh she'd show him. Him and that smug look of his. She'd show him... oh yes, she's show him good.
Jump. Kick. Land.
On the next one, yes, the next one, she'd kick him rather than the training post. That'd wipe the smugness from his face for sure!
Jump. Spin. Kick.
His hand flashed up, catching her leg with ease on his right forearm. He winced at the blow but wasted no movement as he slipped his hand around to grab hold of her leg and tug. She felt herself stop dead in mid air for a less than a second before she was suddenly pulled towards him - just in time to receive a fierce elbow to the gut that smashed her into the floor hard enough to knock the air from her lungs.
Land. Gasp. Swear. Gasp. Curse. Gasp.
"Training," he said then, "Is over for today. Go home Sabakuno-san, and please don't try that again."
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"Naruto," Came a slightly amused feminine voice. "Whilst I have no doubts as to who is to blame for this, there were several much easier ways to get away without being identified."
The blonde boy, currently a girl covered only by a towel and holding a steaming mug of tea, froze in place. "O-Old lady Tsunade!"
"Who's the old lady?" Tsunade muttered to herself as she rose from the hot spring she had been hiding in, grabbing a towel and holding it out to preserve her modesty as she did so. "Anyway, turn around."
"Huh?" Naruto stared at Tsunade in confusion for a moment before comprehension settled into his mind. "Oh!" Quickly he spun around and, more than that, slapped his free hand over his eyes. "I'm sorry!" He yelled, "I wasn't loo-"A hand reached around and placed one finger against his lips, effectively quieting him almost instantly.
"I know, Naruto, I know." Tsunade laughed lightly as she withdrew her hand. "I saw how you were trying not to look at any girls other than those that were covered." There was a rustling sound for a few moments before Tsunade spoke again. "I must say, I'm surprised that someone your age is so... so... moralistic. Oh, you can turn around now."
"Mora- huh?" Naruto turned, snatching his shirt from where it sat on a nearby rock. Frowning at how wet it felt, the boy disguised as a girl began to wring some of the water from the thick cloth. "I don't get it." He grumbled, his face twisted up in a look of concentration as he squeezed out the water.
"I thought you might not," Murmured the older lady. "Which, I guess, is the whole problem."
"Problem!?" Naruto glared at Tsunade. "I don't have a problem!" The boy, turned girl, glared in the direction Jiraiya had fled. "Unlike some people."
Smiling, Tsunade placed one hand on Naruto's head. "Poor child," She murmured, "You really don't have a clue do you?" Also looking out over where Jiraiya had run off, the newly decided fifth hokage, the Godaime, sighed. "Naruto," She began, "What do you know about... well... That is to say... Now, you know when a man and a woman get together..."
The blonde haired genin stared at the woman in confusion. "Huh?"
"I see," Sighed the legendary medic, "That this could take some time."
"Man and woman... man and woman..." Naruto frowned, before suddenly pointing at Tsunade. "Ah!" He yelled, "You mean like dates and stuff?"
"Yes, that's right. Dating and romance." Answered the taller of the two, as the both walked into what turned out to be a small changing room at the edge of the fenced-off hot springs area. "Wait outside." She ordered, ushering Naruto through the room and out the outer exit.
About to begin changing, Tsunade paused in realization and slid across to the outer door. "And put your shirt on!" She hissed, nodding to herself when she heard the rustling of cloth on the other side of the door.
By the time she had finished dressing and left the changing rooms, Naruto had already released his transformation. The boy was, when Tsunade spotted him, hopping from one foot to another in an effort to keep warm - or maybe he was just playing some little game with himself to keep amused. Whatever the reason, he soon stopped and fell into place behind Tsunade as she stalked her way back towards the inn they were staying in for the night.
"So, Naruto..." She asked as they walked. "Apparently I have to explain something important to you."
Instantly the short genin perked up, his movements becoming bouncier while his face shone with an ear-to-ear grin. "What? What? Is it a secret? A new technique? I bet someone as old as y-"
Tsunade's knuckles bounced off of his head, leaving him to rub his now hurting crown. "I'm not old." She growled, crossing her arms under her rather ample bosom and scowling at the world around her.
"Ah..." Naruto rubbed at his head, thankful that it was so solid. "Sorry..." Ordinarily he wouldn't have apologized but, well, if Jiraiya was scared of her then it meant he himself had every right to be scared of what Tsunade would do if he annoyed her too much.
"A new technique?" Tsunade, despite her annoyance at being called old, couldn't help but smirk at what, to Naruto, seemed to be some sort of private joke. "Not really, but I suppose it could lead to some new techniques..." When Naruto cheered, she dropped her voice far below a whisper. "Not that they'd be anything like what you may be expecting of course..."
Eventually Naruto calmed down until he was merely bubbling with excitement, rather than exploding with it. This was, Tsunade decided, probably about as calm as the boy was going to get and, as such, the best time to carry on with her speech.
"What I have to tell you is, really, something that most boys, and often girls, get told when they're a little older than you are now. Then again, some are told earlier." The tall woman sighed, "You see Naruto, this is normally something their parents explain to them."
She winced when she saw the look that passed over Naruto's face and the way he barely missed his step and stumbled ever so slightly when his body stiffened. "... oh..." His voice was small, his bubbly expression and movement all gone now. Instead he slouched along, his feet dragging against the cobbled street floor. "... I see."
Tsunade watched as Naruto slouched along and resisted, barely, the urge to sweep him up into a hug. Instead she decided to press on with what she had to, somehow, try to explain. "Naruto, do you by any chance have..." She paused for a moment before continuing. "No, actually, I'll make it easier to answer. Naruto, is there a girl you like?"
The change in Naruto was almost instantaneous, and rather spectacular too. In less than the blink of an eye his face went red with embarrassment, his movements became nervous and fidgety and he kept glancing around him, almost as if he expected someone to jump out and yell 'surprise!'
"Ah, there is. Isn't there?" Pressed the older woman, "Care to tell?"
Naruto fidgeted, his fingers finding their way to the base of his jacket and beginning to just fiddle with the thick cloth - tugging at it, stretching it out, wrapping it around his hand - just... fidgeting really. "Uhm..." He mumbled, "Th-there's Sakura-chan..." Naruto bit his lower lip and looked around, as if trying to find an escape route.
"And the sand girl, Temako? Temami?" Tsunade knew who Temari was, but acting as if she didn't know her name made it seem as if she had only heard it in passing – rather than being informed in detail about it by Jiraiya a few days ago.
"Temari." Came the rather annoyed correction. "Her name is Temari."
"Oh? Is that it?" The legendary kunoichi asked, sounding particularly indifferent to the girl's name. "So what do you think of her then, this Temari?"
Naruto slowed his pace and, after a few steps, stopped walking altogether. "I..." He began, his voice cracking ever so slightly. "uhm..." Naruto gulped. "She's... pretty?" He offered, not exactly sure of what he was trying to say. "And... uhm... She's nice, and... ah..."
Noticing that Naruto was no longer following her, Tsunade halted and turned to look at the much younger boy. "I take it that you like her then? Maybe even you have a thing for her?" She asked, smirking slightly at the way Naruto stumbled over his words while trying to explain – without embarrassing himself – what he thought.
"... yes..." Naruto whispered, his voice sounding small and weak.
"Sooooo..." As the kunoichi drew out the 'o' sound, Naruto seemed to get progressively smaller – no doubt expecting an insult or a rebuttal for what he had just admitted. "Have you two been on a date yet?"
The blonde genin looked around, then made a few waving motions with his hands, indicating that he didn't want anyone to hear what he was going to say. Raising an eyebrow at his actions, the taller woman stepped over to him and leant down close so that he could speak much quieter and still be heard by her.
"No..." He whispered, "But... we... there was..." At that point he apparently changed his mind and went silent once more before speaking up again in a quiet voice. "Tsunade-oneesan..."
Almost at once Naruto felt himself being swept up into a hug of, to put it bluntly, freakish strength. "Oneesan!?" Tsunade practically giggled with delight that Naruto had just used a term that was usually reserved for older sisters, or women that one considered to be like an older sister. Since she was taller than the young Genin, the end result was that the poor boy was swung to and fro almost a foot above the ground. "Oh! I'm so happy that you see me as an older sister!" Naruto, however, had nothing much to say since his face was now buried between Tsunade's most 'visible' attributes. Fortunately for him, however, he felt the older woman's grip loosen enough for him to lean his head back enough to actually breathe.
Suddenly the poor boy felt the unforgiving touch of gravity about his person as Tsunade let go, leaving him to fall to the floor like a sack of potatoes. "What the he-"he began to yell, but was cut off as Tsunade hoisted him off the floor and happily deposited him, standing, back onto it.
Before he had a chance to yell again, the legendary kunoichi placed one finger against his lips. "You've never been on a date, have you?" She asked, "But you have done something. I can tell by the way that got all nervous like that." Smiling slightly, the well-endowed woman patted the smaller boy on the head. "A kiss was all I suspect, Jiraiya seemed to think you'd know about that much at least."
"Th-that much?" Naruto asked, his eyes wide and his legs feeling more than a little like jelly. Frankly he was beginning to get rather confused and being swung around like a rag doll a few moments ago hadn't exactly helped matters much either.
"Naruto, do you know what a man and a woman, or in your case a boy and a girl, do when they love each other?" At the question posed by Tsunade, Naruto scrunched up his face in confusion.
"They... go on dates?" He hazarded. When he saw Tsunade's face fall slightly, he guessed that perhaps this wasn't quite the right answer. Okay then, so what else did he know couples did with each other? Well, apart from the obvious... then again, maybe Tsunade was after the obvious answer? She was, after all, trying to find out what he knew about something so maybe that was what she wanted. Taking a slight breath, Naruto decided to have a second guess. "They... kiss?"
"Then what happens?" Tsunade pressed, "They date, they kiss, then what, what else do couples do?"
This time Naruto reacted in a way that hinted at a vague sort of understanding. "Ah!" He shouted, hopping up from where he sat. "I think I know this one!"
The legendary medic merely raised one eyebrow at this. "Oh? So what happens then? What happens after a date and a kiss?" She asked, hoping that Naruto's answer would indicate that he knew more than he had let on about the subject.
Naruto grinned. "A second date!"
Needless to say, when she heard Naruto's guess, Tsunade could think of no suitable reply other than to curse softly under her breath.
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Temari yawned and scowled. This wasn't exactly the easiest thing to do without looking rather daft, but frankly Temari couldn't care less. She was tired, her legs hurt from repeated kicks, her abdomen hurt from being elbowed and the rest of her hurt from being slammed into the ground so hard.
That aside, she had managed to prove her intellectual superiority over that incompetent Haruno girl! Gods, had she studied to be that... that... brainless or was it just something she had been born into?
Feh. It wasn't like it really mattered anyway. Eventually her brother Gaara would come to his senses and massacre the Sand village council. Then she'd be recalled out of this ludicrous arrangement and she'd never have to... to...
No. That was stupid thinking. Strong Gaara may be, but even he would have to bow to the sheer combined power of the entire Sand council. Besides, crazed killer he may have been, but he was also loyal like no other. No, there was no chance that she'd be recalled.
Not that she was entirely sure she wanted to be...
The village was, after all, a rather nice place really. She longed for the desert but, frankly, there was a lot to be said for being able to wake up without having to worry about the odd scorpion or desert-snake having made its way into one's bed overnight. It didn't happen often, but it was still something that did vaguely worry her. If she was going to die, she'd much rather die in combat than to die of poison after being stung or bitten whilst nearly naked in bed in the morning. At least here all she had to worry about were... insects.
Good gods, she'd only barely been able to keep her composure when she had discovered of the existence of the Aburame clan during the chuunin exams. After she'd retired to where her team had been staying, however, she had indulged herself in a good lengthy session of freaking out and throwing up. Hell, she hadn't been able to sleep properly for almost a week after returning to the Sand village, the mental images of Shino – insects crawling from under his skin – were enough to make her wake in a cold sweat from nightmares every single time she tried to sleep.
It was, perhaps, one of the few times that she felt as murderous as Gaara had been prior to the chuunin exam. Still, a few easy missions – body- guarding and bandit hunting mostly – had let her work off her anger in the simplest way she knew, by reducing weak opponents to large lumps of bloodied flesh.
Actually, that was something she really didn't like about the village – the lack of killing. Then again, it wasn't like they could trust her to go out on a mission without a jounin to keep an eye on her movements but still... a good days bandit-hunting would really be so damn stress-relieving right now!
Sighing to herself, Temari shook her head to clear it of the murderous thoughts that were dancing across her mind. Kneeling down she slipped her fingers into a special pocket secreted just inside her shoe – the left one, the one with the key in it, not the right one which held a small blade instead. Plucking the key from it's hiding place Temari rose and smoothly slotted it into the small lock that was all that prevented just anyone from getting into Naruto's home while he was away.
As the door swung open the first thing that hit her was the smell. Quite an unforgettable smell actually. A mix of straw and dung and... well... Animals.
Farm animals no less.
Wandering around on a floor which someone had covered with a layer of straw and, naturally, manure.
Evidently this was yet another prank pulled on her by the mystery person who'd pulled the previous ones – the swamp mud and the hair dye – only this time he or she had gone a little too far. Covering her with mud, replacing a bottle of shampoo with dye even as she bought it – those things were okay. Annoying, but they weren't altogether too bad.
Well. Okay, they were too bad, but when they were compared to this they were practically nothing. After all, in the previous two times the pranks had been directed at her, this time the pranker had gone as far as breaking into Naruto's, not her own, but Naruto's home and filling it with animals and dung. Animals that were, at present, happily making the mess even worse than it already had been.
Kicking a clucking chicken out of her way, and quite possibly killing it in the process, Temari swept through the building in order to find out just how bad things were. As she stepped into the kitchen area she had only a screeching squeal of anger to warn her before what appeared to be a wild boar attempted to drive it's tusks into her body. With a reaction speed bought about by a combination of both anger and fear for her life, since such an animal could kill a person with ease, Temari hopped into the air and placed one hand on the charging brute's back in order to vault herself over it.
As she vaulted she turned in mid air to face the back of the, now slightly confused, animal and whipped one arm out – launching a kunai into the back of the beasts skull. The dull crunching sound told her that the weapon had pierced it's skull and that, if not dead already, it would be dead in a moment or two. Landing lightly, Temari grimaced at the corpse of the boar.
"Well," She murmured, "At least we can eat it."
A scrabbling sound from behind caused her to turn and stare at what appeared to be another wild pig, this one a sow and thus less likely to try to kill her. Ignoring it, Temari slipped out of the kitchen and poked her head into one of the other downstairs rooms. Since nothing attacked her the moment she did so, she slipped inside and shut the door behind her. It would not, after all, do to let potential food escape the house before she killed it. The sound of deep breathing filled the room, mostly due to the sleeping ox that sat upon an old rug in the center of the room.
Nodding to herself, the sand genin slipped out of the room – again making sure she shut the door – and headed upstairs. The ox had made a mess and the wild boar had attacked her. Both of these, Temari assumed, were really to annoy her – not to actually harm her, what would be likely to harm her would be what, if anything, the person responsible could have placed in her room.
For Temari had already noticed that, apart from a bit of straw and mud, no real damage had been done to the rooms that contained Naruto's belongings. This obviously meant that whoever had done it was willing to go as far as damaging the house, but didn't want to damage anything Naruto placed any value on.
In fact... now that she thought about it... These pranks only really started when word of Naruto's engagement to her had leaked out, hadn't they? Given this fact, could it be possible that the perpetrator wasn't against herself personally, but against the fact that she was engaged to Naruto?
Was someone, perhaps, trying to make her leave in order to render the engagement voided? Possibly so that they could have Naruto to themselves?
Pushing her theorizing aside, Temari approached the door to her room and stopped dead. Growing up as all sand-nin did, paranoid, had taught her more than a few useful things. For a start it taught her to always make sure she could tell if anyone had intruded into her private places, her room for example. Today such paranoia paid off as, in the bottom corner of her door, she had affixed a single one of her hairs so that it bridged the gap between the door and the doorframe. Looking closely it was obvious that the hair had been snapped in two, proof that someone had opened the door without realizing that this particular little trick had been in use.
So, then, someone had been in her room. Obviously it must have been the same person who had broken into and bought animals into the rest of the house. This, of course, left just one nasty little thought in Temari's mind.
What, exactly, had this intruder done in her room?
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"Oh." Naruto sat next to Tsunade on the edge of a simple little bed of the kind found in every room in this particular inn. The expression on his face was a mix of interest and the sort of look usually found on small stunned rabbits. "So... babies come from mommies?" He asked, his voice sounding like that of a little child's.
"Well," Murmured Shizune, who had been hanging around in a small café next to the inn and, when she had seen Tsunade and Naruto returning, had decided to tag along with them into the inn and up to their rooms. "Where else did you think they would come from Naruto-kun?"
The genin frowned, "Ah..." he began, "I always thought they were found inside watermelons or something."
The room went silent as one medical-nin and one medical legend both stared at Naruto as if he were from a different world. Finally, in an almost dreamlike voice – bought about by the way her train of thought had hit the wall known as Naruto – Tsunade asked a question she would dread asking for years to come. "Why... why do you think that?"
"It's obvious!" Naruto half-yelled, "Mommies can't possibly grow that fat so quickly! So they must be keeping the watermelon under their clothes to keep it warm!"
Tsunade's eye twitched slightly for a moment before, suddenly, she fell backwards onto the bed, her legs kicking up into the air, laughing like a hyena. "Ahaha! That's brilliant!" She exclaimed, in between fits of laughing and giggling. Opposite her, Shizune also allowed herself a small smirk as she reached down to grab one of the jackets Tsunade had damaged in her fight with Orochimaru a few days before.
"Trust us Naruto-kun," She whispered whilst she started work on sewing up some of the rips and tears in the jacket. "Babies come from mothers, not from watermelons."
"Aha!" Naruto jumped to his feet and pointed at Shizune. "If babies come from mommies, then how come they get so fat! No-one grows that fat that quickly! They have to be hiding something under their clothes!" Then he paused and raised scratched his chin with the hand he had used to point at Shizune with. "Or maybe they lay eggs, like chickens, and then they keep the eggs under their clothes... That could work..."
Giggling softly, the legendary medic reached up with one arm, grabbed Naruto by the base of his shirt and tugged him back down onto the bed. Taking a deep breath in order to, hopefully, calm her giggling, Tsunade pulled herself back into a sitting position and wrapped an arm around Naruto's shoulders.
"Babies grow inside their mothers, that's why they get 'fat'. It's because the growing baby takes up a lot of space inside the mothers abdomen." She smiled and placed a finger to the younger boys lips. "Before you say it, the babies get there after a girl and a guy who love each other go into their bedroom together."
Using both hands, Naruto could only barely move Tsunade's arm far enough away to prevent her finger from covering his lips. "What... what happens after they go into their bedroom?" Naruto asked, glaring at the busty woman.
"Ah..." Shizune lifted her head from her sewing and laughed nervously. "I... think that's something you'll find out when you get there, right Tsunade- sama?"
"Hah! A little fumbling around is probably the best way to learn." Tsunade grinned at Naruto. "Just remember, she'll probably know more about it than you do, so listen to what she say, okay?"
Naruto opened his mouth to answer, but was cut off as the window to the room slammed open and a rather irritated white-haired figure slid inside. The boy glared at the figure for a moment, before deciding that it couldn't hurt much to take the opportunity to insult the man. "Oi! Pervert-sennin! Were those girls too much for you?"
Jiraiya's head whipped around to glare at the boy. "That," he growled, "Wasn't playing fair."
"Pff, and since when did you ever play fair Jiraiya? As I understand it, you pushed him into the spring to begin with." Tsunade snorted in annoyance as she glared at her once team-mate. "You deserve every bruise you got from those girls,"
"Hah!" The self proclaimed 'super pervert' laughed a short, almost mocking, laugh. "Do you really think I even let them get near enough to hit me? I am the legendary toad sennin you know!"
"I know," whispered the blonde woman. "Which gives me so much more satisfaction when I do this." As she spoke, she happily poked Jiraiya in the side - almost immediately the man collapsed upon the floor, twitching ever so often. "You're not the only legendary ninja Jiraiya, someday you and your ego may even remember that."
Staring at the twitching pile that was Jiraiya, Naruto frowned in thought. It was pretty obvious that Tsunade had used some incredible technique to disable him but... well, that wasn't what he was thinking about.
"You know," He began at last, "Like that, he can't keep running away from that crowd of woman, can he?"
Jiraiya blinked. Then his eyes widened as he realized just what, exactly, Naruto was suggesting. "Aheh, well, there's no need to go that far... right?" he mumbled, his face resting against the carpeted floor.
"Actually," Murmured Tsunade, "I think there is." She finished as she stood up and lifted Jiraiya into the air with one hand. "Happy landings?"
With that, she took a step towards the window turned slightly and launched the legendary sennin out into the evening sky. "We'll see you tomorrow!" Yelled Naruto, as he watched his sometimes-sensei's landing attract the crowd of women who had been chasing him earlier.
"Tsunade-sama?" Shizune spoke up after a while, "I really think you should shut the window, so his screams of pain don't keep us awake all night."
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Slipping a kunai out of on of the many hiding places about her person, Temari carefully reached out to the door to her room with her free hand. Slowly she began to open the door, stopping once it had been opened just enough for her too peek into the room. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, she pushed the door open a little more, giving herself a slightly wider angle of vision.
Still there was nothing odd in the room. How... strange.
Snarling to herself Temari slammed the door open the rest of the way and threw herself to one side as a small yellow and orange blur came shooting out of the room. The moment she landed on the floor she rolled to one side, just in time to see the yellow and orange animal – one that appeared to be some kind of really angry wildcat – land claws first where her head had just been. Slamming one hand on the ground, Temari pivoted herself on it and spun around, swinging her legs out in a sweeping kick that barely clipped the animal in the side.
The cat, now angered due to the pain from the kick, hissed furiously and pounced, claws first. There was a wet slicing sound and a squeal of feline pain as Temari rolled to bring her other hand, with the kunai it held, up into the flight path of the feline. Even as the animal died, her kunai in it's belly, it's fore and hind claws scrabbled around furiously, scratching and tearing small chunks of flesh from the arm that held it aloft. Grimacing in pain, Temari refused to let the furious beast down, knowing that should she do so it still had more than enough life left in it to make a pretty good attempt at attacking her neck. Admittedly it was dying but, well, it had been a while since Temari had seriously watched anything die.
She had been only six or seven the first time, when she had watched as her father, the Kazekage, executed a traitor in full view of everyone. Though she hadn't much liked it at the time, she slowly grew somewhat desensitized as she watched her father perform execution after execution. Being the daughter of the Kazekage and, at the time, a potential heir, she had been pretty much forced to watch them by a mix of tradition and orders from her father.
A few years later she was ten, her youngest brother – Gaara – had just turned seven when the three children of the Kazekage – herself, Gaara and her other brother Kankuro – were sent on a mission.
She'd never forget that mission, ever. Since, after all, that had been when she had killed someone for the first time.
He had been some pathetic bandit, a mere inconvenience to any ninja, even one as young as herself. She had watched, then, as the man died from a kunai she had embedded in his neck – even after he had pleaded for mercy. Mercy that was, after all, something a Sand-nin was not expected to give.
The way his breathing had become all damp, like he was drowning. Which, in fact he was, drowning in his own blood at least.
The tiny glimmer of life in his eyes that slowly faded even as she watched.
Temari had killed for the first time then.
And, frankly, she found it to be quite enjoyable.
The wet feeling of blood running down her arm bought the, currently brown- haired, genin back from the dreamlike memories she had been thinking about. The wildcat, now dead, hung limply over her arm and it was it's blood, still oozing from where her kunai had impaled it, that was running down her arm. Silently she berated herself for missing her favorite part, watching the spark of life fade away from the eyes of her victim. It was then that, albeit somewhat dimly, she realized that she'd have to clean up all the mess that filled the house, as well as get rid of the few rather more tame animals that were still around.
Ah. Sod it all. She could clean up tomorrow, after she'd washed up and had a good nights sleep.
Then, once the house was clean again, she'd have to deal with the real issue at hand. Namely, finding out who was responsible and kicking their teeth in.
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Naruto bounced happily as he peered through Jiraiya's telescope at the familiar gate in the far distance. It would be about a day or two of walking before they'd be standing at the bottom of those giant wooden doors.
Currently, the four of them, Naruto, Jiraiya, Tsunade and Shizune, were passing through a small trading town that sat atop a cliff they were going to be walking down for the most of the afternoon. Surprisingly they had made good time – after Tsunade had healed the multiple bruises Jiraiya had picked up the night before – and had actually arrived at the trading town earlier than they had planned.
Given this, Jiraiya and Tsunade had wandered off to find a bar – or a small gambling place – whilst leaving Naruto and Shizune to their own devices. Naruto, his froggy wallet filled to bursting once more, peered into dusty shop windows and grimly searched through the contents of various market stalls.
"Ah, Naruto-kun?" Asked Shizune, as they passed what was the seventh stall Naruto had searched thus far. "What, exactly, are you looking for?"
"Mmph." The genin didn't reply, but instead dug around in a pile of what appeared to be large wood and metal blocks. "'s not one here either." He muttered, leaving that particular stall and moving onto the next in line. A few minutes rummaging around in this new pile of stuff produced much the same results as all the previous stalls had produced – or, in other words, nothing that he was after.
"Naruto-kun, please tell me what you're looking for?" Suggested Shizune as she placed one hand on the boy's shoulder. "Then maybe I can help."
Turning to face the older woman, Naruto seemed like he was going to reply to her when he suddenly stopped dead mid turn. Without a word the young genin practically vanished due to the speed at which he dashed off in the direction of what he had seen. Shizune followed, at a much more leisurely pace and caught up with the boy just as he handed his wallet over to a bearded old craftsman in exchange for a large bundle of... Well, Shizune wasn't sure what it was exactly, but it looked particularly heavy and was wrapped in a thick paper covering. Carrying the package over one shoulder Naruto grinned happily and looked at Shizune.
"Oi! Oi!" he exclaimed, "Where'd Ero-sennin and old lady Tsunade go?"
Shizune frowned. "Jiraiya-san and Tsunade-sama are... uh... entertaining themselves."
The blonde genin nodded. "They went to get drunk, huh?"
"Ah..." The taller woman blushed ever so slightly in embarrassment. "I think they probably did, Naruto-kun." Glancing at Naruto's package, she frowned slightly. "So, are you going to tell me what you spent so much money on?"
Naruto smiled. "It's a present." He stated, "A present, for someone I like."
He grinned, his face lighting up like a one million watt bulb. "Okay?"
Chapter 13 – ended.
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WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAAAAAAAAAAA!
Good gods. Almost two months to do this. Now, I just hope you think it was worth the wait ^-^
So... next time in 'Betrothal' !
Naruto returns to the village! Stuff happens! ... uhh... more stuff happens!
. and... ah... Sakura will get one heck of a surprise!
Now, lemme sleep x.x
- Lackey H, needing sleep after this.
A Naruto fanfiction. By Lackey H
Chapter 13 - Words
"What!?" Sakura rose from her seat, slamming her hands flat upon the table between herself and Temari. "There's no way Naruto could perform a summoning! That's a jounin level jutsu!"
"Isn't the Kage Bunshin a jounin level jutsu as well?" Asked the, now slightly smug, brown-haired girl. "And Naruto can pull that off with ease, the same ease any jounin could possibly perform it with I expect." Her words caused Sakura to pause for a moment before slowly returning to her seat with a speculative look on her face.
"Well... I suppose that's true, he performed it at least as well as I've seen Kakashi-sensei perform it. Though I suppose Kakashi-sensei would have done better if he hadn't been injured and exhausted at the time." Sakura nodded at her words even as she did her best to ignore her inner-Sakura, who was quite happily pointing out that Naruto, too, had been injured and exhausted at that time on what was now called the Great Naruto Bridge.
"He's strong... As strong as, no, maybe even stronger than my brother." Whispered the ex-sand girl, "It's terrifying, that such abnormal powers can exist in this world, and people used to believed that advanced bloodlines were terrifying enough." Temari smirked slightly and leant back in her chair, tilting her head back so that she could stare at the ceiling. "Hey..."
Sakura, who had been thinking about Naruto and his almost miraculous ability to advance in skill and power, popped out of her thoughts and stared at her companion. "What?" She asked as Temari fell forwards until she was leaning on the table between them.
"Why is Naruto so strong anyway?" The girl with dyed hair asked, "Is it an advanced bloodline or something? I mean, there's no way any normal genin could be that strong... Well, except for Gaara, but then he has reasons for it." Yes. Reasons, very terrifying reasons no less. Reasons that, frankly, Temari didn't want to think about any more than she had to.
The pink haired genin-turned-teacher frowned at the question. "I have no idea." She stated, "If he was so strong, then we would have known about it – but he wasn't, he was a screw-up from the first day I met him an the academy. And now..." She trailed off as her eyes met Temari's and both girls gave each other a slight nod.
"... Now he's incredible." Finished the older of the two. She seemed ready to say something else, but a flicker of movement near the door to the small tea-house they were sitting in caught her attention. "Ah," She sighed, "I have to go, I have some training I want to get in before it starts to get dark."
At this, Sakura frowned again. Watching Temari stand up and stalk out of the building she could only wonder why she seemed to be spending almost all her free time training, what she was training in and, more to the point, who was actually training her.
Well, she'd probably find out sooner or later. Besides, it wasn't like she didn't have any training of her own to attend to. Of course, her training was... unusual, so it was probably vastly different to what Temari was up to. Either way, Sakura was beginning to get mixed feelings about the sand- nin girl. At first she had thought as bad of her as almost everyone else in the village did, that of course had begun to change during their time working together. Now Sakura was finding it hard to understand just why people didn't like Temari.
Oh, sure, she was a sand-nin still - but that was just a mere technicality really, until she married and donned the mark of the leaf, she would remain a sand-nin amongst leaf-nin. Once she married Naruto however...
Well, Sakura always did think that the leaf had too few female ninja, another one such as Temari would be most welcome.
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Naruto screamed various obscenities as he was dragged, quite painfully, over rooftop after rooftop. He had lost count of how many roofs he'd been dragged over some time ago but he was pretty sure that he had been over some roofs more than once or twice. Evidently Jiraiya, the person dragging him around in this most painful manner, was looking for something.
Naruto had already guessed what the open-pervert was looking for and, frankly, wasn't happy about it. It was bad enough when Jiraiya went off peeping alone – now the old pervert had decided to have some company on this trip, namely himself.
"A-ha!" Naruto winced as Jiraiya let lose with a loud laugh of excitement. "Jackpot!" Lifting his arm, he raised Naruto into what was more or less a standing position and let go. The poor boy, already tired and now battered a bruised to boot, collapsed forwards as his legs gave out on him. Jiraiya merely nodded in approval. "Now Naruto," he began, "I know you're enthusiastic about this, but control yourself. We don't want to be discovered after all."
"Who's enthusia-i-ai-ai..." Naruto's eyes threatened to pop out of their sockets as they took in the scene that this particular rooftop perch offered. Below them, and a little of to the side, a trio of young women were quite happily getting undressed ready for a dip in what looked like a small hot spring bath. The blonde boy gulped, his throat dry and his face burning. Admittedly the woman were still covered - barely - but just looking at them bought one particular memory of a certain sandy-blonde girl.
Jiraiya knelt down next to Naruto and peeked over the edge of the roof, grinning wildly. "Ahhh..." he sighed, "Just perfect, they're well built, have lovely hair and faces as radiant as -oof!" The old man doubled over slightly due to Naruto's elbow being rammed into his stomach. Granted, it didn't hurt simply because he was much to tough for that, but it had taken him by surprise as he had been fairly sure that Naruto would be so entranced that he wouldn't have been able to move if he had wanted to. After all, had not he himself been a raging ball of male hormones when he was Naruto's age?
Well. Actually the whole raging hormones thing had come a year later than that, but to him it seemed that Naruto had matured to that point a little early – possibly due to the presence of the kyuubi within him.
It was only at this point that Jiraiya noticed that Naruto's eyes were screwed shut. His face was covered with a bright red blush, so obviously he was thinking along the lines that Jiraiya expected he would be thinking but... well. Jiraiya wasn't too impressed with the fact that Naruto's eyes were closed. How, after all, was the boy supposed to learn to appreciate the female form if he kept his eyes shut all the time? It was just mind- boggling, after all, what teenage boy didn't want to stare at semi naked women?
"Boy," He began to say, "How do you expect to learn with your eyes closed? How do you expect to follow the graceful curves of a beautiful woman's body, how will you marvel at the way their hair falls across their skin, how will you..." Jiraiya frowned as he watched Naruto cover his ears with his hands. "I see." He murmured, "Well, we can do this the hard way if you want."
Reaching up behind the boy, Jiraiya extended two fingers and concentrated for a moment, grinning madly as two tiny orange symbols appears on his fingertips, both etched out in burning chakra.
"Double open eyed seal!" He muttered as he rammed his two fingers down against Naruto's backbone – the boy's eyes snapping open with an almost audible sound.
Naruto suddenly found himself staring down at three women who were, to be blunt, less than decently attired. Assuming that Jiraiya had just used some fancy pressure point blow to force his eyes open, the young genin tried to shut them once more – and promptly found that he couldn't.
"What..." he growled, "What did you do!" He yelled, rolling over onto his back and pulling his hands from his ears. Jiraiya merely nodded as Naruto tried, without much success, to close his eyes.
The open-pervert nodded, his eyes closed, and spoke in a low, lecturing, tone of voice. "A two part seal of my own design, one that makes it possible to keep one's eyes open for incredibly long periods of time – meaning that they won't miss a single thing that could slip past them if they were to blink!" He nodded and leaned forward, "It also means you won't be able to close your eyes for a while so..." The old man grinned a grin that chilled Naruto to the bone. "... Enjoy." He stated as he quite casually kicked Naruto off of the building.
"Damn yooooouuu open peerveeeert!" Naruto screamed as he fell, the air whipping past him and causing his eyes to sting since he just couldn't close them.
Back up atop the building, Jiraiya peered over the edge and frowned slightly as he noticed something he hadn't noticed before. "Damn," he muttered, "Best to get out of here before I get spotted..."
A quick glance down at the various beauties below, however, made his decision to leave waver.
And... was that woman going topless? No? Well even so, the two-piece she was wearing could easily have been mistaken for something else – cotton thread maybe.
Grinning to himself, the self proclaimed super pervert sat down and peered over the edge of the building. As he sat he made sure to be as quiet as he possibly could, so as not to attract attention to himself.
Fortunately the sound of Naruto screaming insults on his way down to meet the earth below should be perfect at drawing attention, thus allowing him to peep in relative safety.
Okay, so sure they'd beat Naruto senseless when he landed but hey, in perversion there are times sacrifices just have to be made.
Besides, better Naruto than himself after all.
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A ramen stand was not, exactly, the best place to hold a secretive meeting. Then again, in a village full of Ninja, Kunoichi and other Shinobi, very few places were good for holding secret meetings. Still, of the available locations this particular ramen stand was the best of what was a pretty pathetic selection. It wasn't too busy, but there were enough customers around to mask a quite conversation with their own sounds. At least, as long as no-one was specifically listening for that particular conversation anyway.
Fortunately there were only a handful of people in the entire village who would take an interest in such a conversation and the two people involved in said conversation had already made sure that those people didn't visit this particular place very often. At the present moment only one of the two conspirators was present, waiting for her companion. This particular day she had foregone her usual attire for a much more nondescript orange T- shirt and dark shorts. Grumbling to herself she idly poked at a bowl of shrimp ramen that she had ordered a short while ago.
"Ah... Yamanaka-san?" A soft voice pulled her out of the boredom she had been experiencing and caused her to turn and look at the speaker.
"Hinata!" She exclaimed, "You took your time, didn't you? And how many times do I have to tell you to just call me 'Ino', it is my name after all!" The Hyuuga girl merely bowed her head and whispered a quick, yet polite, apology - which caused Ino to slap one hand against her forehead in exasperation. "And don't keep apologizing either! You need to grow a little backbone right?" When Hinata nodded, Ino continued, "Then you have to stop backsliding like that - speak a little louder, don't apologize if you don't have to and, most of all, don't let anyone push you around. Right?"
The black-haired, white-eyed Genin blinked and nodded silently before sliding over and sitting on a stool next to Ino. "R-right." She agreed, "I'm so- no. No, I don't have to apologize do I?"
Her blonde companion smiled and nodded, "Ha! Maybe you are improving more than I thought after all." She ginned and placed one arm around Hinata's shoulders in order to pull the quiet girl a little closer. "So..." Ino glanced around to make sure no-one was listening in on them before she continued, "Did you... you know?" The white-eyed girl nodded at the question. Ino just grinned and pressed a little further. "All of them? Even the pigs?"
"Th-the dirtiest ones I could find yamana-... Ino." Came the reply, along with a slightly mischievous grin. "I even managed to find... well..." Hinata leaned nearer to Ino and whispered into her ear for a few moments. Suddenly Ino pulled away and stared at Hinata in shock.
"No way!" She exclaimed, causing more than a few patrons of the ramen stand to glance at her for a moment before turning back to their own food and conversations. "How did you even manage to find one of them!?"
"Not one, several of them." Hinata replied, causing Ino to pale somewhat. Admittedly the whole string of pranks had been Ino's idea originally - the plan being to maybe scare Temari away so that Hinata could swoop in and take Naruto for herself.
Well. Alright, Hinata wasn't exactly the sort of person who would 'swoop in' and take anything, but at least Naruto would be promptly unattached and therefore there would still be a chance for Hinata to catch him for herself.
But... this... This was possibly going a little further than Ino had expected.
No. That wasn't quite right.
It was, in fact, going quite a lot further than Ino had expected. Evidently, under that calm, shy and polite exterior, Hinata appeared to have one heck of a mean streak. Years of repressing her negative feelings were behind that no doubt.
"Are... are you sure that's even safe?" Ino mumbled, somewhat weakly. "I mean... farm animals are one thing but those... aren't they a little too much?"
Hinata grinned, a grin that made Ino slide away from the quiet girl. "No, not at all." She replied.
For the first time since she had begun to hang around with Hinata, Ino wondered if making the girl more independent was actually a good idea...
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Naruto snarled in annoyance and pushed chakra into both his hands and feet as quickly as he could as soon as he felt them tingle with power he reached out and smacked them against a windowsill that he had managed to get himself within reach of. There was a dull crack followed by a bass explosion as Naruto discovered first hand the effect of trying to grab hold of something when one's hands were filled with way too much chakra for the object to support. The effect was somewhat like when he had trained in running up trees in the wave country, and Sasuke had shattered part of a tree trunk by using too much chakra in his feet. The only difference being that Naruto had, in panic, used way more chakra and had also hit the object he was trying to stick to at far to high a speed.
As Naruto fell the last few floors towards the ground, he flung the two chunks of windowsill that he had snagged, moments before they promptly snapped off, to one side being careful to make sure that they would not hit anyone below.
A female scream alerted him to the fact that he had been spotted and, regardless of what he did to stop the fall, he would be seen and recognized. Since he was going to get in trouble anyway, the blonde genin rationalized that he may as well save himself some of the pain of landing by hitting the water instead of the concrete and rock flooring around it.
Thus it was that Tsunade was treated to the sight of an orange blur slamming into the hot spring pool next to the one she was in with enough force to send a plume of water up into the air, where it then soaked everyone around the pool. Her mind working quickly she glanced up to see a certain, familiar, white-haired man snigger in amusement at Naruto's predicament.
"Ah!" Tsunade's gaze snapped downwards as she heard the sound of someone gasping for air as they surface - Naruto most likely. She began to rise from the water, prepared to defend Naruto from what evidently was a situation that wasn't his fault. As soon as she saw who had surfaced, she paused and blinked in confusion.
"Gyaaaa..." In the middle of the pool a blonde haired girl floated, her legs and arms working hard to keep her from sinking under the weight of a waterlogged orange outfit. Naruto, with the sheer ingenuity of a super prankster, had managed to use his sexy no jutsu moments before the impact with the hot springs surface had forced the air from his, now her, lungs.
There was a series of splashes around the pool as more than a few girls hopped into the water to drag 'that poor young woman' away from the danger of imminent drowning. Up until that point Tsunade had been convinced that Naruto would be rumbled the moment the women attempted to drag 'her' to the side of the pool.
"O-ho." She whispered when what she had predicted failed to happen, "So he knows the advanced henge too? Well now, isn't he just full of surprises?" She grinned and sank a little deeper into the warm waters, not wanting the watching Jiraiya to notice her presence and flee.
Not that it really mattered if he did of course, as she could just beat him senseless when their little group continued on the last stretch of their journey back to the leaf village in the morning.
Smirking slightly she leant back, resting against a warm rock, and listened to what was going on just out of her sight.
"Oh you poor, poor thing!" Squealed one woman as she assisted another in pulling off Naruto's shirt and draping a soft towel across his - or rather her - shoulders. One or two women blushed slightly or muttered amongst themselves when they saw that Naruto was obviously bra-less.
"Just relax, perhaps you could tell us what happened?" One older woman, who had wandered off as Naruto was being pulled from the spring, asked as she returned with a small mug and a pot of steaming tea upon a plain tray. "Here, get some of this inside you, poor dear."
Naruto nodded in acceptance and lifted one shaking hand to accept the mug before eventually bringing it to her lips and sipping at the hot, almost scalding, drink it contained. Inside her head, however, her mind was racing for a plausible explanation as to... what... happened...
It was lucky that Naruto had an almost god-like poker face, otherwise his features would have been split by a grin that just promised vast amounts of mayhem. Instead of this, however, Naruto started to cry instead. "Th- there," She began, "There whu-whu-was a muh-mean man!"
The moment she said those words the women around her erupted into angry muttering. The older woman patted Naruto on the shoulder and urged her to continue with her explanation. Slowly Naruto stammered and sobbed her way though her explanation, claiming to have seen Jiraiya peeping then tripping off the edge of the roof after trying to confront him and his evil lecherous ways.
When she had finished her story, the collection of women all turned to glare up at the top of the building Naruto had fallen from. Unfortunately for him, Jiraiya had remained where he was to observed how Naruto would react to being dropped into a crowd of mostly naked women.
Needless to say, this meant that the aforementioned collection of women had just spotted him.
"Well," Spoke the old white haired man as he jumped from his peeping spot to the branches of a nearby tree then from there onto a different roof. "Crap" Below him the crowd of women surged out of the hot springs area, grabbing clothes and changing as the went through the changing rooms and finally chasing after the fleeing sennin as best the could. Whilst they weren't a serious danger to him, they would prove to be rather... tenacious in their pursuit.
Naruto, meanwhile, merely smirked as the horde chased after his teacher.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Jump. Kick. Land.
Jump. Kick. Land.
Jump. Kick. Land.
Gods...
Jump. Kick. Land.
This repetition was really starting to get to her...
Jump. Kick. Land.
Why did these damn training sessions all have to be the same!?
Jump. Kick. Land.
This was all she had been doing for the past week now, jump kicks - one of the most basic aerial Taijutsu techniques there was!
Jump. Kick. Land.
And her she was, performing them again and again under the supervision of her trainer, like some child at school learning to write kanji like some kind of repeat-y thing.
Jump. Kick. Land.
Parrot. Yes, that was the word. Learning like a parrot, by just repeating the same thing over and over and over and...
Jump. Kick. Land.
Look at him! Just look at him! That smug look he wore as he watched her train!
Jump. Kick. Land.
Was he getting some kind of cheap entertainment out of this? Making her repeat basic moves hour upon hour upon hour?
Jump. Kick. Land.
"That was sloppy, bend your knee a bit more next time."
Jump. Correct. Kick. Land.
And now he was correcting her! The nerve!
Jump. Kick. Land.
Why was he being so damned picky about her technique? Her kicks were just fine, hell they were perfect! They had to be! Mostly because she was, after all, a full-fledged Genin level ninja, not some child learning the basics!
Jump. Kick. Land.
Oh she'd show him. Him and that smug look of his. She'd show him... oh yes, she's show him good.
Jump. Kick. Land.
On the next one, yes, the next one, she'd kick him rather than the training post. That'd wipe the smugness from his face for sure!
Jump. Spin. Kick.
His hand flashed up, catching her leg with ease on his right forearm. He winced at the blow but wasted no movement as he slipped his hand around to grab hold of her leg and tug. She felt herself stop dead in mid air for a less than a second before she was suddenly pulled towards him - just in time to receive a fierce elbow to the gut that smashed her into the floor hard enough to knock the air from her lungs.
Land. Gasp. Swear. Gasp. Curse. Gasp.
"Training," he said then, "Is over for today. Go home Sabakuno-san, and please don't try that again."
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Naruto," Came a slightly amused feminine voice. "Whilst I have no doubts as to who is to blame for this, there were several much easier ways to get away without being identified."
The blonde boy, currently a girl covered only by a towel and holding a steaming mug of tea, froze in place. "O-Old lady Tsunade!"
"Who's the old lady?" Tsunade muttered to herself as she rose from the hot spring she had been hiding in, grabbing a towel and holding it out to preserve her modesty as she did so. "Anyway, turn around."
"Huh?" Naruto stared at Tsunade in confusion for a moment before comprehension settled into his mind. "Oh!" Quickly he spun around and, more than that, slapped his free hand over his eyes. "I'm sorry!" He yelled, "I wasn't loo-"A hand reached around and placed one finger against his lips, effectively quieting him almost instantly.
"I know, Naruto, I know." Tsunade laughed lightly as she withdrew her hand. "I saw how you were trying not to look at any girls other than those that were covered." There was a rustling sound for a few moments before Tsunade spoke again. "I must say, I'm surprised that someone your age is so... so... moralistic. Oh, you can turn around now."
"Mora- huh?" Naruto turned, snatching his shirt from where it sat on a nearby rock. Frowning at how wet it felt, the boy disguised as a girl began to wring some of the water from the thick cloth. "I don't get it." He grumbled, his face twisted up in a look of concentration as he squeezed out the water.
"I thought you might not," Murmured the older lady. "Which, I guess, is the whole problem."
"Problem!?" Naruto glared at Tsunade. "I don't have a problem!" The boy, turned girl, glared in the direction Jiraiya had fled. "Unlike some people."
Smiling, Tsunade placed one hand on Naruto's head. "Poor child," She murmured, "You really don't have a clue do you?" Also looking out over where Jiraiya had run off, the newly decided fifth hokage, the Godaime, sighed. "Naruto," She began, "What do you know about... well... That is to say... Now, you know when a man and a woman get together..."
The blonde haired genin stared at the woman in confusion. "Huh?"
"I see," Sighed the legendary medic, "That this could take some time."
"Man and woman... man and woman..." Naruto frowned, before suddenly pointing at Tsunade. "Ah!" He yelled, "You mean like dates and stuff?"
"Yes, that's right. Dating and romance." Answered the taller of the two, as the both walked into what turned out to be a small changing room at the edge of the fenced-off hot springs area. "Wait outside." She ordered, ushering Naruto through the room and out the outer exit.
About to begin changing, Tsunade paused in realization and slid across to the outer door. "And put your shirt on!" She hissed, nodding to herself when she heard the rustling of cloth on the other side of the door.
By the time she had finished dressing and left the changing rooms, Naruto had already released his transformation. The boy was, when Tsunade spotted him, hopping from one foot to another in an effort to keep warm - or maybe he was just playing some little game with himself to keep amused. Whatever the reason, he soon stopped and fell into place behind Tsunade as she stalked her way back towards the inn they were staying in for the night.
"So, Naruto..." She asked as they walked. "Apparently I have to explain something important to you."
Instantly the short genin perked up, his movements becoming bouncier while his face shone with an ear-to-ear grin. "What? What? Is it a secret? A new technique? I bet someone as old as y-"
Tsunade's knuckles bounced off of his head, leaving him to rub his now hurting crown. "I'm not old." She growled, crossing her arms under her rather ample bosom and scowling at the world around her.
"Ah..." Naruto rubbed at his head, thankful that it was so solid. "Sorry..." Ordinarily he wouldn't have apologized but, well, if Jiraiya was scared of her then it meant he himself had every right to be scared of what Tsunade would do if he annoyed her too much.
"A new technique?" Tsunade, despite her annoyance at being called old, couldn't help but smirk at what, to Naruto, seemed to be some sort of private joke. "Not really, but I suppose it could lead to some new techniques..." When Naruto cheered, she dropped her voice far below a whisper. "Not that they'd be anything like what you may be expecting of course..."
Eventually Naruto calmed down until he was merely bubbling with excitement, rather than exploding with it. This was, Tsunade decided, probably about as calm as the boy was going to get and, as such, the best time to carry on with her speech.
"What I have to tell you is, really, something that most boys, and often girls, get told when they're a little older than you are now. Then again, some are told earlier." The tall woman sighed, "You see Naruto, this is normally something their parents explain to them."
She winced when she saw the look that passed over Naruto's face and the way he barely missed his step and stumbled ever so slightly when his body stiffened. "... oh..." His voice was small, his bubbly expression and movement all gone now. Instead he slouched along, his feet dragging against the cobbled street floor. "... I see."
Tsunade watched as Naruto slouched along and resisted, barely, the urge to sweep him up into a hug. Instead she decided to press on with what she had to, somehow, try to explain. "Naruto, do you by any chance have..." She paused for a moment before continuing. "No, actually, I'll make it easier to answer. Naruto, is there a girl you like?"
The change in Naruto was almost instantaneous, and rather spectacular too. In less than the blink of an eye his face went red with embarrassment, his movements became nervous and fidgety and he kept glancing around him, almost as if he expected someone to jump out and yell 'surprise!'
"Ah, there is. Isn't there?" Pressed the older woman, "Care to tell?"
Naruto fidgeted, his fingers finding their way to the base of his jacket and beginning to just fiddle with the thick cloth - tugging at it, stretching it out, wrapping it around his hand - just... fidgeting really. "Uhm..." He mumbled, "Th-there's Sakura-chan..." Naruto bit his lower lip and looked around, as if trying to find an escape route.
"And the sand girl, Temako? Temami?" Tsunade knew who Temari was, but acting as if she didn't know her name made it seem as if she had only heard it in passing – rather than being informed in detail about it by Jiraiya a few days ago.
"Temari." Came the rather annoyed correction. "Her name is Temari."
"Oh? Is that it?" The legendary kunoichi asked, sounding particularly indifferent to the girl's name. "So what do you think of her then, this Temari?"
Naruto slowed his pace and, after a few steps, stopped walking altogether. "I..." He began, his voice cracking ever so slightly. "uhm..." Naruto gulped. "She's... pretty?" He offered, not exactly sure of what he was trying to say. "And... uhm... She's nice, and... ah..."
Noticing that Naruto was no longer following her, Tsunade halted and turned to look at the much younger boy. "I take it that you like her then? Maybe even you have a thing for her?" She asked, smirking slightly at the way Naruto stumbled over his words while trying to explain – without embarrassing himself – what he thought.
"... yes..." Naruto whispered, his voice sounding small and weak.
"Sooooo..." As the kunoichi drew out the 'o' sound, Naruto seemed to get progressively smaller – no doubt expecting an insult or a rebuttal for what he had just admitted. "Have you two been on a date yet?"
The blonde genin looked around, then made a few waving motions with his hands, indicating that he didn't want anyone to hear what he was going to say. Raising an eyebrow at his actions, the taller woman stepped over to him and leant down close so that he could speak much quieter and still be heard by her.
"No..." He whispered, "But... we... there was..." At that point he apparently changed his mind and went silent once more before speaking up again in a quiet voice. "Tsunade-oneesan..."
Almost at once Naruto felt himself being swept up into a hug of, to put it bluntly, freakish strength. "Oneesan!?" Tsunade practically giggled with delight that Naruto had just used a term that was usually reserved for older sisters, or women that one considered to be like an older sister. Since she was taller than the young Genin, the end result was that the poor boy was swung to and fro almost a foot above the ground. "Oh! I'm so happy that you see me as an older sister!" Naruto, however, had nothing much to say since his face was now buried between Tsunade's most 'visible' attributes. Fortunately for him, however, he felt the older woman's grip loosen enough for him to lean his head back enough to actually breathe.
Suddenly the poor boy felt the unforgiving touch of gravity about his person as Tsunade let go, leaving him to fall to the floor like a sack of potatoes. "What the he-"he began to yell, but was cut off as Tsunade hoisted him off the floor and happily deposited him, standing, back onto it.
Before he had a chance to yell again, the legendary kunoichi placed one finger against his lips. "You've never been on a date, have you?" She asked, "But you have done something. I can tell by the way that got all nervous like that." Smiling slightly, the well-endowed woman patted the smaller boy on the head. "A kiss was all I suspect, Jiraiya seemed to think you'd know about that much at least."
"Th-that much?" Naruto asked, his eyes wide and his legs feeling more than a little like jelly. Frankly he was beginning to get rather confused and being swung around like a rag doll a few moments ago hadn't exactly helped matters much either.
"Naruto, do you know what a man and a woman, or in your case a boy and a girl, do when they love each other?" At the question posed by Tsunade, Naruto scrunched up his face in confusion.
"They... go on dates?" He hazarded. When he saw Tsunade's face fall slightly, he guessed that perhaps this wasn't quite the right answer. Okay then, so what else did he know couples did with each other? Well, apart from the obvious... then again, maybe Tsunade was after the obvious answer? She was, after all, trying to find out what he knew about something so maybe that was what she wanted. Taking a slight breath, Naruto decided to have a second guess. "They... kiss?"
"Then what happens?" Tsunade pressed, "They date, they kiss, then what, what else do couples do?"
This time Naruto reacted in a way that hinted at a vague sort of understanding. "Ah!" He shouted, hopping up from where he sat. "I think I know this one!"
The legendary medic merely raised one eyebrow at this. "Oh? So what happens then? What happens after a date and a kiss?" She asked, hoping that Naruto's answer would indicate that he knew more than he had let on about the subject.
Naruto grinned. "A second date!"
Needless to say, when she heard Naruto's guess, Tsunade could think of no suitable reply other than to curse softly under her breath.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Temari yawned and scowled. This wasn't exactly the easiest thing to do without looking rather daft, but frankly Temari couldn't care less. She was tired, her legs hurt from repeated kicks, her abdomen hurt from being elbowed and the rest of her hurt from being slammed into the ground so hard.
That aside, she had managed to prove her intellectual superiority over that incompetent Haruno girl! Gods, had she studied to be that... that... brainless or was it just something she had been born into?
Feh. It wasn't like it really mattered anyway. Eventually her brother Gaara would come to his senses and massacre the Sand village council. Then she'd be recalled out of this ludicrous arrangement and she'd never have to... to...
No. That was stupid thinking. Strong Gaara may be, but even he would have to bow to the sheer combined power of the entire Sand council. Besides, crazed killer he may have been, but he was also loyal like no other. No, there was no chance that she'd be recalled.
Not that she was entirely sure she wanted to be...
The village was, after all, a rather nice place really. She longed for the desert but, frankly, there was a lot to be said for being able to wake up without having to worry about the odd scorpion or desert-snake having made its way into one's bed overnight. It didn't happen often, but it was still something that did vaguely worry her. If she was going to die, she'd much rather die in combat than to die of poison after being stung or bitten whilst nearly naked in bed in the morning. At least here all she had to worry about were... insects.
Good gods, she'd only barely been able to keep her composure when she had discovered of the existence of the Aburame clan during the chuunin exams. After she'd retired to where her team had been staying, however, she had indulged herself in a good lengthy session of freaking out and throwing up. Hell, she hadn't been able to sleep properly for almost a week after returning to the Sand village, the mental images of Shino – insects crawling from under his skin – were enough to make her wake in a cold sweat from nightmares every single time she tried to sleep.
It was, perhaps, one of the few times that she felt as murderous as Gaara had been prior to the chuunin exam. Still, a few easy missions – body- guarding and bandit hunting mostly – had let her work off her anger in the simplest way she knew, by reducing weak opponents to large lumps of bloodied flesh.
Actually, that was something she really didn't like about the village – the lack of killing. Then again, it wasn't like they could trust her to go out on a mission without a jounin to keep an eye on her movements but still... a good days bandit-hunting would really be so damn stress-relieving right now!
Sighing to herself, Temari shook her head to clear it of the murderous thoughts that were dancing across her mind. Kneeling down she slipped her fingers into a special pocket secreted just inside her shoe – the left one, the one with the key in it, not the right one which held a small blade instead. Plucking the key from it's hiding place Temari rose and smoothly slotted it into the small lock that was all that prevented just anyone from getting into Naruto's home while he was away.
As the door swung open the first thing that hit her was the smell. Quite an unforgettable smell actually. A mix of straw and dung and... well... Animals.
Farm animals no less.
Wandering around on a floor which someone had covered with a layer of straw and, naturally, manure.
Evidently this was yet another prank pulled on her by the mystery person who'd pulled the previous ones – the swamp mud and the hair dye – only this time he or she had gone a little too far. Covering her with mud, replacing a bottle of shampoo with dye even as she bought it – those things were okay. Annoying, but they weren't altogether too bad.
Well. Okay, they were too bad, but when they were compared to this they were practically nothing. After all, in the previous two times the pranks had been directed at her, this time the pranker had gone as far as breaking into Naruto's, not her own, but Naruto's home and filling it with animals and dung. Animals that were, at present, happily making the mess even worse than it already had been.
Kicking a clucking chicken out of her way, and quite possibly killing it in the process, Temari swept through the building in order to find out just how bad things were. As she stepped into the kitchen area she had only a screeching squeal of anger to warn her before what appeared to be a wild boar attempted to drive it's tusks into her body. With a reaction speed bought about by a combination of both anger and fear for her life, since such an animal could kill a person with ease, Temari hopped into the air and placed one hand on the charging brute's back in order to vault herself over it.
As she vaulted she turned in mid air to face the back of the, now slightly confused, animal and whipped one arm out – launching a kunai into the back of the beasts skull. The dull crunching sound told her that the weapon had pierced it's skull and that, if not dead already, it would be dead in a moment or two. Landing lightly, Temari grimaced at the corpse of the boar.
"Well," She murmured, "At least we can eat it."
A scrabbling sound from behind caused her to turn and stare at what appeared to be another wild pig, this one a sow and thus less likely to try to kill her. Ignoring it, Temari slipped out of the kitchen and poked her head into one of the other downstairs rooms. Since nothing attacked her the moment she did so, she slipped inside and shut the door behind her. It would not, after all, do to let potential food escape the house before she killed it. The sound of deep breathing filled the room, mostly due to the sleeping ox that sat upon an old rug in the center of the room.
Nodding to herself, the sand genin slipped out of the room – again making sure she shut the door – and headed upstairs. The ox had made a mess and the wild boar had attacked her. Both of these, Temari assumed, were really to annoy her – not to actually harm her, what would be likely to harm her would be what, if anything, the person responsible could have placed in her room.
For Temari had already noticed that, apart from a bit of straw and mud, no real damage had been done to the rooms that contained Naruto's belongings. This obviously meant that whoever had done it was willing to go as far as damaging the house, but didn't want to damage anything Naruto placed any value on.
In fact... now that she thought about it... These pranks only really started when word of Naruto's engagement to her had leaked out, hadn't they? Given this fact, could it be possible that the perpetrator wasn't against herself personally, but against the fact that she was engaged to Naruto?
Was someone, perhaps, trying to make her leave in order to render the engagement voided? Possibly so that they could have Naruto to themselves?
Pushing her theorizing aside, Temari approached the door to her room and stopped dead. Growing up as all sand-nin did, paranoid, had taught her more than a few useful things. For a start it taught her to always make sure she could tell if anyone had intruded into her private places, her room for example. Today such paranoia paid off as, in the bottom corner of her door, she had affixed a single one of her hairs so that it bridged the gap between the door and the doorframe. Looking closely it was obvious that the hair had been snapped in two, proof that someone had opened the door without realizing that this particular little trick had been in use.
So, then, someone had been in her room. Obviously it must have been the same person who had broken into and bought animals into the rest of the house. This, of course, left just one nasty little thought in Temari's mind.
What, exactly, had this intruder done in her room?
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
"Oh." Naruto sat next to Tsunade on the edge of a simple little bed of the kind found in every room in this particular inn. The expression on his face was a mix of interest and the sort of look usually found on small stunned rabbits. "So... babies come from mommies?" He asked, his voice sounding like that of a little child's.
"Well," Murmured Shizune, who had been hanging around in a small café next to the inn and, when she had seen Tsunade and Naruto returning, had decided to tag along with them into the inn and up to their rooms. "Where else did you think they would come from Naruto-kun?"
The genin frowned, "Ah..." he began, "I always thought they were found inside watermelons or something."
The room went silent as one medical-nin and one medical legend both stared at Naruto as if he were from a different world. Finally, in an almost dreamlike voice – bought about by the way her train of thought had hit the wall known as Naruto – Tsunade asked a question she would dread asking for years to come. "Why... why do you think that?"
"It's obvious!" Naruto half-yelled, "Mommies can't possibly grow that fat so quickly! So they must be keeping the watermelon under their clothes to keep it warm!"
Tsunade's eye twitched slightly for a moment before, suddenly, she fell backwards onto the bed, her legs kicking up into the air, laughing like a hyena. "Ahaha! That's brilliant!" She exclaimed, in between fits of laughing and giggling. Opposite her, Shizune also allowed herself a small smirk as she reached down to grab one of the jackets Tsunade had damaged in her fight with Orochimaru a few days before.
"Trust us Naruto-kun," She whispered whilst she started work on sewing up some of the rips and tears in the jacket. "Babies come from mothers, not from watermelons."
"Aha!" Naruto jumped to his feet and pointed at Shizune. "If babies come from mommies, then how come they get so fat! No-one grows that fat that quickly! They have to be hiding something under their clothes!" Then he paused and raised scratched his chin with the hand he had used to point at Shizune with. "Or maybe they lay eggs, like chickens, and then they keep the eggs under their clothes... That could work..."
Giggling softly, the legendary medic reached up with one arm, grabbed Naruto by the base of his shirt and tugged him back down onto the bed. Taking a deep breath in order to, hopefully, calm her giggling, Tsunade pulled herself back into a sitting position and wrapped an arm around Naruto's shoulders.
"Babies grow inside their mothers, that's why they get 'fat'. It's because the growing baby takes up a lot of space inside the mothers abdomen." She smiled and placed a finger to the younger boys lips. "Before you say it, the babies get there after a girl and a guy who love each other go into their bedroom together."
Using both hands, Naruto could only barely move Tsunade's arm far enough away to prevent her finger from covering his lips. "What... what happens after they go into their bedroom?" Naruto asked, glaring at the busty woman.
"Ah..." Shizune lifted her head from her sewing and laughed nervously. "I... think that's something you'll find out when you get there, right Tsunade- sama?"
"Hah! A little fumbling around is probably the best way to learn." Tsunade grinned at Naruto. "Just remember, she'll probably know more about it than you do, so listen to what she say, okay?"
Naruto opened his mouth to answer, but was cut off as the window to the room slammed open and a rather irritated white-haired figure slid inside. The boy glared at the figure for a moment, before deciding that it couldn't hurt much to take the opportunity to insult the man. "Oi! Pervert-sennin! Were those girls too much for you?"
Jiraiya's head whipped around to glare at the boy. "That," he growled, "Wasn't playing fair."
"Pff, and since when did you ever play fair Jiraiya? As I understand it, you pushed him into the spring to begin with." Tsunade snorted in annoyance as she glared at her once team-mate. "You deserve every bruise you got from those girls,"
"Hah!" The self proclaimed 'super pervert' laughed a short, almost mocking, laugh. "Do you really think I even let them get near enough to hit me? I am the legendary toad sennin you know!"
"I know," whispered the blonde woman. "Which gives me so much more satisfaction when I do this." As she spoke, she happily poked Jiraiya in the side - almost immediately the man collapsed upon the floor, twitching ever so often. "You're not the only legendary ninja Jiraiya, someday you and your ego may even remember that."
Staring at the twitching pile that was Jiraiya, Naruto frowned in thought. It was pretty obvious that Tsunade had used some incredible technique to disable him but... well, that wasn't what he was thinking about.
"You know," He began at last, "Like that, he can't keep running away from that crowd of woman, can he?"
Jiraiya blinked. Then his eyes widened as he realized just what, exactly, Naruto was suggesting. "Aheh, well, there's no need to go that far... right?" he mumbled, his face resting against the carpeted floor.
"Actually," Murmured Tsunade, "I think there is." She finished as she stood up and lifted Jiraiya into the air with one hand. "Happy landings?"
With that, she took a step towards the window turned slightly and launched the legendary sennin out into the evening sky. "We'll see you tomorrow!" Yelled Naruto, as he watched his sometimes-sensei's landing attract the crowd of women who had been chasing him earlier.
"Tsunade-sama?" Shizune spoke up after a while, "I really think you should shut the window, so his screams of pain don't keep us awake all night."
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Slipping a kunai out of on of the many hiding places about her person, Temari carefully reached out to the door to her room with her free hand. Slowly she began to open the door, stopping once it had been opened just enough for her too peek into the room. Seeing nothing out of the ordinary, she pushed the door open a little more, giving herself a slightly wider angle of vision.
Still there was nothing odd in the room. How... strange.
Snarling to herself Temari slammed the door open the rest of the way and threw herself to one side as a small yellow and orange blur came shooting out of the room. The moment she landed on the floor she rolled to one side, just in time to see the yellow and orange animal – one that appeared to be some kind of really angry wildcat – land claws first where her head had just been. Slamming one hand on the ground, Temari pivoted herself on it and spun around, swinging her legs out in a sweeping kick that barely clipped the animal in the side.
The cat, now angered due to the pain from the kick, hissed furiously and pounced, claws first. There was a wet slicing sound and a squeal of feline pain as Temari rolled to bring her other hand, with the kunai it held, up into the flight path of the feline. Even as the animal died, her kunai in it's belly, it's fore and hind claws scrabbled around furiously, scratching and tearing small chunks of flesh from the arm that held it aloft. Grimacing in pain, Temari refused to let the furious beast down, knowing that should she do so it still had more than enough life left in it to make a pretty good attempt at attacking her neck. Admittedly it was dying but, well, it had been a while since Temari had seriously watched anything die.
She had been only six or seven the first time, when she had watched as her father, the Kazekage, executed a traitor in full view of everyone. Though she hadn't much liked it at the time, she slowly grew somewhat desensitized as she watched her father perform execution after execution. Being the daughter of the Kazekage and, at the time, a potential heir, she had been pretty much forced to watch them by a mix of tradition and orders from her father.
A few years later she was ten, her youngest brother – Gaara – had just turned seven when the three children of the Kazekage – herself, Gaara and her other brother Kankuro – were sent on a mission.
She'd never forget that mission, ever. Since, after all, that had been when she had killed someone for the first time.
He had been some pathetic bandit, a mere inconvenience to any ninja, even one as young as herself. She had watched, then, as the man died from a kunai she had embedded in his neck – even after he had pleaded for mercy. Mercy that was, after all, something a Sand-nin was not expected to give.
The way his breathing had become all damp, like he was drowning. Which, in fact he was, drowning in his own blood at least.
The tiny glimmer of life in his eyes that slowly faded even as she watched.
Temari had killed for the first time then.
And, frankly, she found it to be quite enjoyable.
The wet feeling of blood running down her arm bought the, currently brown- haired, genin back from the dreamlike memories she had been thinking about. The wildcat, now dead, hung limply over her arm and it was it's blood, still oozing from where her kunai had impaled it, that was running down her arm. Silently she berated herself for missing her favorite part, watching the spark of life fade away from the eyes of her victim. It was then that, albeit somewhat dimly, she realized that she'd have to clean up all the mess that filled the house, as well as get rid of the few rather more tame animals that were still around.
Ah. Sod it all. She could clean up tomorrow, after she'd washed up and had a good nights sleep.
Then, once the house was clean again, she'd have to deal with the real issue at hand. Namely, finding out who was responsible and kicking their teeth in.
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Naruto bounced happily as he peered through Jiraiya's telescope at the familiar gate in the far distance. It would be about a day or two of walking before they'd be standing at the bottom of those giant wooden doors.
Currently, the four of them, Naruto, Jiraiya, Tsunade and Shizune, were passing through a small trading town that sat atop a cliff they were going to be walking down for the most of the afternoon. Surprisingly they had made good time – after Tsunade had healed the multiple bruises Jiraiya had picked up the night before – and had actually arrived at the trading town earlier than they had planned.
Given this, Jiraiya and Tsunade had wandered off to find a bar – or a small gambling place – whilst leaving Naruto and Shizune to their own devices. Naruto, his froggy wallet filled to bursting once more, peered into dusty shop windows and grimly searched through the contents of various market stalls.
"Ah, Naruto-kun?" Asked Shizune, as they passed what was the seventh stall Naruto had searched thus far. "What, exactly, are you looking for?"
"Mmph." The genin didn't reply, but instead dug around in a pile of what appeared to be large wood and metal blocks. "'s not one here either." He muttered, leaving that particular stall and moving onto the next in line. A few minutes rummaging around in this new pile of stuff produced much the same results as all the previous stalls had produced – or, in other words, nothing that he was after.
"Naruto-kun, please tell me what you're looking for?" Suggested Shizune as she placed one hand on the boy's shoulder. "Then maybe I can help."
Turning to face the older woman, Naruto seemed like he was going to reply to her when he suddenly stopped dead mid turn. Without a word the young genin practically vanished due to the speed at which he dashed off in the direction of what he had seen. Shizune followed, at a much more leisurely pace and caught up with the boy just as he handed his wallet over to a bearded old craftsman in exchange for a large bundle of... Well, Shizune wasn't sure what it was exactly, but it looked particularly heavy and was wrapped in a thick paper covering. Carrying the package over one shoulder Naruto grinned happily and looked at Shizune.
"Oi! Oi!" he exclaimed, "Where'd Ero-sennin and old lady Tsunade go?"
Shizune frowned. "Jiraiya-san and Tsunade-sama are... uh... entertaining themselves."
The blonde genin nodded. "They went to get drunk, huh?"
"Ah..." The taller woman blushed ever so slightly in embarrassment. "I think they probably did, Naruto-kun." Glancing at Naruto's package, she frowned slightly. "So, are you going to tell me what you spent so much money on?"
Naruto smiled. "It's a present." He stated, "A present, for someone I like."
He grinned, his face lighting up like a one million watt bulb. "Okay?"
Chapter 13 – ended.
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WAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAAAAAAAAAAA!
Good gods. Almost two months to do this. Now, I just hope you think it was worth the wait ^-^
So... next time in 'Betrothal' !
Naruto returns to the village! Stuff happens! ... uhh... more stuff happens!
. and... ah... Sakura will get one heck of a surprise!
Now, lemme sleep x.x
- Lackey H, needing sleep after this.