The Village Hidden in the Sand's Top Secret Archives
The spy ducked as the Kunoichi from the leaf aimed her kunai at his head. His panic at the dub bomb being discovered had caused his chakra to spike. The weapon nicked off some of his dirty blonde hair and barely missed his forehead. He regained his composure and watched their surprised faces as he calmed his chakra again and escaped through the low bushes so as to be unseen.
He ran through the woods at lightning speed. As he went further, the trees got thicker indicating a location on the outskirts of the sand village. He didn't stop until he came to a clearing where an opening was concealed by a very thick wall of ivy. He ducked through the opening and down the stairs into the tunnels below. Originally it had been one of Orochimaru's hideouts that had been abandoned, but they had disposed of all his experiments and tools and made it into their own accommodating living space. He quickly ran down the west hallway toward the infirmary where Riyu was recovering from the poison. He burst open the door which surprised Riyu and the Brown haired, dark skinned girl tending to him.
"Al?" she questioned. "What's wrong?"
"Is she here?" Al asked after he had finally caught his breath.
"Ugh! Is who here Al?" Riyu groaned from the medical table. "If you mean Tia she's in the training room…"
"Not her! Fae!" Al said quickly. "We have a problem!"
Airi cocked her head. "What kind of problem? Besides she's not here. She got stir crazy and went to the market."
Al's shoulders sank with dread. "They found the bomb that had her chakra signature in it." Airi froze. Riyu cursed before throwing up.
Sakura looked at Naruto with a newfound worry. He hadn't been able to sense the intruder's chakra like she and Kankuro had. He was getting weaker, and she didn't know how much more his body could take. "Naruto," she said. "You look really tired. Why don't you go back to the hotel and see if you can't get some energy back up. I'll look around and find something for us to eat later." Naruto sighed and nodded. "Sure, might as well get it over with early today." Sakura looked at her friend confused. "What?" Naruto gave her a tiny smile. "Don't worry about it." He trudged on ahead of her and disappeared around a corner. She frowned wondering if sleeping was going to do him any good at this point. She might have to contact Shizune. She looked around as she began walking again. She would worry about that later. The current challenge was going to be finding what Naruto would eat besides ramen to help with the chakra exhaustion.
That's when the chakra presence hit her senses like wildfire. She whipped her head around in surprise. She had picked up on the thief's chakra signature. She frowned. All the intel she and Naruto had gathered back in the leaf told her the thieves were nearly impossible to catch. She shouldn't have picked up on the signature so easily. Sakura warily followed the trail hoping she wouldn't be getting into a fight with this many civilians around. What she saw at the end of the trail, however, shocked her.
"Though her comrades had fallen Midori-san knew she had no choice but to keep pressing forward. As the mighty dragon stared her down she quaked with fear in the wake of its scorching breath…" "Quaked with fear?" The raven-hired girl stopped her story to look at the grumpy face of Shiro Nakama. He stopped by the market every day to hear her stories. She had to crinkle her nose to keep herself from laughing at his pouty face. "Oh come on Fae Onee-san!" He complained loudly making the other kids grumble. Fae smiled. "You don't like the story Shiro?" she asked him. He waved his hand dismissing the notion. "The story is fine." He said. "It's Midori-san who's dumb!" Fae just tilted her head curiously. The story was from one of the books in her father's library. She and her siblings had never had a problem with the character.
Shiro loved her stories whether they were of her own invention or not, but he always felt like he had to tell her something to make them better. It was endearing and annoying at the same time. "Oh?" she said in response. "Why do you think she's dumb?" she questioned. Shiro ignored the kids who were telling him to hush so she could finish. "Quaked with fear?" he said skeptically. "I mean come on a warrior shouldn't be scared!" Fae smiled. "Actually Shiro even the strongest people in the world get scared." He held open his mouth comically. "What? No way! My parents are super strong and they never get scared!" The next words out of her mouth were intended to be some sort of life lesson or something along those lines, but the words caught in her throat as soon as the pink-haired girl appeared around the corner.
She knew who the girl was of course. Ryu, Riyu's older and surprisingly less responsible twin, had done intel on them as soon as they heard the Kazekage was planning on bringing in help from the leaf. Sakura Haruno. Classified Chunin. The current Hokage's pupil. Youngest expert medic-nin to ever grace Konoha. Unfortunately, said person had started staring holes into her since she rounded the corner. Fae had a bad feeling. She gave her attention back to Shiro wanting to wrap this up quickly. "Well how bout we end the story there for now, and you can ask your parents and tell me whether strong people get scared or not tomorrow ok?" If she was even here tomorrow. "Awwwww!" All the kids chorused slowly making their way back to their parents.
Sakura appraised the girl the boy had called Fae's appearance. She was fairly short with shoulder length black hair partially covering her face. She was wearing the normal Suna-nin gear, and Sakura supposed she was pretty other than her bandaged left arm. She faintly wondered what had caused the injury. She would've just arrested the girl right there, but a more intelligent part of her brain reminded her they were in the marketplace. Though Kankuro had made it clear what he wanted done if any of the thieves were actually found, the fact remained that she was still in Sand territory, and people would get the wrong idea if someone from the leaf tried to take in a civilian. However, even she hadn't expected to find the supposed thief telling stories to kids in the market place. The notion somewhat shattered her pre-supposed image of a hardened ninja mercenary for hire.
Choosing a more indirect approach, Sakura walked up to the girl quickly and quietly when she was done with her tale. "They really seem to like you." She said trying to appeal to the girl's ego. "You must be a good story teller." Fae blinked up at her and glanced back in the direction the kids had gone. "I don't know about that," she said cautiously. "But I do enjoy making them smile." Sakura herself blinked at the girl's simple answer. "Well, what I heard sounded good." She further complimented suddenly unsure. The girl gave her a smile and Sakura honestly couldn't tell if it was fake of not. "What's a leaf ninja doing talking to a story teller?" The girl questioned.
Sakura was surprised at the abrupt statement. "You don't see many women with pink hair and the leaf village insignia around here." The girl said pointing at her forehead. Sakura touched her headband in embarrassment. "Actually," she said trying to gage whether or not the girl was a threat. "I noticed your uniform. You wouldn't happen to work at the archives would you?" The girl nodded. "I'm stationed in the East hall at the moment." Sakura gave the most non-threatening smile she could manage. "Would you mind answering some questions? We're just trying to get everyone's side of the story." The girl frowned at her. "You mean you're interrogating everyone." She said bluntly. "If you're going to declare your intentions you may as well be honest about them." Sakura sweat dropped wondering if she should've waited on Kankuro or Temari after all. "I thought I'd put it a nicer way." She said carefully. The girl seemed to be sizing her up as well. After glancing her over for a few seconds she stood up dusting off her bum. "Actually I do mind. I have somewhere else to be right now. It shouldn't be an inconvenience for you to interrogate me with everyone else tomorrow." The girl said turning to walk away.
Sakura frowned trying to keep up with…What had that kid called her? Fae? Either way there was no chance she was letting this girl out of her sight. She pointed a finger at the girl's bandaged left arm. "Are you sure you don't need me to help with anything? That arm's got to be a pain." Fae's expression changed to a defensive one. "It isn't injured." she said pulling back from Sakura. "You have no reason to keep pestering me, so leave me alone." She started to quicken her pace. Not knowing what else to do Sakura grabbed her arm and stopped her. She knew that was a mistake as soon as the girl sent her a glare with enough kill chakra to put Tsunade to shame. "Let. Go." She said evenly.
Sakura glared back throwing all caution out the window. She pulled Fae up to her face and said to her just as evenly. "Listen here. I don't know who you are or what you're doing here. What I do know is that you're a thief and you have two choices. You can come with me quietly and explain exactly what it is you're stealing, or we fight right here and make the townspeople panic and alert the Kazekage's guard. Considering your track record so far I don't think you want the second option." She could see the girl's wheels turning in her head. "Fine." She said. "Lead the way." Sakura glared and kept a grip on the girl's arm making it look like she was helping lead her around. "So," she said to the girl. "Exactly where is it you have to be?" The girl smirked wryly giving Sakura an unexpected feeling of déjà vu. "Wouldn't you like to know."
Sakura pulled her along leading her to the path to Kankuro's office. "You know in all this excitement I almost forgot," She said as she practically dragged her. "My name's Haruno Sakura. What's yours so I can put it down for the records?" The girl hesitated for a moment before answering. "Rin Fae. It's nice to meet you. Want to hear a story?"
Naruto had made his way back to the hotel and immediately collapsed on the bed. It wasn't long before he opened his eyes and found himself back inside the maze. "You're early today." Alien said. Naruto sighed. He was obviously not going to get any kind of peace until he somehow went through the maze. He looked around and thanked God that he at least kept ending up in the same places he was before he woke up. He looked around at the cryptic symbols on the walls that Alien had called Alkaymay before getting up and stretching. He faced the direction he had been heading the night before and started walking. At this point he didn't really care where he went as long as he ended up going somewhere. Besides there was a more pressing matter on his mind. "Hey Alien," he said casually remembering she didn't like it when he yelled. Her voice came from nowhere as always.
"Yes Naruto?"
"Are you actually gonna tell me about the stupid Kyuubi?" he questioned. It wasn't like he had anything better to do at the moment.
He heard her chuckle. "These are the simplest terms I can go into so try to keep up." She said. Naruto glared, but stayed quiet. "The Kyuubi isn't just some intruder in your mind that was sealed here without your consent. Whether you like it or not, in a sense your body also belongs to him. Therefore, he is a very effective guardian." She paused to see if he was following then continued. "I believe I told you before I had to break down some barriers around your mind to get in here." Naruto frowned wondering again if she had done damage to anything important. "If it was just you occupying this body, entering your mind like I have would have been easy. However, you are not alone. The fox is also an inhabitant of your body. What I did, essentially, is use my chakra to temporarily strengthen your seal enough to bar the fox from you for a temporary period of time. Coincidently, the effect of the seal's strengthening is him taking a very hard nap. Make sense?"
Naruto was still frowning. "So basically what you're saying is you sealed him farther in my body than he was already so you could mess around in my head without him interfering?" He stated bluntly. "Yes." She deadpanned making him sweat drop. She had basically insured her passage into his head and prevented him from getting help from the Kyuubi all in one hit. He was silent for awhile making his way through the maze and looking at all the strange symbols. Why were these even here? Shoot, why was a maze here? He was supposed to find whatever he had lost, but how? Why was it so important to find whatever it was anyway? He had so many questions with the main one still being why? He growled in frustration and he wondered if he was ever going to get out of the maze, or if he was going to die from chakra exhaustion before he even got close.
He walked along miserably in no mood to talk to Alien. He passed the time by staring quizzically at the walls. He went over all that he knew and tried to put the pieces together. Alien had sealed the Kyuubi away to enter his mind and refused to help him through the maze because she insisted he had to do it himself. The maze hadn't appeared until he had actually sought her out instead of her calling to him first. She had told him she wasn't the one that had put the maze there. If she hadn't, than who had? He had run through the maze never seeming to get anywhere, and she wouldn't help him. A thought that hadn't occurred to him before suddenly entered his mind.
She had told him she wouldn't help him because he had to figure it out himself. Did he have to figure it out himself because she somehow wasn't allowed to help him? He stopped walking in light of this revelation. Alien was seemed so powerful that he had never entertained the idea of her working under someone else's whim.
"These symbols," he said aloud to her. "They all mean something right?"
"Yes. Why?" Tallah asked.
"You said something before about not being the one who put this maze in my mind. Who did?"
Tallah was silent for a few minutes. "She's not from the East Gate." She said surprising Naruto, who had expected the usual answer. "The symbols are from the West Gate, the world of her origin."
His confidence was somewhat boosted at finally receiving some answers. "Is there any way to read them?" he asked smiling.
"You knew how once." She replied.
Naruto frowned. The answer frustrated him, but he was convinced he was finally asking the right questions. "How did I know? What was the secret?"
"Figure it out again and you'll find what you seek." She said in a finalizing tone. "This is all the help I can give."
Naruto nodded. He was unsatisfied, but it would have to do. The more he looked at the symbols the more he tried to recall the seal books Jiraiya had tried to get him to memorize. As the info he could recall all came together in his mind, he realized the trend that had been bugging him for days. They signs making up the symbols were all backwards. Alien said the creator of the maze was not from the East Gate. She was from another world, the West Gate. If the maze owner was from the west gate did that mean the symbols were backwards because his world was in the East Gate? Before he knew what was happening he began rearranging the symbols. He panicked slightly as it seemed like something possessed his hands twisting the symbols and rearranging them into patterns he didn't really understand. As his hands began working faster and faster the seals began glowing brightly seeming to course through his whole being. The light all at once became so bright he couldn't see anything but white.
Just as he was about to shout for Alien to help him, he heard a new voice loud and clear in his head as if it was speaking to the very core of his being. "What are you looking for?" Suddenly nothing mattered. All the worries and fears that had consumed him left his mind. What had he been looking for? "Why are you here?" the voice asked. The voice was so familiar. He could only make out a blurry shape in the midst of all the white. He was frightened as the shape got closer. He didn't know. He couldn't move. "Why do you have to hurry?" Naruto stopped fighting as the he realized how small the shape was. "What did you lose?" Naruto recognized the voice as that of a child. What did he lose? As he stared at the shape the blur faded and with a jolt he recognized the voice's owner. It was him. The child Naruto had once been years ago smiled up at him. "You only get one word, one chance. That's how the seal works." His younger self said. "Answer the question."
Naruto reached out a hand in awe. He was surprised when the tip of his finger hit something hard. Curious Naruto spread out his hand. As his vision cleared Naruto realized what the seals had combined to make. It was a mirror. His tiny reflection mirrored his own. "What are looking for?" he asked again. "One word. Remember the last question." Naruto wracked his brain trying to find the answer. Alien said figuring out the seals would give him what he wanted. A way out? No, that couldn't be it. The maze had been designed to help him find what Alien said he was missing. The girl in his images? Maybe, but girl was too broad an answer. He needed a name. He couldn't remember her name. Naruto's breath stilled. Memories. Was that what he was missing? All those images were memories. It all suddenly made sense. "Do you have your answer?" he younger self asked. "What are you looking for?" Naruto was about to reply with his newfound revelation when something stopped him. It was an odd sensation he didn't understand. One that felt both familiar and foreign at the same time. "One word. Remember the last question."It breathed.
Naruto blinked in realization. It was a trick question. The seal knew he would realize what was missing and answer memories. He didn't know how he knew, but he did. The last question his younger image asked him wasn't "What are you missing?" His last question was "What are you looking for?" What was he looking for? Answers? No it was simpler than that. A word he had yet to think of. Suddenly the same odd sensation came over him again, and he smiled. Alien had been right. He did know how once, and he still did. The answer was as much a part of him as his own chakra network. He smiled. His younger self mirrored it. "What are you looking for?" he asked one last time. "The Truth." Naruto said. The mirror shattered under his hand leaving an opening to the path that would lead him out of the maze.
Naruto's grin lit up his whole face as he felt his chakra being restored. He lifted his head about to yell in triumph to Alien when his whole mind shook. He gave a yelp as he fell to the ground. He heard Alien yell faintly. "I am going to kill..!" Before he could finish hearing the thought, he was pulled violently from sleep. He lay there panting in shock for several minutes before one thought surfaced over all the others running through his head. What just happened?
Meanwhile
Sakura stared at Fae for the umpteenth hundredth time that evening. She hadn't expected bringing her in to be this easy. In fact, considering the thieves had a track record extending to more nations than the sand she thought she'd at least get a fight from the girl. However, she was just letting Sakura drag her along. To top matters off she had spent most of the time telling her a story about a boy trying to get his love to kiss him back to life because the guardian of death or something told him he wasn't supposed to die yet and was being given a second chance. (1) She rolled her eyes at the fairly talkative prisoner. She was 99% sure the girl was doing it just to tick her off.
"So why all the decoys?" she asked interrupting the girl's story.
"Don't you already know the answer to that? Your file said you were pretty smart." Fae replied sarcastically.
Sakura frowned. So she had known who she was as soon as she had seen her. She sighed. "Well I don't suppose you're actually going to tell me what you're really stealing now are you?"
"Shouldn't Kankuro be interrogating me?" Fae asked her. "After all the Leaf isn't the authority here."
Sakura was tempted to take out her kunai and press it to the back of the girl's neck. She had made it her mission to push every one of Sakura's buttons as soon as she had captured her. She let out an exasperated sigh. "Let's start with something simple then. How did your friend break into the archives?" The girl surprised her by actually responding. "I work there. You said as much back in the market." Sakura glanced at the girl's bandaged arm. "You were caught in the explosion." It wasn't a question and the girl didn't bother to answer it. "You're making a mistake." she said instead. Sakura narrowed her eyes. "Is that a threat?" She said tone dangerous. The girl rolled her eyes giving Sakura another sense of déjà vu. "It's a statement. I don't have time to get thrown in jail and you don't have time to arrest me. You've scratched the surface, but you have no idea what the rest of the story looks like."
Sakura was confused. Fae obviously was not willing to go to jail, but she wasn't fighting to get away from her either. In fact, other than the sarcastic comments and baiting, she was being so civil Sakura was convinced something was wrong. "Unless you're willing to enlighten me, I have plenty of time to see Kankuro throw you and the rest of your group behind bars." The girl glared at her. "Someone from Konohagakure has no right to call me a thief after all the corrupt things your elders have done to get the village where it is." She said bitterly. Sakura blinked at the girl's hostility. "You should mind your tongue thief. Konohagakure is one of the most respected ninja villages in this land." Fae looked her right in the eyes and sent shivers down Sakura's spine. "Are you really that naïve," she said calmly. "Or did they really do such a wonderful job covering up the Uchiha Massacre and the Anbu base explosion?"
Sakura was getting a little intimidated now. As harmless as she seemed Fae obviously knew a lot about Konoha, and she was obviously very sure of herself. That made her dangerous. Sakura gripped her kunai tightly. "You should keep quiet about matters that don't concern you." She said pointing it at the back of the girl's neck threateningly. "And you should've put me in hand cuffs when you had the chance." Fae replied. Before Sakura knew what was happening Fae had kicked her in the stomach shoving her backward and was making a run for it. Sakura recovered from the hit and pursued her. She was tough to follow. She was good at dodging things and knocking them in front of Sakura. She bit her lip. The market was in an uproar thanks to the girls antics and people were wondering why a leaf ninja was chasing someone they apparently knew.
Sakura wondered exactly where the girl was heading when she started seeing trees. She recognized the scenery and realized Fae was heading somewhere on the outskirts of the town. Even though Suna was mostly dessert, it had a section on the outskirts of the village made up by an oasis. (2) For some reason she couldn't pinpoint, Sakura began feeling nervous. It wasn't until then that she realized the direction Fae was heading had no other chakra signatures. She slowed her pace suddenly realizing the danger she was in.
Fae wouldn't just escape and lead her directly to the other thieves. It was then she realized Fae's chakra had been standing still for the past ten minutes. She had walked into a trap. By the time this realization set in it was too late. The steel cable wires loomed all around the frightened Konoichi, and she screamed as Fae sent the rush of lightning all through them electrocuting her.
1. To those of you who realized this immediately, you're awesome! For those of you who didn't get this reference, the story Fae is telling Sakura is the basic plot of the first few episodes of Yu Yu Hakasho.
2. I realize that there is no oasis in Sunagakure in the manga or anime, but it fits my purpose for the story and they live in a darn desert. So in reality it's not a big stretch assuming there's going to be an oasis somewhere in a state that's completely covered in sand.