Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto.

REVISED 5/30/2015

All posted chapters have been revised. This basically involved cleaned up typos, rewording a little dialogue, fixing a messed up name and correcting a continuity error. While there are very likely still errors because I'm not perfect, these should be a little cleaner. I have redone all that was already posted in order to get myself back in the game of writing. I know it's been getting close to a year now since I've last updated, but I am working on it. Life happened and I'm sorry but I'm back. And if it makes you feel better, my little sister is going to be badgering me to update and since I live with this person and I'll want her off my back, it is likely that you will get more frequent updates now.

No Thanks Necessary

Chapter 5

Naruto knew better than to go to the hospital without an adult. Even if they knew that one was coming, the staff was still going to deny him service or wait until the other man showed up, not believing him because, "you're just a little liar!"

No one had seemed to even want to touch him the last time that he had ended up there, instead ordering him out and an enraged Third Hokage had to bring the boy back after he had been wandering the streets with a dangerously high fever edging towards horrendous hallucinations.

So he didn't want to go to the hospital. But he didn't want to disobey the man, who'd looked a bit like his classmate Shikamaru actually, either. The old-Shikamaru had stopped the fighting and helped them out and been strong enough to keep the large man from grabbing them as they fled. But he didn't want the dark man mad at him either.

If there was one thing that Naruto had learned in his life, it was to not get grown ninja truly mad at him. Yes, he pulled pranks, and that might annoy some of them. But he tried to stop short of invoking true anger. He knew that an angry ninja was a terrifying ninja. And he didn't want to face an angry ninja.

They rounded a corner and Naruto stopped up, shoving his heels into the ground and forcing Kiba to stop his relentless march forward.

"Naruto! Come on! Mr. Nara said to go to the hospital!"

Naruto shook his head, wishing he could talk right now to explain. Instead he could only point to a small building on their right.

Kiba looked confused and annoyed. "That's not the hospital." He said plainly.

Naruto rolled his eyes. He pointed at his wrist and then held up two fingers.

Kiba's confusion grew, as did his annoyance, knotting his fingers into his hair tight enough to hurt he shouted, "I don't know what you're saying!"

Naruto looked pained before trying again. This time he lightly drew a circle on his wrist before pointing to it again, this time tapping his finger.

Kiba felt like he was playing charades…and he had never liked charades. "Your wrist?"

Naruto shook his head and pointed again, incessantly tapping his finger.

Kiba pulled hard on his hair. "I dunno!"

Naruto stomped his foot, grimacing momentarily at the uncomfortable jolt it sent through his abused body, and pointed at his wrist again.

Suddenly Kiba remembered the gesture. "A watch?"

Naruto smiled and made some weird spaztic gesture that Kiba just took to mean he was correct. Then he remembered the two fingers. "Two minutes?"

Naruto clapped once and pointed to the building again.

"Two minutes in there?" Kiba bit his lip for a second. "Naruto, you're hurt. You need to get to the hospital!"

Then Naruto looked at him and Kiba felt unsettled. The look in the blonde's eyes was not his normal happy excitement. Nor was it the pain that Naruto had to be feeling. It was some strange cross between fear and confusion and desperation and morbid acceptance that made Kiba's skin crawl for reasons he couldn't name, other than knowing that it was a look that should never appear on a child's face.

"Alright fine. Two minutes. Then we're going!"

Naruto saluted and headed off inside, as fast as his injured and fatigued body would allow. Kiba followed on his heels. He was supposed to get the blonde to the hospital and he would do so. He wasn't going to let Naruto out of his sight.

Naruto went up to the second floor of what seemed to be a small and modest apartment building with only about 4 rooms per floor. Naruto went to the door just off of the staircase and knocked.

There was silence from within and Kiba thought it likely that whoever Naruto wanted to see was sleeping and wasn't going to answer the door.

Kiba leaned back against the wall with a sigh.

But then he heard a light cough and shuffling within and then the light padding of feet. "Who is it?" A voice asked a little gruffly, but then again he had just been woken up in the middle of the night.

Naruto moved to answer except he only made a gagging noise and clutched at his throat in pain, clearly having forgotten that speaking was bad in the 30 seconds it took to reach the door.

Kiba sighed, "It's Kiba and Naruto, Iruka-sensei." He responded instead, having recognized the voice through the door.

The door flew open and the shirtless form of their scarred academy teacher stood in the door way taking in the site of them. It was then that Kiba realized that he was covered in splinters and dirt and dust from the grinding of Naruto's meager furniture.

"What happened?!" Iruka exclaimed in shock, "Naruto you're hurt!" he cried a second later. "Who did this to you?" Their teacher dropped to a knee as his eyes examined the uncomfortable Naruto.

Kiba dropped his gaze to the hallway floor. He was suddenly ashamed. It was his fault. If he hadn't taken advantage of Naruto's own kindness, he never would have been in the apartment. Then his father wouldn't have come and hurt the blonde. Then the blonde would have something to go home to that wasn't a wreck of broken furniture and dead plants.

"Mr. Nara said to take him to the hospital…" Kiba said quietly, unable to look the caring man in the eye for fear he would see the selfishness and blame him for Naruto's injuries. Even if he was right, Kiba didn't want to see that look of disappointment.

"Right." Was all he heard and moments later a shirt had been tossed on, and sandals shoved onto his feet as he picked up Naruto, who frankly was looking exhausted, and held the small body against his chest, Naruto happily resting his head on their teacher's shoulder, while grabbing Kiba's hand with his spare, the group made their way to the hospital to get the blonde checked out. Normally, Kiba wouldn't want any adult holding his hand through town, especially not his teacher! But right now it felt nice to have that warm grip around his own, safe and secure. Besides, he rationalized quickly, no one is really awake right now to see anyway.

Kiba was confused as to why they had to get their teacher, but Naruto was going to the hospital now so Mr. Nara wasn't going to get mad at him and his friend would see a doctor. It would all be alright now.

So he was surprised when they got to the hospital, the staff saw the rapidly spreading and angry bruise on the blonde's neck, heard Kiba tell them that his friend couldn't talk, heard that Naruto had been thrown into a wall by a grown man, and then they decided to do absolutely nothing.

In fact, they seemed to be looking at Kiba in more concern even though the only that that had happened to him was that he had been afraid. There was nothing wrong with him that a good shower couldn't fix.

Nameless nurses tried to tell them to sit in the waiting room and wait for a doctor to be free until Iruka started yelling about something with procedures and Naruto groaned into his neck and a nurse started shouting back about patient safety and Kiba was getting angry and he was more than done with adults yelling around him.

He had been useless all night. He hadn't been able to help Naruto in the apartment. He hadn't even been able to get Naruto to the hospital, because Iruka-sensei had gotten them there really, and now his friend was being denied service at the only hospital in town.

Kiba was growling, his fists clenching and his naturally sharp nails drawing blood as they broke through the skin. But the adults were ignoring him, much as they were Naruto and he was just fucking done. He stalked over to one of the stupid plastic chairs that stood along the wall in the waiting room, drew his leg back and kicked the first one as hard as he could. The whole row of chairs went scattering as they slammed into each other like dominos, each passing on their considerable kinetic energy into the next.

Iruka stared in surprise at his student, not so much at the aggressive action but at the controlled simmer of what seemed to be considerable rage for someone so young. The boy was practically vibrating as though his body was not able to contain the fury that was coursing through it.

Then Kiba did something he had never done before. He called upon Konoha's tendency to cater to the whims of the ninja clans who protect them from harm and bring prosperity to their village. He would shame them into doing their FUCKING JOB and seeing to his friend.

"He got hurt protecting the son of the Inuzuka clan head." He growled out. "That makes him pack. I wonder how the clan would react to the hospital refusing to treat one of the pack?" It was said idly, but the threat was clear. The Inuzukas on the whole were overly aggressive ninja who did their job affectively, but frequently got hurt in the process. The hospital made a considerable amount of money caring for the members of that clan. Not to mention, the second you ostracize one clan, the others would take offense, especially the Aburame and Hyuuga clans who were frequently teamed with Inuzukas due to how well their abilities lent to tracking and that meant funding cuts given how much money was donated to the hospital every year from the Hyuuga clan…

The intake nurse blanched as the implications began to snowball in her mind. Kiba took no notice of the proud look that Iruka granted him, as he focused an almost feral grin on the woman who had begun to quake.

She finally ushered Iruka and the still form of Naruto down the hall and into a room where reluctant staff began to check the boy's injuries. Kiba remained in the hallway outside, while Iruka hovered within. He suddenly felt exhausted, and his legs like noodles. He slid down the wall into a weird crouch that would have left him flat on his ass if he hadn't had the wall to balance against. He hugged his legs in close to his body and rested his forehead on his knees and hiccoughed softly as he tried to swallow the sobs that now threatened to break forth.

A warm arm wrapped around his shoulder and his nose caught the scent of deer, wet earth and deep forests.

"Mr. Nara…?" Kiba began. He wanted to say something, but he had no idea what he wanted to say, or should even say.

"It's okay Kiba." The man's gravelly voice said slowly. "It's not your fault."

And the dam broke. Kiba's hiccoughs turned into full on sobs. Tears streamed freely and a sound approaching wailing began to flow from his mouth. Everything that had been held back for weeks, the reasons he sought out shelter with Naruto in the first place, the reasons he kept running there, and this terrible, horrific night, it was all finally finding release in this moment, in that stark white hallway of the Konoha hospital.

Shikaku sighed and muttered under his breath, though Kiba's keen ears picked up "Troublesome." He snorted at the phrase more common than breathing for the shadow clan, but quickly fell back into his anguish.

Kiba didn't react as he was picked up and huddled into the lap of his classmate's father other than to turn into the man's chest as arms closed around him seeking comfort of the kind of tactile nature practically never seen in the gruff, get-back-up, shake-it-off, what-are-you-a-baby-? parenting style of the Inuzuka clan.

A hand ruffled through his hair as sob after wrenching sob tore out of his small body. "It's not your fault." Shikaku repeated again.

Kiba keened softly, clenching his fingers into the mesh of the Nara's shirt.

He wished that he could believe that.