Author's Notes:
First, thank you so much to those who were kind enough to review my first chapter. I really appreciate it!
For whatever reason this story is moving really slowly. I have a whole plot planned out in my head and it hasn't even really gotten started yet – so basically what I'm saying is that SasuNaru is gonna happen, but it may take a looong freaking time. Several chapters. I hope people will be patient with me! I do promise to kill off any OCs eventually.
The next day, Team Seven had been instructed to gather, promptly at eight o'clock, in the Hokage's office. 'Promptly' had been emphasized several times, but that didn't prevent Kakashi from being twenty minutes late.
"I had to… uh…"
"Help a kitten cross a road?" Sakura supplied helpfully.
"Rescue a baby from a burning building?" asked Naruto.
Sasuke didn't say anything. The Hokage sighed. "Well, now that you're all assembled," she said, and tossed a picture across the desk for Kakashi to look at.
"This man," she said, "Is a dangerous criminal. He was formerly working for Orochimaru," she refrained from looking at Sasuke, "and we think he slipped away from the Hidden Sound village before it was destroyed. In fact, he's not a very powerful ninja per se, but we believe that he managed to steal some important information before he left Sound, and furthermore that he may have come to Konoha recently for some purpose, in order to gather more. I need your team to… Good Lord, Naruto, Sakura, why are you two gaping like that?"
Kakashi had glanced over the photo and passed it to Sasuke, who had recognized it as being a shinobi from Sound – not one he had tagged as being important or interesting. He had passed the picture on to Sakura who had glanced at it – then glanced at it again, more carefully, and was now leaning over to Naruto and whispering, "hey, isn't that the guy from the other night who…" and Naruto was looking distinctly green.
"Akira..." he mumbled.
Naruto had seen Sasuke laughing yesterday, now Sakura, Kakashi, and the Hokage got to appreciate the weirdness of it too. Actually they were all pretty much too busy laughing at the same time to really notice.
"You're telling me…" the Hokage said, between giggles, "that you, last night, Naruto… went out… disguised as a girl… this criminal… we have been trying to apprehend… tried to pick you up… and now won't stop…." Her laughter caused her to start hiccupping. "Calling."
Naruto decided not to dignify this with a response, especially since he had already explained the whole thing twice.
"Well, it makes sense," said Kakashi, who was sufficiently recovered to have started reading the information they had gathered about the criminal.
"Ohore Akira… see? It says that his major weakness is women… it seems he gets infatuated… and.. uhh..." his eyes slid down the page. "Actually, this doesn't look that good." He looked at Naruto, and seemed to be smiling under his mask. "Luckily, Naruto, I think you're a lot stronger, so you can probably fight him off."
"What does it say?" Sakura pulled the dossier away from Kakashi. "Oh gross! It says he eviscerated his last girlfriend after he caught her cheating on him… Don't worry, Naruto!" She put her hand on his shoulder. "We'll protect you, so it's ok!"
"It's fine, Sakura," Naruto said in annoyance. "I'm never going to use that disguise again anyway, and I don't need protection, so.. DAMNIT SASUKE, TEME! Will you STOP laughing at me already!?"
"Hmmm…" said Tsunade, thoughtfully. "This raises a lot of interesting possibilities, though… don't you think, Kakashi-san?"
Kakashi looked lazy "I don't know. What do you have in mind?"
"Well, my original plan was to tell you four to go out, capture this man, and then bring him back here, for interrogation. But what Naruto is saying is that, with no provocation whatsoever, Ohore spilled all kinds of secrets about his mission last night to Naruto – um, excuse me, Kumiko – just because he wanted to impress her. So maybe, as they say, you can catch more flies with honey than with vinegar."
This was enough of a hint of what she had in mind for Sasuke to catch her meaning, and start smirking again. Naruto thought about it and began to turn green. "No, you old bag, listen…"
"You old bag?" Tsunade raised one eyebrow. "Don't you think, Kumiko-chan, you should be a little more polite to people who have control over your missions?"
Changes in missions involved logistical challenges as well. For one thing, even though Ohore Akira didn't seem to the brightest bulb, even he was likely to notice a simple jutsu like the sexy jutsu and see through it when he wasn't drunk. And, a bigger challenge, Tsunade explained, was that she suspected he had superiors hiding in towns near Konoha – higher-ups in the Sound hierarchy who were waiting for him to report back to him. If any of them got a whiff of 'Kumiko'… well…
"Luckily," said Tsunade, leading Naruto and Team Seven through the hallways of Konoha hospitals, "you have twice the chakra of an average ninja, and we can take advantage of that."
"What do you mean?" Naruto said, cautiously.
"Here," Tsunade opened the door to an examining room. "Everyone sit down. Sakura, this'll be good training for you too. Ok, Naruto, show me 'Kumiko'."
Naruto muttered a few rude things under his breath, but with a sigh performed the jutsu.
"Good, good!" Tsunade said, looking the form over. "More realistic than that busty girl you usually do. A little shorter than you, though… we'll have to change that… ok…" She started looking through the scrolls she had brought with her. "That is what we're going to do."
Sakura, Naruto, and Kakashi looked over the scroll curiously. "And this is?" Sakura asked.
"A jutsu usually used by male nins when they want to get pregnant."
"No!" said Naruto. "No, no, no, no! Damn it, Tsunade, I'll go and cut off that guy's head right now. I am NOT doing this."
"Just relax. Nobody's getting you pregnant. This is just a way of making your body take on the female shape without it being an illusion. Also, you won't have to consciously maintain it. In other words," Tsunade pointed a finger at him, "You'll stay in female form while you sleep, and the amount of chakra needed to maintain the form should be less. And," she stressed, "no one looking at you, even Sasuke, or a Hyuuga, will be able to tell that you aren't genuine, 100 female."
"Yippee." Naruto mumbled.
"Don't be so difficult!" Most people can't even do this jutsu!" She tried to persuade him. "It takes someone super-strong… this is like, a special technique only you can handle, Naruto. "
The blonde's eyes were starting to brighten. They brightened a little bit with 'super-strong' and a little more with 'special technique."
"He's not really going to fall for that, is he?" Sakura whispered to Kakashi.
They all waited for a tense moment.
"You'll be the only person in the world to currently be able to do this technique..." she coaxed.
"There's a reason no one wants to master it..." Sakura mumbled.
"Well, when you put it like that…" Naruto said. He was sticking his chest out, and getting that entirely-too-pleased look on his face that often appeared when he was being praised.
"He's going to fall for it." Said Sakura.
"He fell for it." Said Sasuke.
"Great!" said Tsunade. She threw him a hospital robe. "Put this on, ok! Sakura, we need to prepare!"
Twenty-four hours later, an exhausted female Naruto was discharged from the hospital.
"Take him home, ok?" Kakashi told Sasuke. "And stay there, at least overnight. Tsunade said it normally takes two weeks for a person to recover, but with Naruto's abilities it should be a lot faster. Even so, just to be on the safe side, I want you to keep an eye on him. We meet to develop a plan tomorrow evening."
Naruto was barely keeping his head up as they stumbled down the street. "Damn," he said. "I feel so tired."
"Tsunade said you would."
"This sucks, Sasuke… this is like, the worst stupid mission ever."
"Worse than the cat-chasing? Worse than the baby-sitting?"
That caused a slight smile to appear on Naruto's face. "Ok, well, at least this one is A-ranked."
"Right."
Sasuke tried unlocking the door to Naruto's apartment for a moment before the blonde mumbled that it wasn't locked.
"Ah..." said Naruto. "I'm going to bed." He stumbled off.
Sasuke looked around the messy living-room. The blankets from when he'd slept on the couch the other day were still there. He sat down next to it. Something was blinking, he noticed…
It was the phone, next to the couch. The little answering light was blinking. Curious, Sasuke pressed it.
"Kumiko-chan? Are you there?..." beep
"Kumiko-chan? It's me… uh… Akira… we met the other night, and. Umm.." beep
"That guy who picked up the phone this morning? That wasn't your boyfriend, was it? The one you said dumped you? Because, you know, if you're having a problem with him, I could always help you out, and uh…" beep
"Hi? I just wanted to call and apologize to… whoever this is… I thought this was someone else's number, so.. uh… sorry.. but, uh, if this is Kumiko's number, you can call me back, I'm at 755-1032… oh, yeah, this is Akira, from the other night… so.. uh.. yeah, bye." beep
Sasuke stared at the phone. He'd had some pretty extreme stalkers in his life, and this guy definitely rated a full nine or even ten points on the creepy and/or annoying scale. Luckily Naruto really could take care of himself…
He leaned his head on the back of the couch and sighed. What was he supposed to do until Naruto woke up, anyway? He looked around the sparse living room. Couch, kitchen table, two chairs, a couple of empty ramen cups that still hadn't been thrown away. A stack of manga in the corner. He should have brought something to read with him…
In the bedroom, twenty feet away, Naruto's head had already hit the pillow… the jutsu had thrown his body and all his hormones out of whack, and so his dreams were coming warped and unpleasant, not quite nightmares but not quite right either…
He was standing in a field, in a clearing somewhere near Konoha, and an animal was stalking him. Or rather he was stalking the animal. He could smell his prey so clearly that he knew every move the little animal was making, every thought that went racing through its head as it tried to catch the scent of the fox, tried to turn, run, hide, and
Then he was upon it on it jumping down catching the neck between his teeth snapping cracking breaking with a satisfying crunch the little movement stopped and the thing was dead and the hunt was over and the interest was gone, but he was still hungry and so he would eat and then
one of Kiba's dogs, or Kakashi's, a little nin dog with it's neck broken, and
Naruto groaned, woke halfway up, turned and rolled over… but how could a fox catch a dog? He thought to wonder..
But oh, no, this fox was very BIG, big, and a dog, even a nin dog couldn't see it couldn't smell it and oh how nice hot blood on a cool evening and a pleasant shudder went through his body
Something nice to take home for the kits, they are small still but catch a live one in a few days time and they can start practicing, start practicing and learn and
The image passed through his mind of kits that were not kits, but rather dangerous and evil, little balls of red-hot chakra and fire. Little live rasengens ready to roll out onto the world. And curled around them was the shape of their mother, the evil Cheshire-Cat like grin that was somehow most of what Naruto ever saw of the Kyuubi, when the Kyuubi pressed its snout against the bars and snaked it's chakra-fire tongue through, trying to wrap around his body and
"Damn Fox!" Naruto shouted, leaping back.
"you see my memory?" Purred the fox. "Oh, I like you in this new form."
Twenty feet away, in the living room, Sasuke heard Naruto groan again and wondered what to do. He could go and wake the boy up, he supposed. Sit by the bed, but that wouldn't help things anyway. Tsunade had said he just needed to sleep.
And, he admitted to himself, just grudgingly, that seeing Naruto in that female form made him just a little… uneasy. Not so much because Naruto looked hot like that- though he did, and that made Sasuke a little uneasy in itself - but because it seemed so wrong to put Naruto into any form that made him look weak, as though he needed to be protected. Not when, Naruto was, hands down, the strongest person Sasuke knew. No one else could have tried so hard with so little encouragement for so long.
Naruto moaned again. I wonder what he dreams about, Sasuke wondered briefly. He knew vaguely that Naruto was an orphan, like he was. He knew as well about the fox within.
I wonder if, when he dreams, he has the same kind of nightmares, like me.
Naruto slept for sixteen hours. When he finally woke, it was dawn, and he felt as though he usually did, after any good night of sleep: comfortably rested. It wasn't until he hauled his ass to the bathroom to brush his teeth, and casually looked in the mirror, that the events of the day before came rushing back to him. Damn sexy jutsu! And damn Tsunade-baba for coming up with such a lame-ass mission for him to complete. It was probably revenge, he thought, for all the pranks he had pulled on her in the past.
Lazily, he scratched his crotch (out of habit, it didn't feel the same) and wandered into the kitchen to find some breakfast. Sasuke was asleep on the couch, he noticed – surprisingly, it seemed the Uchiha was not a neat sleeper, because he had managed to kick his blanket one way, and his pillow another, and now one leg and one arm were handing entirely off the couch, and the other arm was pinned under his body… that's gonna hurt when he wakes up, Naruto thought vaguely, imagining the pins and needles he would feel from a limb that had fallen asleep.
Something about Sasuke looked vaguely different this morning… Naruto slit his eyes and stared. Maybe he just wasn't used to seeing his teammate asleep… but no, he'd seen that lots of times, on missions and stuff, even though Sasuke was generally so anal-retentive that he didn't really like it when people saw him with his guard down. No, it was something else… but he couldn't quite put his finger on what….
The phone rang, and Naruto's heart skipped a beat. No one called him pretty much ever, but the other morning that stalker had called a lot. He went over to the receiver and picked up. On the couch, Sasuke was stirring. He must have heard the call too.
How do I act? Naruto thought nervously. "Hello?" he said, hesitantly.
"Hello? Is this Kumiko-chan?"
"Speaking." Naruto said.
"This is… uh… I don't know if you remember me from the other night, but… Akira? We met at La Maison Blanche?"
"Oh, of course, Akira-san…" he tried to put a little bit of relief into his voice. He was just winging it here. "I heard your messages from the other day, I wanted to call, but…" Naruto lowered his voice, "He came back, you know? And I was so afraid…"
"Your ex?" Akira's voice sounded protective towards Kumiko, and menacing, all at once. "I talked to him. He didn't…"
"Oh, no, nothing like that.." Naruto said, nervously. Sasuke had sat up and was listening to the conversation intently. "I mean… uh… I fought him off… and, uh… got my neighbor to keep an eye out for him… I'm sorry, Akira-san," he hesitated, "I just met you, I shouldn't be bothering you with all this."
"Not at all," said the Sound nin, "If there's anything I can do to help… tell you what," he continued, "Why don't we meet somewhere? I'm a pretty advanced fighter, you know, maybe I can give you some help. At the very least we can talk things over. Ok?"
Naruto looked at Sasuke and mimicked a shudder. Sasuke nodded, grimly.
"That sounds great, Akira-san."
He hung up the phone firmly. "Bleh! Gross." Naruto said. "gross, gross, gross."
Sasuke stretched, cat-like. "What was all that about?"
"The other day, he got the idea that I have this super-possessive ex-boyfriend. I just went with it."
"Fine," Sasuke said, "But don't make your story too complicated. An idiot like you will get confused over the details."
Naruto glared at him. Just for that, he thought, I'm gonna make up at least four or five pointless details to tell this Akira guy today. Just to piss Sasuke off. "I'll call Kakashi and tell him we've moved up the plan."
For a second time, Naruto found himself dolled-up, waiting at a restaurant for a man to come and sweep him off his feet. Today's outfit was something Sakura had run over (she had lamented that Naruto had not been able to negotiate a dinner date, thus giving her time to shop). Since the clothing was Sakura's it was cute and stylish, but tight around Naruto's bust and loose around the waist and hips. This had put Sakura in a bad mood when she saw him try it on.
He played with the soda he had ordered and tried to think of ways to look and act feminine so that his cover wouldn't be blown when Akira came. Two tables over, Kakashi and Sakura had ordered lunch, and were waiting to see what would happen. Sasuke, who, it was felt, was too likely to be recognized by anyone from the Sound, had been ordered to stay far, far away from the whole Sting operation.
"Sorry I'm late." With a look that Naruto supposed was meant to be charming Akira sat down beside him. "I have to be careful wherever I go, you never know who might be looking for me."
"Oh?" Naruto remembered his mission. The sooner I sweet-talk this loser into revealing all his pathetic secrets, the sooner I can drop this body and get back to normal. He opened his eyes very wide, as if he were frightened. "People are looking for you? Are they dangerous?"
Akira nodded grimly. He had a tiny piece of tissue paper on his chin, as if he had cut himself shaving and forgotten to take it off. "Very."
"But, this is Konoha. Surely you are safe here…"
He laughed. "Some of the people looking for me are Konoha ninjas." He looked off, as if gazing into the distance. "Those aren't the ones I'm worried about, though. Anyway, look at yourself. You're in Konoha, and you aren't safe from your ex-boyfriend."
"Oh, that's.. that's because…" Naruto thought fast, "He's a ninja himself, and very well regarded, whereas I'm just a… uh.. waitress… so nobody takes me seriously."
"Oh, is it like that?" Akira said. "What's his name, anyway? Maybe I've heard of him.."
Naruto drew a blank. If he picked a random, fake name, Akira, who presumably had done research on the Hidden Leaf, would probably know it was fake. So he should pick someone real. Kakashi? But if the person he named was too strong, would it scare Akira off? After all, he wanted it to be someone Akira thought he could defeat… Shikamaru? Out. Neji? Out. Chouji? Out, out, out."
"Lee," Naruto said, weakly. "Rock Lee."
Akira looked confused. "I haven't heard of him."
"Well…" Naruto prevaricated, "He was injured a few years ago, so he's pretty much out of action now, but he's got a great reputation in the village, people see him as being a pretty great guy. And he is, in public… but in private he's totally different." He tried to look scared. Out of the corner of his eye he could see Kakashi, looking amused, and Sakura pissed-off. Well, he thought, I did just start making up rumors about her boyfriend, Naruto thought.
"Oh, is that it?" Akira looked pleased. "Well, why don't I go and talk to him for you?" He cracked his knuckles.
"Oh, no, you don't understand," Naruto said, desperately… "We've tried all that… it's just, people in the village respect him so much… they see me as being the bad one in all this, and… uh…" Why are we talking so much about me, and my fake life, he wondered. How can I get things back on track? "I'm sorry, Akira-san," he said. "Here I am, spilling all my problems to you, and I haven't even asked about you. Tell me more about yourself."
"Oh," Akira said, "Don't worry about me. Just think of me as… your knight in shining armor."
Oh, Naruto thought. Great. My knight.
"I've got a plan," Akira told him.
So? Sakura asked, once the freak-nin was gone. "What did he say?"
"He wouldn't tell me." Naruto sighed. "Just that I'm supposed to meet him again, tonight, at midnight, by the West gate of town."
"Wow," said Sakura. "I wonder what he's thinking."
Naruto glared. "I think that's unfortunately obvious, don't you?"
"Why did you have to pull Lee into all this, anyway? What if that freak shows up and starts bothering him?"
Kakashi nodded. "Just to be on the safe side, Sakura, why don't you go and fill Lee in on everything that's been happening. You can spend the night at his place, too, just in case."
Sakura flushed. "Ok." She turned to go.
"Since she's occupied with that, " Kakashi continued. "I guess I get to be the one to pick out your next outfit?"
"What are they doing now?"
Sakura groaned. She, Sasuke, and Kakashi were sitting on a rooftop, hidden by a chimney, and Sasuke was using binoculars to watch the progress of Naruto and Akira's second 'date'.
"They're still talking," Sasuke reported, emotionlessly. Geez, Sakura moaned to herself. Sasuke was reporting on the same situation every time Kakashi asked him, giving no indication by the tone of his voice about how lame the entire exercise off. Kakashi was enjoying himself, because he was requiring Sasuke to give running commentary. Obviously it wasn't even necessary, because Kakashi's nose was, as always, deep into his porno book. All Sasuke had said for the past fifteen minutes was 'they're still talking."
"Hey, let me see," she said, finally, just for something better to do. Wordlessly, Sasuke handed over the binoculars. Sakura peered towards the street below them.
"Hey!" She yelped. "They're not just talking! He's got his arm on Naruto's shoulder, and… wow, he's leaning in… like he's gonna… no wait, he just picked a piece of lint or something off Naruto's shirt. But he kind of brushed her boob while he did it. Now, that's trashy… if a guy did that to me, I'd…"
"Swoon in ecstacy?" Kakashi said, helpfully.
"Hey." She gave him a dirty look.
"On second thought, why don't you finish the look-out, Sakura? You clearly have more of a gift for description than Sasuke here."
Pouting, Sakura went back to the binoculars. Had she just gotten tricked? Damn, this was the lamest mission ever…
"Hey, wait," she said, surprised. "They're gone."
Akira's brilliant plan to help 'Kumiko-chan', in turned out, was pretty simple. Akira explained it to Naruto in a few words, as they stood on the street.
"I'm leaving Konoha," Akira said. "Tonight. I'd like you to come with me."
Naruto felt his mouth falling open, and then his already overworked brain was forced to start spinning again. What should he do? He didn't want to have to go on a trip with Akira. He didn't want his spy-mission (after all, he'd had to get changed into a girl, for goodness sake) to go to waste. Tsunade-baba had said that Akira probably had important information.
"But… but..." he said, "I want to get to know you better, can't we do that before you ask me to make such a big decision?"
Akira looked belligerent. "I already know," he said, grabbing Naruto's hands and pulling them to his chest, "that you're the one for me." He narrowed his eyes. "I don't understand you to understand immediately, but soon, you'll see that we were meant to be together. Once we start moving you'll see."
"Umm… ok… but, you know, I have to pack… and… um… tell my family good-bye… and… uh… have a farewell party?"
"What are you talking about?" Akira gestured. "I'm an outlaw, get it? From now on we're going to live totally free, away from all the ties of normal people. I can buy you new clothes. And you can send your family a note. Unless…" his eyes narrowed dangerously, "Unless you don't want to run away with me…"
"Oh, no, not that at all… I definitely want to…" Naruto stammered, inwardly cursing. How was this all getting so out of hand?
"Now," Akira said, firmly, suddenly reaching down and picking up Naruto, bridal-style, in a swooping gesture, "Let's be on our way."
Damn, Naruto just had time to think. This totally sucks.