Kakashi arrives at afternoon training about four hours late. "Sorry I'm late," he says completely non-apologetically. "I wandered a bit from the path of life."
"If that lie was any more obvious, your pants would be on fire!" yells Madoka.
"Calm down," says Kakashi, holding up three official-looking forms. "I brought you registration forms for the chunin exams."
"Kakashi sensei, you're the best!" yells Naruto, throwing his arms around Kakashi.
"Are you sure we're ready for this?" asks Madoka nervously.
"Yes," says Kakashi. "But it's entirely up to each of you whether or not you compete. If you do want to compete, fill out the forms and go to the Academy, and hand in your forms at room 301 by 4pm."
"AWESOME!" yells Naruto, throwing his arms in the air. "I'm gonna get all the way to the finals and show off my flying seal!"
"I can honestly say that technique will scare quite a few people," says Kakashi. "Definitely save it."
"Yes!" shouts Naruto, doing an aerial backflip. "This morning, I pretended to lose control of it in my sleep and Grandma and Grandpa panicked so much until I pretended to remember how to shut it off." He grins widely. "I even tricked Mr. Nice Police Man by pretending to lose control of the seal outside the police station. He freaked out so much."
"Well, so long as you don't actually lose control of it, keep up the good work," says Kakashi, giving Naruto a cheerful thumbs-up.
"WHY ARE YOU ENCOURAGING THIS?" demands Madoka.
"Why are you getting your pants in a knot over this?" counters Kakashi. Then he turns his attention to Sasuke. "Sasuke, have you told your family that you have the sharingan yet?"
Sasuke blushes and looks down at her feet. "No," she mumbles.
"Then you have two options," says Kakashi. "You can either tell them as soon as you get home, or you can save it and surprise them in the chunin exams. That's if your grounding sentence doesn't forbid you from competing, not that I care about that. Take it if you want to." He raises a hand. "Well, see ya!" Kakashi shunshins away.
"I am beginning to understand why you train with Shisui," says Madoka. "But doesn't he have his own genin team?"
"Yeah!" Naruto says. "Maybe they'll be taking part in the chunin exams too!"
"I have to ask my parents if I can compete," says Sasuke, and leaves her idiot teammates to go home. Her mum should be there looking after The Brother.
"Hey Sasuke, where are you going?" calls Naruto. "We can still train without sensei! You can talk to your parents later!"
Sasuke does not reply, but just keeps walking. When she finally arrives at her home, she finds The Brother sitting inside by the door. She has to pull off some nifty taijutsu to stop him from latching on to her leg. Stupid kid.
Sasuke's mother emerges from somewhere. "Oh, Sasuke," she says. "You're home. Good. I need to go into town to get some things, can you watch Eizo while I'm gone?" Without waiting for an answer, Sasuke's mother leaves, waving good bye and calling over her shoulder, "I'll be back in a couple of hours, don't let him get into the knife drawer!"
Sasuke stands in the hall staring at the closed front door for a whole minute. During that time, her brother stares up at Sasuke with a frown on his face. Finally, Sasuke looks down at Eizo-Mori. She glares at him.
Eizo stares up at Sasuke, then he smiles cunningly.
What is he up to, Sasuke wonders.
Then Eizo screams.
And screams. And starts bawling his eyes out and howling worse than a lost puppy.
Sasuke runs to her room, grabs her kitten and retreats to the old bomb shelter in the back of her wardrobe. Unfortunately she can still hear Eizo screaming. Sasuke tries to calm her kitten down, and decide on a name for him. The fluffy, grey, flat-nosed kitten is trying to run and hide from Eizo's screaming. Sasuke got grounded for a whole four weeks for getting this kitten, making her current sentence equal 52 weeks in total. A whole year's worth of grounding. But at least she was allowed to keep the kitten - on the condition that she be the only one to look after it. Her Dad said she has to take responsibility for her actions.
But The Brother is still screaming, so Sasuke cannot think of a name for her kitten. Stupid brat needs to shut up. After what seems like an eternity, Sasuke is finally fed up enough to stomp back to the front door, where Eizo is still sitting on the floor screaming, his mouth wider than the gap between Naruto and common sense. His face is wet and sticky with tears and snot. Gross. When Eizo sees Sasuke, he increases the volume of his screaming by a half.
"SHUT UP!" Sasuke yells.
Eizo jumps in fright, chokes on his next scream, coughs and screams louder than before.
Sasuke feels like screaming herself. The kitten is hiding under her bed. "Stop screaming!" Sasuke begs.
Eizo screams louder.
In a last desperate attempt to shut her brother up, Sasuke asks, "If I pick you up, will you stop screaming?"
Eizo waves his arms in the air, still screaming.
Sasuke gingerly picks him up under the armpits and holds him at arms' length. What is she supposed to do with him? She's never held him or any baby before. Eizo's screams settle down to a passionate sobbing. He stretches his arms towards Sasuke, who pulls him closer, in hopes it will stop him crying completely. Eizo stops his crying, choking back the last few sobs and burrowing his head into Sasuke's shoulder. Sasuke's dress is soaked where Eizo's face touches it almost instantly.
Eizo is kind of soft and warm, Sasuke notes. She adjusts her hold on him so that he is sitting in her arms rather than hanging with his legs dangling.
Eizo sits back and looks at Sasuke, his face still all wet and shiny. Then he grabs a lock of her blue hair and laughs. "PWETTY!" he yells. "PWETTY PWETTY PWETTY!"
Figures that her baby brother is the only one who actually likes her new hair colour. Then Sasuke realizes something. She has never heard Eizo talk before. She had always just assumed he couldn't. Seems he can. Eizo is kind of cute, in a chubby, sticky, round kind of way. Still, that mess of snot and tears must go.
Ten minutes and half a box of tissues, three paper towels and a lot of soap later Eizo-Mori is de-grossified. Sasuke tries to put Eizo down so she can change her sticky dress. Unfortunately, he clings like duct tape so she has to take him with her to her room and juggle him around while she finds a clean dress, and then sit down with him on her lap to change it. Once the sticky dress is in the wash and the kitten is out from underneath Sasuke's bed, Sasuke sits down on the living room floor with both kitten and brother, and introduces them to each other.
After a few minutes, Eizo is more interested in the kitten than in Sasuke, and Sasuke is able to free herself from his vice-like grip. Just as Sasuke has finished disentangling herself and stands up, she hears the unmistakable sound of her mother getting home from town. Sasuke glares at Eizo and says, "By no means does this make us friends!" Then she stalks off to the opposite side of the room to pretend she wasn't just cuddling her baby brother.
Eizo looks over at Sasuke and laughs.
Something is bugging Sasuke. Itachi is not sure what it is, but if they are patient, Sasuke will spill the beans. Mmm, beans. Itachi munches her beans happily. Beans are exactly what she's been wanting all day. Sasuke's problems don't seem nearly as important to Itachi as eating those awful, wonderful beans. Besides, her kid sister will cough up the information sooner or later.
Eizo, ever the adventurer, climbs off their mother's lap and starts crawling around the table. He makes adorable babbling noises as he goes. He hasn't shown much interest in walking yet, but neither Itachi nor her parents mind. He's cute, and that's all that matters. "Pitty, pitty, pitty," Eizo giggles as he crawls past Itachi to where Sasuke is sitting pushing her food around her plate. Eizo giggles. "Nene."
If Itachi didn't know any better, it would almost seem like Eizo is trying to say actual words, instead of his usual grunts and cooing.
Their parents are not paying much attention to Eizo, if anything they seem more interested in having a silent conversation about who is going to try and get Sasuke to talk about what is bothering her. They don't seem to realize that if they wait quietly Sasuke will speak up eventually.
Itachi watches out of the corner of her eye to see if Sasuke will scoot away from Eizo or just get up and leave like she normally does. Come to think of it, Itachi does not remember ever seeing Sasuke touch Eizo. Just as Eizo is getting within touching range, Sasuke glares down at their little brother. Surprisingly, she lets him sit down beside her.
Eizo pats Sasuke's arm and makes one of his grunting noises, the one he usually makes before he tries to climb on someone's lap. Sasuke glares at Eizo. Eizo laughs and grabs a hold of Sasuke's sleeve, then uses it to pull himself up onto his feet. Then he grabs a fistful of Sasuke's hair and yells, "PRETTY!"
Itachi drops her chopsticks.
Her father chokes on his mouthful of food.
Her mother gasps and covers her mouth with one hand.
"Ow, get off!" protests Sasuke.
"PRETTY! PRETTY! PRETTY!" laughs Eizo-Mori, tugging on Sasuke's hair.
Sasuke notices the looks on Itachi and their parent's faces. "What's the matter?" she asks, confused.
"That's…" their mother takes a deep breath. "That's his first word."
An expression of utter confusion spreads across Sasuke's face. "But he said it before, while you were out…"
Eizo, oblivious to the stir his outburst caused, climbs onto Sasuke's lap and says happily, "Pretty neechan." Then he settles down and goes to sleep.
Itachi and her parents stare at Sasuke and Eizo, completely dumbfounded.