Once upon a Modern Tale
Pairing: Naruto x Sasuke
Warning: Shounen ai, unbeta-ed, Neji x Naruto, Gaara x Neji
Inspired by: Robin Hood, Love among the Walnuts, and always by my wacko imagination
Summary: AU (NaruSasu) Once upon a time, there lived an extremely handsome and exceedingly rich young man. But, he didn't care for any of it, and so he locked himself up in his large manor, never coming out. Then, one day, he met the most amazing person; a beautiful boy with cerulean blue eyes. This is where our Modern Tale begins, with a Modern Robin Hood, and a Modern love story.
Please forgive my bad usages of Japanese terms; I don't speak the language so I have almost no idea how to use them.
Disclaimer: Naruto and anything related does not belong to me. Don't sue.
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Third
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Now, I know some you are wondering just how did Naruto become like this? For someone so innocent seeming, he sure is mean to the rich. Well, you see there is one simple reason for this character trait of his. But, to find that out (and I know you really do want to know), we will have to go a couple of years back, into the childhood of our modern-day Robin Hood. Of course, that will mean we must put the fairy tale on a temporary hold….
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"This will be your new home, Naruto-kun." A small blonde child stared up at the old house, and then back at his Iruka-sensei. He didn't want to go in there. It looked like a prison, and it sounded like one too. Everything was so deadly still, and not one thing was out of place. No children played, no laughter was heard, and indeed it was a place completely unfit for children. Yet, there were so many living in that old manor, because it was the only place they could go. This place was their home, and soon Naruto would be calling it his home as well.
"I want you to be strong, Naruto-kun." Iruka-sensei's brown eyes were sad. The blonde child nodded, but clung onto him sensei. "I want to go with you!"
"You can't, Naruto." The man's reply was gentle, "they won't let me adopt you…. Yet, but maybe later." He hugged Naruto close to him.
Naruto felt himself being torn from Iruka's hold, and cried out. He cried from the pain coming from his heart, and from the vice-like grip the nun had on his thin little arm.
"Be strong, Naruto!" was the last thing he heard, before he was dragged into the old house, which smelled of emptiness, and the wide heavy doors swung closed with a booming sound.
That sadly was only the beginning. There is more of our Robin Hood's childhood. He arrived at the boarding school at the age of six. There wasn't anywhere else to go, and no other place would accept him. Iruka-sensei had no choice but to send the blonde to the school. It wasn't a particularly nice school, as Naruto soon discovered.
"You will wear this," the nun said, pointing to a patched up looking pants and a shirt that was almost in shatters. "You will keep your eyes down at all times, and keep you yourself. Never speak unless you are spoken to, and most importantly, you must know your place." The blonde child nodded meekly, tears in his blue eyes.
You see, the poor and the rich went to this school. The poor because there was nowhere else to go, and the rich because the teachers there are all top graduates of their classes, and are very famous throughout the land. There were always differences between the rich and the poor though. The most noticeable one was that they wore different uniforms. The poor got the old clothes that have been used over and over. The rich on the other hand, had the money to buy new uniforms made from expensive material. The uniform was what set them apart. The teachers were nice to the rich, and treated the poor like slaves. That was what the nun had meant when she said, 'know your place.'
The days were very much alike. Each day, Naruto would wake at exactly five o'clock in the morning, and be in the dining room (a dirty and foul smelling room) by five ten. If he was late by a few minutes, he would not get a breakfast. The food they gave him was a measly amount. There was never enough to fill his stomach, which was always growling. He soon felt light-headed.
He would attend his classes, with other children dressed in the same tattered clothes as his. No one spoke. It could have been because they had no energy from lack of food or because the teachers were all quite nasty and had the tendency of hitting the students, Naruto did not know. But he tried his best to keep out of the way. That however, didn't work one day.
Naruto had been roughly pushed out of the way when the nuns started to serve the food. He fell on his wrist, and had probably sprained it badly. It had swollen up immediately. No one helped him, and he didn't dare tell the nuns or teachers. They wouldn't have cared anyway, or if they did he would have been excused from his classes, and forced to do horrible chores around the school. He didn't get any food that morning. So, the blonde had dropped the chalk box the teacher had told him to get. It fell onto the floor. Naruto flinched at the sound of chalk snapping in half, or threes, or fours.
Everything was deadly quiet as the teacher came. Naruto saw death in his eyes. He didn't remember much afterwards, except stumbling out into the courtyard with something sticky and hot streaming down his face. Then black, and everything went numb.
Naruto woke and found himself staring into pupil-less eyes. They were the colour of white ivory, and they gazed deep into him. His head was being cradled in someone's lap, and he no longer felt anything on his face. The other child smiled shyly. It was the day Naruto met Neji Hyuuga.
Neji was of noble blood, and his family was very rich. For some reason, he took an interest in Naruto Uzumaki; an orphan with no noble blood or money. Neji didn't seem to care.
"Naruto-chan," Neji had taken to calling him that, and Naruto didn't dare correct the Hyuuga, "why don't you come and sit by me?" Neji gave a small smile.
"Yes, Hyuuga-sama." The blonde child did as he was told, and sat beside the other boy on the soft grass. They were in the courtyard in the late afternoon. The sun was setting, and the sky was a beautiful mixture of pinks, oranges, yellows and purple.
Naruto stiffened as he felt cool hands on his neck, as his head was directed to rest on the white-eyed boy's shoulder. "Don't call me Hyuuga-sama…"
"But…" Small Naruto's eyes widened considerably.
"Please." Neji turned his head and pushed his nose into Naruto's blonde locks. There was silence for a while.
"But…what should I call you?"
"What ever you want, Naruto-chan." Neji smiled and Naruto gazed at his ivory-eyes.
Naruto couldn't believe that Neji Hyuuga took an interest in him. He didn't trust his ears the day that Neji had confessed to him. He thought that it was too good to be true. Neji liked him. The tomato face of the Hyuuga had told the blonde that it was not a lie.
"I like you."
"I like you too."
I would very much love to say, 'and they lived happily ever after' but that was not the case. There was still a difference in status between them. Naruto remained clueless to the strange looks that came his way whenever he walked with Neji, or whenever he was seen with the other boy. Life was simple to Naruto. He had three things; his life, his happiness and his Neji. And, of course, you would be expecting this line. Then one day everything changed.
"This can't go on anymore Uzumaki." Neji's voice was harsh. He was just called into the head teacher/s office, and his uncle had been in there also.
"What? But, Neji-san…"
The white-haired child turned away abruptly, but Naruto saw a flash in Neji's eyes. Anger. "Are you…mad at me?" Neji ignored his question.
"You were nothing to me, understand?! Nothing!" Naruto flinched, but didn't back off. He wanted a reason, he needed a reason. "Why? Why are you doing this? Please tell me why!"
The blonde was crying now; everything was happening so fast. One moment he was so happy laughing with his Neji, and now it was all just so easily ripped away from him. His head hurt, it was just like the day he was torn from Iruka-sensei's hug. Neji didn't turn around, but he clenched his hand into a fist.
"Because," a new voice said suddenly, and a red-haired boy with the kanji "Love" on his forehead appeared from the shadows of the empty hall.
Naruto stared at him, and the stranger stared back. He realized it a moment before the other boy said it. He saw the stranger was wearing the uniform of the rich. The blonde's eyes widened at this person, who looked back devoid of emotion, "because you're not rich enough."
"Because Neji can never be with someone like you." That thought rang throughout Naruto's head.
"Neji…?" Naruto whispered to the ivory-eyed boy, but the other boy didn't answer. Naruto turned and stared once more at the red-head.
"Uzumaki…." The blonde gazed at Neji, his eyes glazed, "this is….Subaku no Gaara." Naruto watched in horror as Gaara walked closer and closer to Neji. "If there is anyone I care about, it is him, never you. Understand? You are nothing, and he is everything."
Naruto turned and ran just as the shock worn off and the pain grabbed at his heart. The last sight he saw of Neji and Gaara was the way the Hyuuga tilted his head and gently kissed the redhead on the forehead, just as he has done to the blonde so many times before.
Naruto was adopted by Iruka-sensei soon after and left the terrible school burdened with his sorrowful memories.
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Naruto first heard to Robin Hood from his father, as I have told you earlier. Actually, he didn't hear the story; he read it, from a book his father gave him, not from his dad himself, because his father was dead.
After seven years, the social services finally sorted out the death of Naruto's father. No one knew why it took that long, since it was quite a simple case. There was a car crash, and Naruto's dad had been killed. His mother had died giving birth to the blonde child. All he had was his father, and Iruka-sensei. Until Neji came along…And I can only imagine how it must have felt to the blonde to have first his father taken away, then his sensei and finally his last precious person; Neji. All of these people were taken away from him because he had no money. He didn't have any money to give his dad the surgery he needed, or maybe he could have survived. He didn't have any money so Iruka-sensei couldn't adopt him due to his low teacher salary. And, because he was poor, Neji had gone away with Gaara.
He hated being poor. Because he wasn't rich, he was picked on, dumped on, beaten up, looked down upon, and had been mistreated everywhere he went. He hated the rich more than being poor. It was all because of them that he had suffered. You and I both realize that this wasn't the right path to go on, but Naruto was young; just turned thirteen, and he wanted revenge. He wanted to make sure no one else would suffer like he had.
That was when he was introduced to Robin Hood. Among the things that belonged to his father, Naruto was given a book with a dusty cover. There was a hand-drawn picture of a beautiful blonde man on the front page. The title was "Robin Hood". The entire book was made by Naruto's ancestors, and it was kept in almost perfect condition (except for the dust which has gathered for the past seven years of course). The blonde read the book, reread it and reread it again. He loved that story, which was about a hero who stole from the rich who had so much, and gave to the poor who had so little.
Naruto decided that he would do something about the unfairness. He vowed to do what Robin Hood had done; he would take from the rich and give to the poor. He would become his hero. That night, so many years ago, the blonde child, now into his teen years, clutched the old book in his arms and made a vow to the moon.
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Now I hope you understand why Naruto did what he did, and why he does what he does. I hope you have understood how he became like this; vengeful and innocent at the same time. His little heart had been ripped out and stomped on. He was given his heart back; with it cracked and broken. Iruka-sensei couldn't heal this wound, and Naruto kept it well hidden from his guardian.
Now you must understand why Naruto goes around breaking the hearts of young and rich nobles, and then taking their money to give to the poor. This was done to him a long time ago, and he decided that it wasn't fair the rich had everything. Naruto became the blonde, beautiful, cerulean-eyed and innocent boy who made the rich fall in love, and then took their hearts and their money. He took their everything with him, and left them with emptiness in their homes but also more than enough cash to live by. He wasn't completely heartless mind you.
Now that you know of our modern Robin Hood's past, we should get back to the story.
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The third chapter is finally done! I apologize for the wait, but I was busy the day before. –smiles sheepishly-
Also, for those who were surprised by the Neji x Naruto and Gaara x Neji pairing, please refer to the "warning" section at the top of this chapter.
Just a note that I am still looking for a beta…do you guys seriously want to read an unbeta-ed story? –shock- I will stop adding this to the rest of the chapters, but the offer still stands on my profile!
Wait patiently for the next chapter! It might be a few more days until I update, with the weekend coming. Heh
Sayonara!
- Horologii
