Normal

"Speech"

Thought

Kyuubi

Warning: I do not own Naruto. Rated "M" for language and adult themes.

Chapter 50: Three weeks is a long time

Naruto lay on his bed staring at the ceiling. It was another night he couldn't sleep. It had been three weeks since the accident that left Myra in a coma, and he still blamed himself. The Fox hadn't said a word to him in those three weeks. Not a single outburst of anger or a snide comment. It had been strange for the first few days of silence, but as the days stretched in to weeks, Naruto had started to feel more alone.

The blonde boy had settled back into a routine. Getting up early; training alone for a few hours; sitting with Myra; and then off to bed to start all over. There had been a mission. Once or twice Gaara had insisted he go out and have a little fun, but Naruto didn't want to have fun. He wanted Myra to wake up. But who was going to say "no" to Gaara, especially when the usually private Gaara wanted to go out. Even though Naruto felt like the third wheel at the dinners with Gaara and Sephie, he would go and at least pretend to have a good time.

Naruto turned on his side and closed his eyes. He would fall asleep eventually. The blonde let his breathing even out and he tried to slow his heart beat. He wanted to find that calm place were everything made sense again, but nothing made sense right now. His whole world had been happy for once and now there was only him and his empty apartment.

There was a creak of his balcony doors that caused Naruto to open his eyes and roll out of bed. He looked into the kitchen to see the balcony doors had blown open with a breeze. He grumbled a few curses under his breath and got out of bed to shut the doors. He took a minute to look at the Hokage monument. He started to think of Myra being cooped up in that hospital, and wondered if there was a way to take her out, just for a little while.

Naruto finally shut the doors and started to walk back to his room. In the darkness he saw a figure standing in his bedroom. Then he sensed her presence for the first time in three long weeks. Myra was standing in his bedroom waiting for him. Naruto took a few tentative steps towards her. "Are you a dream?"

"No." Myra shook her head and took a step closer to him.

"Are you a ghost?" He raised a weary eyebrow.

"No." She let out a teary chuckle.

"Then, you're really here?" Naruto reached out and put a hand on her cheek. Her face was wet from the tears she had been crying, and cold from the night air.

Myra leaned head into his touch. "I wanted to see you before I was bombarded by everyone else."

He took his hand away from her cheek and dropped his hand limply at his side. "I'm sorry." He gazed at the floor.

"There is nothing for you to be sorry about. Don't spoil things by having regrets. I ran away from a hospital to see you, please be at least happy to see me." She wrapped her arms around him.

He held her tightly. She was cold from being out in the cool spring air and wearing only a hospital gown. "You shouldn't have run away from the hospital. They will look here first." He grabbed his blanket off the bed and wrapped it around her.

"I know, I'll get a lecture from a few people and I won't care. I got to see you first and that's all I wanted." She put her head on his chest and sighed deeply.

There was a loud banging on Naruto's door. "Naruto! Wake up! Myra is missing and everyone has been called to the Hokage's office." It was Sakura's voice. She seemed panicked and concerned.

"You want to open the door? Or should I?" Myra whispered.

"You're in enough trouble Rabbit." He adjusted the blanket around Myra. "And as much as I want you to stay here, you need to go back to the hospital."

"NARUTO! WAKE UP! DON'T MAKE BE BREAK DOWN THIS DOOR!" Sakura shouted from the other side of the door.

"Better open it before she actually breaks down the door." Myra looked up at Naruto.

Naruto gazed into her chocolate eyes, not wanting to look away. "If I look away, you'll disappear."

"I'm not a figment of your imagination, Love." Myra knitted her fingers with his. "I'll go with you to open the door." Naruto nodded, and they both walked to the door. Myra stood behind Naruto, hiding from Sakura. Myra nodded to Naruto when she was ready for him to open the door.

"It's about time. Get dressed and we'll hurry over to the Hokage's office." Sakura sounded concerned and a little panicked.

"I don't think there is a need to hurry." Naruto smirked.

"In case you didn't hear me the first time, Myra is missing."

Naruto had a large grin on his face and he tried to pull Myra out from behind him and nearly ripped off his boxers in the process. "She was right here, I swear and I was going to take her back to the hospital."

Sakura released Naruto from the simple binding jutsu Myra had used. Sakura looked at the floor behind the door. "You don't think she's running around naked do you?" Sakura bent down to pick up the hospital gown.

Something inside Naruto started to churn. He didn't like that thought at all. "I hope not, but it would be easy to follow the trail of nose bleeds." Naruto grumbled.

Sakura chuckled. "Why would she come here just to run off again?"

"I don't know." Naruto shrugged. He turned to his dresser to find clothes to go on the search. He found his drawers slightly askew and some clothes missing. Naruto frowned.

Sakura looked over his shoulder. "I'm confused… She came here to see you, stole your clothes, and took off again?"

Naruto clenched his fists. "What the hell is going on?"

Akamaru bounded into Naruto's apartment, pouncing on Naruto in the process. The blonde was sprawled on the floor, while the large dog checked the rest of the apartment. Naruto grumbled as he stood back up. Akamaru sat on his haunches at Naruto's feet, whining sadly. Kiba had skidded to a halt at Naruto's door just in time to translate for Akamaru.

"He says that Myra's trail ends in your apartment and all he can smell is you." Kiba looked just as confused. Then he smacked his forehead. "GOD DANMIT! She's scent masking!" Naruto and Sakura raised a confused eyebrow at Kiba.

"Myra came here, I can smell her all over you," The Inuzuka nodded to Naruto, "and I can't tell where you end and she begins. She is using your scent to mask her own. Boy when she doesn't want to be found, she doesn't want to be found." Kiba growled.

"I wonder what Myra's up to?" Naruto whispered to himself.

"But that will only work for so long, right?' Sakura asked hopefully.

"Yeah, but that means Naruto is stuck here." Kiba looked at Naruto.

"What? I can't stay here! I need to be out there looking with the rest of you."

"Look Naruto, if she is scent masking as you, and you are out searching for her, me, Akamaru and the other ninja hounds are going to pick up on you. If you stay in one place and tell me where you've been today, we can look for you in all the other places you HAVEN'T been today." Kiba shook his head.

Naruto sighed deeply. "I was here, at training ground four and five, the dojo, the hospital, and Ichiraku's."

"Good, Akamaru and I will start looking everywhere else for her. Come on Akamaru." The great white dog ran out the apartment door. Kiba gave Naruto a nod and headed off after Akamaru.

Sakura put her hand on Naruto's shoulder. "We'll find her, and I will tell Lady Tsunade why you aren't at the meeting." She smiled and closed the door behind her.

Naruto walked over to his bed. There was an empty can of soda lying on the floor that he stared for a moment. Then he kicked it as hard as he could. The can bounced off the walls and was finally stopped by Myra catching it in her hand.

"Careful there, you could hurt someone doing that." Myra smirked. She had stepped out of his bathroom wearing his clothes.

Naruto chuckled and shook his head. "You are going to be the death of me."

"I highly doubt that."

"What the hell are you thinking?" Naruto stood up. "You are in shit loads of trouble, and now you are dragging me down with you."

"How can I be in trouble? It's not like I needed to be at the hospital. By the way… I'm starving, have you managed to stock your fridge?" She walked into the kitchen.

"Myra, the Fox hit with something and you've been unconscious." He stood up to follow her.

Myra opened the fridge. "I know, I figured that out when I opened my eyes."

"For three weeks." Naruto had his arms crossed and he was leaning against the door to the kitchen.

Myra looked at Naruto from behind the refrigerator door. "Well that would explain why I'm starving." She went back to scrounging in his fridge.

"Myra..."

"Don't you have any veggies?" She pulled out something that looked like lunch meat, made a funny face at it and tossed it in the trash can. She closed the fridge, "please tell me you have food other than ramen?"

"Myra..." He was actually getting slightly annoyed.

"Think you could sneak next door and see what's in my fridge?" She shut the fridge door and smiled at him.

"RABBIT!" He dropped his arms to the side and glared at her.

"What?!"

"You need to go back to the hospital." He kept his glare.

"What for, I feel fine." Myra shrugged. "They are going to look over me, poke and prod, find nothing wrong and no physical cause for the coma and let me go. I'm just skipping all that." She whined.

"So you don't want to know why you've been out cold for almost a month." He raised an eyebrow.

"I know why I was unconscious, I just didn't know for how long." She started to rummage through his pantry.

"Why don't you let me know so I'm not so worried about it." He closed the pantry door.

"Edgar and Poe didn't say anything? My dad didn't say anything? I would think they would have told you what happened." She opened the pantry door again and found the jar of peanut butter.

"They never mentioned anything besides some mumbo jumbo about you being separated from your body and we just had to wait for you to come back."

"That's the short version, but an accurate description of a spirit quest." Myra nodded. She walked over to the fridge. "That's right! I remember why I came here in the first place." She started to glare at Naruto. "Foxy and I need to have a little chit chat." She had a very devious grin and Naruto got a little nervous.

The blonde started to scratch the back of his head. "Um, I haven't talked to him since the accident, so if you can get him to say something..."

Myra had closed her eyes and taken a deep breath. "I really hate doing things like this. I feel so slimy afterwards." She opened her eyes and Naruto stared right back into red sharingan.

"What's with the sharingan?" He said before her realized he was standing in front the Fox's cage. "I hated when the teme did this, but you dragging me here is just weird."

"Well excuse me, but I think you need to hear this too and I didn't want to wait. And I will be happy to tell Sasuke the next time I see him not to go poking around in your head." Myra was standing next to Naruto wearing the same blood red kimono Miyako had worn.

"Next time?" Naruto looked shocked.

"Fasten your seatbelts fellas, its going to be a bumpy ride." She did a decent imitation of Betty Davis.