Carry On Pt. Two
No more lies, no more hiding
Iruka slams the door shut, startling his class. "Get back to your tests. If you're done, bring it to my desk and somebody wake up Shikamaru."
He sits at his desk, head in hands. Sakura makes her way over, placing a finished test in front of him, pausing.
She keeps her voice quiet enough to still be heard. "Were you…talking about him?"
Iruka sighs. "It's nothing you should be worried about."
Sakura briefly looks away, taking a few seconds to think it over. "Is he really that bad?"
"I hope not."
Back at the ramen shop, Naruto stands in place, finding himself unable to move a muscle. His skin had gone pale, his lungs tightened, heart beating like a drum and the flow of blood pounding in his ears.
"Menma."
He looks over to see Tominoko, worried at his sudden change in complexion.
"C'mon." Tominoko leads him over to the bathroom, closing the door behind him and going back to the kitchen, sighing.
"Is the kid sick or something?" One of the shinobi asks.
"I dunno. He was fine earlier."
The sound of vomiting cuts them off before anyone can respond. Naruto kneels over the toilet, trying to catch his breath as he coughs, wiping away burning tears.
The shinobi pushes away the bowl, putting a few bills on the counter. Tominoko sighs again. "Looks like I'll have to buy some new supplies." He mumbles.
Naruto, unable to find the strength to stand, lets himself fall to the floor. As he stares at the white light sitting in the ceiling, his mind wanders and he closes his eyes, waking up in a field of dead but still green grass with patches of snow scattered throughout, melting into the blackened ground. He gets up, a distant voice begging him to return but he ignores it and the voice quickly becomes faint against the sound of the wind blowing and carrying fresh snow that seems to pass right through him. He looks into the distance and sees himself, years younger but unmistakably himself, dressed in a orange coat and blue scarf. He runs through the snow as the wind blows harder and the snow gets thicker and he gets closer and realizes that his younger self doesn't even know he's there. The voice comes back, fighting against the gusts.
"STOP!" It shouts, cutting and bitter but quietly melancholic.
Menma watches as the young boy in the coat kneels into the snow, extending a hand to someone or something drowning in the sea of white. The fresh snow breaks open and a girl stands, her eyes mimicking the blizzard and the wind dies, it's silent and that terrifyingly familiar look of fear spreads across her face. Menma watches in numb and silent horror as she looks away and screams, puncturing his heart with a single strike.
Three knocks at the bathroom door. "Menma, you alright in there?"
Anger floods his mind and he finds himself in a dark hallway with a red cage at the end of it. "Kurama." He says.
"I closed down the shop. Just let me know when you're done in there."
"What was that?"
The Kitsune looks away.
"Kurama!" Menma shouts.
Kurama glares at him, confused by the sudden change in his hair from blonde to black but he chooses to ignore it. "It's something you were never meant to see."
"What?" He asks shakily, confused by a vision of his apparent death.
Kurama takes a few seconds, unable to bring himself to look Menma in the eyes. "It was winter…and you were headed home from Ichiraku ramen. You saw that girl being bullied and you wanted to help. You almost died but…I used my chakra to heal you and take you home."
There's a bout of silence that seems to last for hours. "Why didn't you tell me?" Menma questions, his voice cold and tired.
"I didn't want…"
"Ya know what, just stop. I don't want your excuses." He turns to leave.
"Wait, Naruto!"
"DON'T call me that!"
Kurama recoils, concerned and desperate.
Menma takes a deep breath and exhales. "I don't know if I can put my trust in you anymore. I almost died that night and you stayed silent about it. That ramen chef was one of the only people that treated me like a human and I avoided him for years because I thought he had hurt me. This may be the last time we ever speak but I'm not going to leave you by yourself."
He lets out a bit of his chakra and Kurama watches as it forms into a younger, smiling Naruto in a white shirt, tan jeans and a blue scarf around his neck. The chakra clone runs to Kurama, hugging his snout and laughing happily. Menma takes his leave and Kurama watches him as a heaviness builds in his chest.
Tominoko stands outside the bathroom door. "You alright in there, kid?"
Menma doesn't respond and walks over to the sink, washing the vomit off of his face. He stares at the wall facing the door, shuts off the water and stands in front of it, weaving the Tiger seal followed by a combination of seals he could recall. Nothing. He does it again, starting with Tiger and still nothing. Unfazed, he tries again. "Tiger, boar, tiger." He presses a hand to the wall, blowing a hole in it large enough to walk through and watches curiously as it reforms. Hearing Tominoko call his name, he flickers away and dissapears.