# Action Pack Issue 5
June 28, 12:30-New York General
Kira sat down on the chair beside the prone form of his mother and took out a pen and started to fill out the information sheets he'd gathered from Midtown Middle/Elementary and Midtown High schools for him and Naruto. He'd specifically picked those two because they were nearby each other and he'd know where Naruto would be should an emergency happen.
He could be called overly protective, but with all the loss in his life, he was determined to keep what he still had of his family intact. It was one of the reasons he'd gotten so angry that the Konoha Council tried to take Kushina off life support, that and she was still his mother. He might have had his birth mother before her, but it didn't give the attachment any less meaning.
Back then he was just happy to be around people who treated him like he was normal.
He'd asked the principals of the schools what the curriculum was like and what he heard didn't make him so averse to going. They had P.E, and he knew Naruto would do very well in that class. His brother had asked him why he'd never tried for the Jonin exam since he was stronger and trained very hard to keep his chakras balanced. Kira had then very plainly told him that he liked having the rank he did because then no one could force him to go on any high ranking missions and while he found the D-ranks he had to do degrading, he was still around should Naruto need him.
He'd taught Naruto what the Academy wouldn't and helped him on his Taijutsu forms, but he himself had learned what he could from watching Kushina and Minato and reading any material he could and using what was learned in a practical sense. He knew his brother never liked the Academy textbooks or their history lessons because he never saw them having any practical use. Kira shared these sentiments and when he helped Naruto review the work he only made him read parts of the material that could be used later on in field work.
He knew he'd probably have a harder time in school than Naruto because the boy was still young and a lot less jaded and cynical than he was. That and he'd been out of school for a while and he'd spent so much time as playing a teacher to his brother that it would also be hard to listen to the lessons, an then there was his problem with authority in general.
In a nutshell he thought all adults were useless. The only exceptions had Anko (because she had known how awful the village was), his birth mother, Kushina, and Minato (because they were all his parents, and at the young age he honestly never saw them as 'adults' per say).
His thoughts turned to another aspect of school that had his mask crack to allow a grimace to mar his face. His brother had yet to discover girls and was relieved to find that Naruto had only pursued and taken the abuse she dished out at him without justification because he wanted a friend rather than any real romantic attachment. He knew that this wasn't going to last long though as he'd be in a class where no one would know him and no prejudice against him some girls might show interest in him.
He was severely dreading the day Naruto did discover girls as he had no expertise in that area what so ever.
Kira had been in a class of older kids and none of the girls looked at him with anything other than wariness or disgust. And the only woman he'd spent any extensive amount of time with was his teacher. He wasn't against the idea of being with someone, but he would admit that he himself probably wasn't what any girl would want.
Kira knew all too well about how socially awkward he was, as he wasn't a people person, and it showed how he acted around them.
The brunet paused in filling out the information and looked over at his comatose mother. "Kaa-chan, if you could see us now, would be proud or not?" he asked sardonically but expected no answer as he went back to the sheets in front of him.
He never noticed the pale hand move an inch toward him.
# 5 "Black Fox, Part 2"
Uzumaki Residence, 1:00
Naruto was sitting at the kitchen table, having just finished up eating his bowl of ramen for lunch and still listening to the radio, but so far there was nothing on any woman robbing anything. He wondered if he'd changed for nothing and if his gambit was gonna work before he realized what he'd just thought.
It was also odd, but whenever he did something that involved luck, it always worked out for him. Kira said it was because of Kyuubi and how Kitsunes are lucky, and that it complimented their trickster nature as well. Naruto had been summarily amazed at that, and the fact Kira had just said something nice about himself rather than something self-deprecating.
It had hurt sometimes to hear Kira say those things about himself.
Naruto put the bowl in the sink and decided to go change, as he still hadn't gotten used to taking time to switch clothes at the drop of a hat. He changed into the darker set of clothing and when he came back downstairs, he heard on the radio that the woman from yesterday was robbing yet another bank. He knew the bank mentioned because it had been the one he past the previous day.
Naruto headed back upstairs as he wasn't about to go outside the front door like this, people might think he was a burglar or something and jumped out through his bedroom window. He touched the roof of the next building and took off in a black blur.
He saw another blur speeding through the streets and made sure never to lose sight of her and soon enough he followed her back to a warehouse. He landed on the roof opposite to him and thought back to the previous night about how Joystick had pulled that lamppost out of the street and how she threw that crate at Spider-Man; making him think of using the perfect jutsu to counter, or at the very least, match her strength.
He heard a thwip sound in the air before Naruto felt the webbing hit him and he was sent spiralling into the ground. He glared over at the red and blue costumed man that was perched on the wall opposite to him and was sticking to it by his feet and hands. "Come on, we're on the same side here."
"With how yesterday went down? I'm not so sure about that." Spider-Man retorted before swinging down toward the warehouse where Joystick was hiding out.
Naruto felt like hitting his head on the concrete, but settled for rolling his eyes. He knew how bad it must have made him look to let Joystick go, but it was a necessary evil. He twisted his hand and reached for the kunai pouch at his thigh and pulled it out before carefully proceeding to cut through the webbing and it snapped away when he pushed his arms out.
Naruto stood back on his feet and jumped over to the warehouse, and looked in through the skylight. He pulled back a moment later to avoid getting his face smashed in by a crate that Joystick had thrown at Spider-Man. He peered back in and saw Joystick blasting a concussion blast at Spider-Man on a wall and he must not have remembered what the damage from yesterday did as he didn't jump back up the wall far enough and the man was sent falling onto the floor.
Joystick raised one hand as another bolt appeared and Naruto quickly through his kunai at the woman and the bolt disappeared as the metal began sparking. She ripped it off her wrist and tossed it away and she whirled around, Naruto throwing a flash bomb that hit the ground in front of her and Joystick stumbled back as she grabbed her face.
Naruto jumped down through the skylight and decided it was time to use that 'special' armour Kira taught him. "Rock Armour Release." He whispered as he felt the earth type chakra Kira had tested him for traced over his skin, and he was pleasantly surprised to feel that what Kira had said about the 'armour' not weighing him down to be true as he flashed his hands through several seals. "Shadow Clone Jutsu!"
When Joystick's vision recovered, she blinked upon spotting several dozen clones of the boy in the black and orange clothing. She laughed and was met with disbelieving looks. "Please, you think these illusions can save you?"
Naruto growled as he saw each clone had the tell-tale green reflective glow of the rock armour chakra. "Kick her ass!" he shouted and the clones all descended upon the woman while the originally hurried over to the red and blue costumed man. "You still think I'm the bad guy?"
The man seemed almost sheepish. "Point taken." He said echoing the previous night and looked at the fight taking place. "How were you able to make those?"
Naruto grinned proudly at this. "That's my secret, Spidey."
"Spidey?" The man questioned. "I kinda like the sound of that."
"You won't be liking it for much longer because you'll both be dead!" Joystick snarled as she was started to look manic in the crazy sense of the word and threw one of the clones at them.
The clone disappeared in a puff of smoke upon impact with the wall and Naruto winced from the memory of the impact. He winced several more times as he felt the punches take out his clones as if he was receiving them himself.
Naruto looked at Spider-Man with a raised brow. "What do you say we tag team to take this crazy lady down?"
The costumed man seem to think about this for a moment, as if partnering up with someone who let the same woman escape the previous night was a good idea. "And you're not going to let her go?"
Naruto snorted. "Please, I'll be spending that time looking for the thing she stole from me."
"Then let's do this."
When Joystick finished off the last clone, she looked around, only to find herself alone. She scowled as a bolt of energy emitted from the remaining metal device on her wrist and looked around for the boy and Spider-Man. She'd get rid of the spider quickly, but she was going to blast that little brat into a million pieces for that Doppelgänger trick he pulled.
She felt something attach to her wrist and smirked. "Really, this trick isn't going to work a third time." She said pulling the web line back and was about to punch the spider with her other fist when she saw that it wasn't the spider but another bomb and it hit her in the chest.
She screamed as she felt like she was blinded and began firing off energy bolts in every which way as the panic started to set in. She felt her vision clear enough for her to see blurry shapes and tried to make a super speeded sprint for the exit, but a rock wall halted her attempt as she collided with it and was sent crashing onto her back.
Joystick was about to stand when the webbing hit her feet and she was pulled up into the air. She saw both Spider-Man and the boy standing on the ground and she glared at them. "You think this will hold me?" she sneered before moving her remaining metal device into the direction of the webbing, only to get a kunai shot into the device and it started sparking just like the other one. She quickly took it off and discarded it, her scowl deepening as she realized that she was effectively powerless in this position as the fall would most likely severely injure her, if not outright kill her.
"Bastards." She hissed.
Naruto paid no mind to the woman after that as he and Spider-Man looked around for the loot that Joystick stole from the First National Bank. He walked along the boxes and looked through each one, his face growing stormier and stormier as he found that none of them had the loot bag.
He was tempted to lash out at the woman, but he knew that she probably wouldn't give up its location.
"Hey, over here…kid." Spider-Man said pausing awkwardly over the latter part as he really did have no idea what to call the boy.
Naruto jogged over to him and he saw the bag that Joystick had used the previous day. "Sweet, now let me see…" he said trailing off as he rummaged through the bag, pulling out varying necklaces that were nice, but not his. He tossed each one back in and finally pulled out the silver locket that hopefully still held the picture of his family inside. "Here it is."
"It looks a little girly." Spider-Man said bluntly. "You sure that's the right one?"
Naruto scowled at the man and was tempted to hit him as well as he put it into his pocket. "Yes, I'm sure it's the right one." He said and he heard the sirens approaching. "Time to go." He said and saw the man put the loot bag down and webbed a note to it. Naruto tilted his head as he read it aloud. "'Courtesy of your Friendly Neighbourhood Spider-Man?' Lame." He snorted and sprinted out of the building and added some chakra to his leg muscles and jumped to the roof on the building he'd come to the scene on.
Naruto was about to continue on jumping when he heard Spider-Man call out for him to wait. He stopped against his better judgement and looked expectantly at the man. "Yes?"
"Well, you see, I can't keep calling you kid, so…" Spider-Man trailed off.
Naruto caught on quickly enough to what was being implied. And while he honestly had only done this whole thing to retrieve his locket, he thought he might actually end up enjoying this. "You can call me…" he paused as he hastily thought up a name and his clothing attire came to mind, "Black Fox."
Konoha Council Room, 1:05
The Civilian side of the council was collected into the empty room as the rest of the ninja side had all left to oversee the Chunin exams. The 'normal' members of the council had not dared speak after the Sandaime had chewed them out, as while they knew their actions were uncalled for, they couldn't let that woman live.
She was dangerous when she was alive, and for all intents and purposes, she was dead to the world at this point. No one had held any belief that she would recover, but those demon brats had argued time and time again that she would wake up and they had already bewitched the Hokage into sparring the woman.
Just like
the rest of the village, none of the civilian council liked the elder demon brat, as he was a loose cannon that would sooner kill them all if he could. They didn't want to believe that a human woman would willing give birth to such a vile creature and had pointedly ignored the fact that the brat was still part human.
But unlike the rest of the village, they also didn't want to believe that the younger brat was their beloved Yondaime's son. It was preposterous that the man would use his own son to make such a thing as a Jinchuuriki, and only then it would have been to make a weapon.
They were civilians, they had no knowledge how jutsu worked, and therefore they had never realized that the Kyuubi was a separate entity from Naruto and had preferred to think of both demon brats as just that, demons.
Their overall opinions of Kushina were much worse as most, if not all, of the civilian women had hated the redhead for taking Minato's affection and hiding the murderous disposition she really had under the cheery façade she'd created. It baffled most that such a nice ma could ever stand being with such a…her.
They broke out of their memories as they looked over the information sheet and the bag of ryo notes, wondering if this would be enough.
"Why are we doing this behind the Sandaime's back?" One councilman asked.
"Because Hokage-sama is too soft to do what needs to be done. And if we do this, then we're guaranteed to have results." Another answered.
"Yes, but I still don't know why we need international help." A councilwoman sniffed haughtily.
Most rolled their eyes. "Because while this is more likely to attract more…colorful characters, the ends justify the means; and our end result is seeing those demon brats burned in this village." A council man explained.
The woman nodded as she put the quill to the sheet. "Method of extraction?"
"Dead or alive." Was the blunt answer.
The woman nodded again as she wrote it down. "'Uzumaki Kira and Naruto are to be detained and, if necessary, killed for they pose a dangerous threat to others if allowed to continue on living in freedom.' 50,000 dollar reward for capture."
(#Action Pack Issue 6: As the bounty is set, the Uzumaki brothers are unaware of the price set on their heads as a 'new' comer rejoins the family. The euphoria is short-lived when they learn that the assassin Snapdragon is gunning for the bounty on them and isn't above murder to draw them out.)