Waaaaaaaaah...only five reviews for the last chappie...and that was with all the smut too...(sobs)

Chapter 11: Unexpected Flux


The Next Day

It was highly aberrant of him to be slinking around the University like a criminal escapee. Even he admitted to himself that slithering around the grounds was NOT the way to avoid attention given that strange behavior did the exact opposite. Nevertheless, he slithered anyway, slinking over to where he expected his target to be located. Clear sapphire eyes narrowed in concentration as his target came into view.

There he was. Neji was descending the stairs of the Science building in all of his glorious majestic magnificence. His clothes rippled with the passing breeze and clung to his body, accenting the slim, slender waist and the chiseled torso. Naruto almost swallowed his tongue with the urge to run to him, but something told him to wait, and it was more than once that this something had saved him. He silently counted to ten, and right on cue, a girl with twin buns upon her head appeared at Neji's side, chatting amiably with the Hyuuga. The pang of jealousy that struck a cacophonous chord in his heart was to be expected; nevertheless, Naruto resisted the urge to rip her throat to shreds. For the time being.

"Neji-kun, shall we eat in the cafeteria today?" The words were faint from such a distance, but Naruto heard them all the same. The blonde scoffed and spat briefly on the ground. The girl needed a good, hefty pint of iodine shoved down her thyroid gland, if anything else.

"I prefer the shade of those trees…" Neji responded. A thought flashed across Naruto's mind, and suddenly the prospect of Neji eating lunch under "those trees" seemed like a very good idea indeed. He sent mental thought waves towards the Hyuuga, begging him to further insist.

"That's fine with me." Tenten replied. Naruto pumped a fist in the air. Things were going well. He watched in glee as Neji looked around, brushing hair out of his face with an irritable flick of his wrist.

"Should we not wait for Naruto-kun?"

Naruto felt his knees suddenly pack their bags and leave on a permanent vacation. Neji had just called him Naruto-KUN….ohhhh, victory was indeed quite delectable. Unfortunately, victory had also left him someone incapacitated, seeing that his legs had been reduced to near puddles of flesh at the sweet mention of the aforementioned reference. Things were indeed going well. Very much so, in fact.

"He said he had something to do. Anyhow, I made lunch for you today, Neji-kun." Tenten's sugary voice floated on the breeze.

Scratch that last thought. Still…there were ample opportunities ripe for the plucking…Naruto quickly dove into the crowd, artfully interweaving between people until he safely spotted Neji's back. Pressing himself to the roughened bole of the pine tree in front of him, he settled for observing everything from behind the fir, which gave him a safe haven about three feet away from the Hyuuga and his brunette companion. A secret smile spread across his face as the familiar tingle of anticipation and suspense waltzed a salsa down his spine, sending chills sizzling across his skin with the delicious feel of trepidation. He lived for moments like these.

It suddenly occurred to him that there was a lot more foliage in the higher parts of the tree. He looped a hand around the nearest branch, leaping lightly up to land, then swung himself catlike up once more, deftly manipulating his body until he teetered precariously on a slender branch directly above where Neji and Tenten sat. On an impulse, he bounced on the limb, a foolish grin stretched goofily on his face. How he loved moments like these, moments where the knowledge that he was actually risking his life for some wildly irrational whim sent a sweet, satisfying surge of sheer sensation through his body. Perhaps it was part of the reason why he made so many enemies. And then again—and at this, his mood flickered ever so slightly—most of said foes had a most unreasonable motive for hating him.

A sudden surge of serenity washed over him as he stood erect on the limb. Naruto tilted his head to the universe and inhaled a deep breath of fresh, pure, clean air laced with the heady scent of soft resin. Never before had he felt so free, so at peace with the world. He had to admit, he rather pitied those on the ground; this was the closest thing one could get to flying, and if this was what flying felt like, he'd spend the rest of his life soaring in the clouds without a care in the world. Azure eyes paid homage to the sky, and Naruto let out a sigh of exhilaration, tilting his head back all the way so his throat was exposed to the heavens. A breeze caressed his slim, slight body, and he stood there, bared naked in all the splendid magnificence of nature. It was at times like these when life itself seemed almost within comprehension.

The mellow lilt of voices from below escorted the moment away, and once again the feeling of luscious anticipation dripped through his veins.

Naruto edged out so he stood poised like a dancer on the very tip of the branch. He balanced his weight with immaculate precision, tucking one foot under his rump so that he stood like a flamingo on the slender end of the limb. The branch creaked precariously, but Naruto had judged well and it held his weight with a latent strength that the blonde had coaxed from it with his weight placement. Rocking up and down in an almost pendulum-like motion, Naruto balanced perilously on tiptoe and leaned down, the crown of Neji's head straight in the line of his sight. He could see Tenten's twin-bunned hairstyle bobbing next to the Hyuuga. The girl appeared to be rummaging around in her bag, finally extracting a small, carefully-wrapped parcel swathed in a turquoise-white striped cloth. She shyly extended it to Neji, who, after a moment's hesitation, took it gingerly and unwrapped it.

"Do you like it?" Naruto managed not to wince. Tenten's voice was disgustingly shy.

"I…well, thank you very much." Neji's honey-smooth baritone replied.

The branch quivered more agitatedly as Naruto's steady rocking motion increased with his level of irritation. He scoffed at the ridiculously typical meal. How very predictable; a meal of love from the one doing the wooing. For a brief moment he considered spitting a thin stream of saliva into the food; after all, he was extremely high up in the tree, well-covered by the lower forest-green pine needles which protected him from detection yet gave him a fine view of his target. It'd serve Tenten right when Neji complained of the dour taste…

The thought was banished even as Neji lifted a morsel to his mouth. Naruto bounced on the branch more restlessly than ever, ignoring the threatening complaints from the limb as Neji slowly chewed.

"It's delicious, Tenten. Thank you." His voice was spiked through with satisfaction and admiration.

CRACK

The limb, thoroughly tired of the constant pressure, promptly decided on retribution and snapped, sending Naruto crashing down through the needles. A white-fingered hand reached out and barely managed to close over a subsequent branch; Naruto swung crazily as the other hand flailed, finally managing to come in contact with the sticky bole of the pine. The excess resin on his fingers made his grip a trifle easier, which completely staved his fall. Naruto immediately clung like a limpet to the sticky-sweet trunk of the tree, a soppy smile strapped crookedly onto his face. That was definitely fun. Most deliciously dangerous, really. If he hadn't been in danger of being discovered, he'd want to do it again.

"Tenten…did you put salt into this?" Neji's voice floated from below.

"Salt? No. Does it taste salty?" Tenten's voice immediately followed.

No sooner were the words out of her mouth then a sick, ice-cold feeling of dread seeped through Naruto's skin, curling around his entrails, sucking hungrily at his heart. A memory nudged at his subconscious and he brought a hand to his head, his breath suddenly coming in sharp, shallow sips of air. Those words sounded almost too familiar. The memory's probing was now urgent, desperate and demanding, delving into his brain like a stiletto into flesh. A slide-show began in his head, visions delivering quick, stabbing blows to his eyes, sending horrific detail into his mind, though everything was oddly blurred.

Get away from me, you monster!

Wh…why? I thought…I thought we were…

I don't know you! I've never seen you before! Get away from me!

Suddenly everything seemed off. The world seemed to warp before his mind and he nearly staggered off of the branch he was standing on. The salt…the salt…the salt the salt the salt the saltthesaltthesaltthesaltthesaltthesaltthesaltthesaltthesaltohdeargodtheSALT…

He wanted to cry, to run, to do anything, anything in his power to stop the horrible, horrible thing from happening though he knew not what exactly was about to happen, but it was too late, it was too too too too too late, it was too laaaaaaaaatttteeeeeee……

Neji swallowed, his throat pulsing as the food went down his throat.

His heart stopped dead and Naruto fell from the tree, his body plummeting down to the yawning ground before him.

Nnnnh…

"…ruto?"

What…happened?

"…aruto?"

Why do I suddenly feel like I've drowned in a pool of blood?

"Naruto!"

He sat up with a jerk, eyes snapping wide open, every nerve stretched taut with alarm. The room blurred, spun, then slowed down to a stop, eventually clearing out. A mass of brown slowly outlined before his vision until he looked into worried eyes of Iruka. The man lifted a hand and placed his cool fingers upon Naruto's feverish forehead, brow creased in worry.

"Thank god you're awake." Blatant relief shimmered in his voice. Naruto made a few attempts to answer back, only to find that his voice had been reduced to nothing but a few hoarse gurgles. Iruka handed him a glass of water which he swallowed gratefully.

"What happened?"

"Apparently a couple of students found you lying comatose at the bottom of a tree." Iruka said chidingly. "And after all those warnings I gave you about climbing trees…" He trailed off, shaking his head.

Naruto blinked. He, Uzumaki Naruto, had fallen off of a tree? Hell MUST have frozen over. That was almost as plausible as Jiraiya-sensei admitting he was gay.

"Seriously?" A vein popped in Iruka's head.

"Can't you ever NOT take anything lightly, Naruto? Yes, apparently you did fall off of a tree since you were found covered in pine needles and branches and your hands were sticky with resin! Unless you want to admit that you tripped over your own feet!" He said scathingly. Given the choice between falling off a tree and tripping over his own feet, Naruto would have chosen the former without even blinking.

"Okay, so I fell off a tree. So where am I now?" He said, looking at the sparsely-furnished room.

"The hospital."

"WHAAAAAAT?"

"You were un-con-scious, Naruto, and people are usually shipped off to the hospital when they're found comatose on the ground." Iruka explained with an air of chastising frustration.

"But you didn't have to do that! The doctors could have cut me up with those nasty little scalpel-knife-blade thingies!" The blonde whined. Iruka grimaced.

"Now why would they do that?"

"Because they hate me! I'm a regular patient here!" Naruto shot back.

"And the more patients they get, the more money they make. Now lie down and shut up. You still need to heal." Iruka retaliated.

"No I don't."

To Iruka's surprise, Naruto smiled wanly and held out a forearm, exposing the pristine, creamy flesh. What scrapes he'd sustained from the tree had completely vanished, leaving smooth, unblemished skin. Iruka's lips tilted up in a forlorn smile as he reached out and lightly brushed the pads of his fingers across the milky-white paleness of Naruto's arm.

"Both a blessing and a curse, isn't it?" He murmured wryly. Naruto's gaze swept to the coverlets.

"I'll survive." Resignation shimmered naked in his sapphire eyes. "Now let's get out of here. I want to check on something." He stood, and in one fluid motion, hopped lightly onto the window sill. Iruka looked scandalized.

"Naruto, can't you take the front door like every other normal human being?" He was rewarded by the toothiest cheek-stretching grin Naruto had ever exhibited. The resemblance to a Cheshire cat was freakishly accurate.

"I'm not exactly normal, remember? Besides, the doctors out there wouldn't let me out if I did go the 'normal' way. Come on." Iruka yelped as Naruto hauled him up by an arm and jumped out the window.

"NarutoooooooooOOOOOOOOOOOOOO….."

"Jeez, Iruka-sensei, that landing was so horrible!"

"YOU DIDN'T GIVE ME MUCH CHOICE!"

"So? You're an adult, which means you should have better coordination than me."

"THAT ONLY MEANS I'M HEAVIER!"

"Hence the better coordination."

What moments of erstwhile desolation now vanished as the two walked down the street, bickering playfully.


Uhm...review please?