Sakura couldn't help but adore the kitten.
It was tiny and fluffy with brown striped fur. It gazed up at her with the cutest green eyes she had ever seen.
"Where did you even come from?" she asked, bemused. The kitten just mewed back pitifully. She picked it up, grinning at the way the kitten started purring loud enough to be heard from several feet away. The forest was certainly no place for a kitten.
So she took it with her. "I wonder what I'll call you," she muttered offhandedly.
She was stopped, unusually, at the gate. "Where did you get that?" The guard asked suspiciously. It was someone that she knew vaguely, but just by sight. For the life of her she couldn't remember his name.
"It was just in the forest," Sakura said slowly. "Is there something wrong?" The kitten cowered against her.
"All new arrivals have to go through Inventory," the man said wearily, flipping a kunai through the air and catching it.
"It's a kitten." Sakura said. "It's not even technically a new arrival."
"Provision 38.6b was put into circulation 3 weeks ago and clearly states…" the man began.
"All right, I get it!" Sakura said hurriedly, holding up a hand as if to physically stop his words. She lightly rested her fingers against her forehead, while still cradling the fluffy brown kitten in her other hand. "Where do I go?"
The office wasn't too hard to find. It was near Tsunade's and clearly marked with a couple different signs.
"Didn't this used to be a storage room?" Sakura asked herself. She could quite clearly remember this room, and several others, being filled to the brim with paperwork.
"Hello?" She called out, poking her head into the room. She looked around the room appreciatively. This was indeed an old storage room, but now it was been mostly cleared out and organized. There were still tons of paper, but they were neatly contained in the numerous file cabinets that served as makeshift dividers for the room.
She wondered what had happened to the place. After all, there was no way Tsunade had done any of this. And there didn't seem to be anyone around, she thought scanning the area, stopping when she saw one familiar face.
"Sasuke!" she called out, walking over. "What are you doing here?"
Sasuke had finally become a Konoha citizen again and was on his way to acting as a shinobi once again. Sakura was only just getting used to seeing him on a regular basis, and accepting that he was here to stay. Not that it wasn't something she had always hoped for, but it had been hard to push that nagging, worrying voice to the back of her mind. It was only now that she was succeeding.
"Something about 'damage control,'" Sasuke replied distractedly, glancing up once at Sakura, but then returning to study the papers he had in front of him. He looked up again once the meowing started. "What is that?"
Sakura had to resist rolling her eyes. Hadn't anyone in this village seen a cat before? "It's a kitten," she explained in an overly patient tone. "See?" she shoved the small animal at him.
Sasuke had no choice but to accept the kitten and held it up gingerly. His façade of disinterest cracked for a moment as he started into its eyes, and his own eyes softened as the corners of his mouth twitched in what could potentially be the beginnings of a smile.
"So once you read those over I have a couple of things for you to sign before we start discussing strategy," a voice said, drifting from behind a particularly tall file cabinet. Sakura watched as a small girl, probably around her own age of 17, appeared, carrying a stack of papers high enough to block the view of her head.
The papers were dropped onto a nearby table with a loud thump, and Sakura finally got a glimpse of the girl. She was pale and freckled, with long curly copper hair.
She starred at Sakura for a moment with dark gray eyes behind delicate looking glasses, making Sakura shift uncomfortably. Then she shook her head and held out a hand, "Hello, I'm Charlotte…" she began with a smile, trailing off at the end as she saw Sasuke and the kitten.
"No! Bad!" she said, walking swiftly over to the Uchiha, fumbling around in a pocket and coming out with a small spray bottle.
Sakura watched, very confused, but also a bit entertained at what was happening.
Because Charlotte proceeded to liberally spray both Sasuke and the kitten with the spray bottle. They both had the same first reaction, a mix of confusion and horror.
It was obvious that this was a first for Sasuke, but as he was getting over the shock his eyes began to glint dangerously. "What was that?" he asked softly, the tone of his voice menacing.
Instead of answering Charlotte scooped the kitten out of Sasuke's arms. Sasuke looked at the kitten now as if he was unsure of how it got there. "You have to be careful of these," the girl said firmly. "Even when they don't mean to they can bring out an instant attachment." She looked at the kitten fondly, before carrying it to the desk and plopping it down.
"You are human, right?" Charlotte asked. The kitten looked at her with large innocent eyes, but after being stared at rather sternly it nodded sadly. "Don't worry, we'll help you return to human form and get you back to where you came from. Just sign this form, and for now you'll be placed in a halfway home with others like you." The kitten looked at her with shock. Charlotte just slipped a paper from the pile and placed it down with an inkpad. "This will be explained later, for now just sign here." The kitten, looking resigned, placed a small ink paw print on the line indicated.
It then walked miserably into a waiting cat carrier that Charlotte fetched from somewhere behind the file cabinets.
Sakura voiced her protests. "That's my cat…" she said weakly.
"And maybe you can take care of her once you've gone through the proper training," Charlotte said. "You might not want to though, they can be quite the commitment."
"Cats?" Sakura asked bewilderedly.
"No," Charlotte said. "Fangirls."
This was slightly inspired by several stories around here, most of which I enjoyed reading, but I wanted another perspective on it. :)
This is the last piece that I already had written. I had enjoyed the premise and wanted to get it out there, but I cannot be certain of any future updates, so I will be marking this as complete.
Just in case you were interested, these were some of my other ideas for future chapters.
-a "twin" to a cannon character appears, may affect cannon character
-cannon character doppelgänger appears insisting they are the actual character.
-The Akatsuki start to have their own troubles. Sometimes the fan girls may meet a quick ( and possibly unintended) death. Sometimes they get put to work. Meanwhile Charlotte has become something of an expert "fangirl wrangler" and as the Akatsuki become overwhelmed they kidnap her to take care of their problem.