Start of a Routine

Jiraiya's eyes snapped open as he woke up to the smell of food, egg being the most prominent. This was odd, as he lived alone. He looked at his alarm clock, it was 7:30. Slowly and silently he opened his door and looked into his kitchen/living room and found a humming teenager. A humming teenager who he immediately recognized as Harumi, the girl he'd summoned the day before. She was wearing the red shirt he'd gotten form the depot as well as the brown cargo pants. Her hair was down, instead of in the pony tail it had been yesterday. She looked content, doing this homey task not to mention that it actually smelled pretty good. His stomach agreed with this assessment and let its hunger be known.

She turned around, dark eyes trained on him and a timid smile appeared on her face. "Morning Jiraiya."

It looked like she had slept even less than him, which was given as her world was more shaken than his. Dinner had been the quick and cheap meal of instant shrimp ramen. It had been a rather silent and awkward affair, both of them consumed by deep thoughts. The fact that he'd threatened to kill her earlier that day probably hadn't helped. Eventually he'd broken the silence by offering her his bed, but she'd outright refused it, saying that she'd take the couch because he was already offering her a place to stay. He would have fought for it; propriety and manners and all, but she'd looked at him and said: "It's your bed. Besides, I'll be out of your hair in no time at all." He hadn't had the heart to tell her that it'd probably take it bit more than no time at all. She probably knew that as well and the reason she hadn't accepted was so that she didn't get too close and comfortable in his home.

"Morning Harumi," he replied with a smile of his own, "Smells good." He walked forward, still in his pajamas, which consisted of a black t-shirt and white shorts.

"Thank you," she focused back on the task of making the food, "was the least I could do seeing as you provided me with a place to stay. If you could set the table for two that'd be great, it's almost done." A few minutes later they were once again seated across from each other. She'd made the simple meal of rice, egg and tomatoes and he'd made the green tea that accompanied it. They ate in silence.

"So…"started Harumi once they were both done, "don't you have to train with your team or something?"

He shook his head, "Not today, no. Not in a team capacity at least. Sarutobi-sensei is a busy man, you know."

Her dark eyes widened at the casual reminder that he was being taught by the Hokage. "Right… busy man."

"But, you are right that we need to work out a schedule if you're going to stay here for at least the next few days. Today is Monday, which most of the time means a training day for us, though at times a Chunin will fetch us around noon to do some D-Ranks meaning were done around five or six o'clock - or later, depending on the mission. Thursdays are much the same. The rest of the week Sarutobi-Sensei oversees us. Especially on Saturday; it's the day Sarutobi-sensei absolutely trains us into the ground from six in the morning till nine in the evening, and Sundays are the lesser evil known as the one on one session. Yesterday was Orochimaru's turn meaning he'll be in a foul mood today."

She nodded. "Am I right in assuming then that Mondays and Thursdays are the days upon which you would usually work on your own projects?"

"Yes."

"And seeing as I'm your current project, for lack of better term, you will work on trying to get me home on these two days, yes?"

"I'd suppose so."

"Good that's your end of it, now what about mine. For that matter, am I even allowed to leave your apartment because as far as anyone else is concerned I don't exist?"

She had a point there. At the moment he was the only one who knew of her existence and people were prone to notice the comings and goings of someone as exotic and pretty as her. If not her looks then her accent would definitely garner immediate attention. He also got the subtle jibe at not wanting to be stuck in his crummy apartment for 24 hours at a time.

Then it hit him and he grinned; sometimes the answer was so simple. "You can leave the apartment."

"I can?" A small smile appeared.

"Yes, with a Henge, of course!"

The small smile disappeared and doubt flickered in those dark eyes and suddenly he remembered her panic attack, how that small use of chakra had caused this girl to shatter.

"Right your Chakra, what's up with it," he asked seriously, because as rare as they were Chakra Deficiencies did exist. They were also a very personal matter, and he knew that in some sense he might be over stepping his bounds here.

She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. They snapped open and she spoke softly.

"For as long as I have lived I have never been able to access my Chakra. In fact you could call it a trait of my people, our innate failure to access this energy. A select few can access it and they remind us. We call them divine and enlightened; Buddha's. It is so rare outside of the Temples though that often times we delude ourselves into believing it doesn't exist, that we don't possess Chakra at all. I believed that until yesterday. Yesterday I accessed something I thought I could never attain, but then many things that I thought that could never be happened yesterday."

His mind boggled at the very thought of never being able to access your chakra, but then he thought of all the civilians that inhabited Konoha and how just 7 years ago he hadn't been able to do jack shit with Chakra either. It had been just a word then, a powerful one, but a word nonetheless. Once upon a time he had been just like her, willing something unseen to do his bidding only in his case it had answered.

He felt her chakra, it was there. It always had been. "Can you feel it now, then?"

Once more she closed her eyes and a few seconds passed. "Yes," she whispered reverently, a serene smile etched upon her face. "It kept me up most of the night you know. It is so warm, and for all that it is new it feels so familiar, so….natural."

"Can you move it?"

"I think so."

"Then make it move. Increase its speed like your heart increases in beats when you run."

She nodded. He felt it speed up, felt it activate for the first time and he heard her gasp as the power that had always been hers flooded throughout her body. He smiled and wondered if he had looked like that the first time.

"Now keep that tempo for about two minutes and then try moving it in the opposite direction, into your stomach instead of away from." She nodded.

120 seconds passed, and he felt the shift before he saw it. She grimaced, and he understood all too well why. Going with the current was easy – it was natural, instinctual even – but going against it was a feat that was not as easy. The Chakra system didn't entirely like it either, but it was a lesson in control. It was what would eventually allow you to remove as much of your Chakra presence as was naturally possible.

He let her do that for 30 seconds and when he saw sweat appear on her brow he said: "Now send it back out, but instead of just circulating it try moving to the palm of your right hand." Again she nodded and she held open her palm. He watched with avid interest, because so far she was doing really well.

Almost as well as him; he hadn't been chosen to learn under Sarutobi Hiruzen by pure chance.

Tsunade had been chosen for not only her name but also her already insane Chakra control, Orochimaru for his intellect which rivaled that of his teacher, and Jiraiya had been chosen because of his natural use of Chakra, of how easy manipulation came to him. Sure the control and amounts were not innate to him, but he'd always found that his Chakra called to him. It begged to be used.

"Imagine that you're cupping a bit of water, except that the water is your Chakra."

Harumi's seemed to sing the same tune, if only because it had never been used before. He grinned as he saw the slight bleu shimmer appear in the middle of her palm after only a few minutes. It was a small, spectral oval in the middle of her hand; a wavering tattoo of sorts. He watched as it pulsed and grew slightly in size, covering a bit more of her palm.

"Open your eyes."

She did and the smile that adorned her face was the truest one yet. They watched as the oval grew until it covered all of her palm and then dissipated. She giggled as it did. Harumi looked up from her hand; her dark eyes alight with happiness. He was wearing a grin of his own, her happiness contagious.

She stood up and moved towards him, her lips upturned. She stood in front of him and bent down. His eyes widened as he felt her lips touch his forehead. A flush covered his face as suddenly dark chocolate eyes met his charcoal ones. "Thank you, Jiraiya." The flush got more severe.

She sat back down, at first eyes watching him intently to see if he'd react in any way reminiscent of the day before – checking if she hadn't just crossed some line - but he just stared at her with big eyes and slowly a satisfied and somewhat amused smirk on her face. She hummed for a bit, glancing at him out of the corner of her eye whilst he flustered in silence because he'd never been kissed on the forehead before. Not by anyone other than his mother and that had been a long, long time ago.

He wanted to act all cool, to wave it off like it was nothing but it wasn't. When was the last time someone had been that sincere with him? When was the last time someone had been that joyously affectionate to him? Not on his team, and certainly not outside of that. Sure, it had been spontaneous and probably brought on by the endorphins and adrenaline that suddenly rushed into her system, which was better known as a 'chakra high' but it carried so much weight. The gesture was so civilian not to mention familial, both things that he only retained in vague childhood memories. Not only that but it was a sign of trust, of forgiveness and both were things he had not expected. Frankly, he was blown away by it all. That she was beautiful was just a bonus, really.

"So Sensei," she said teasingly, interrupting his train of thought, "going to teach me the Henge so I can go out and about?"

He collected himself; shaking off the spell she'd kind put him under. "Yes. Yes, I will."

He didn't realize it yet as he spoke to her about the basics of the first Jutsu he had ever learned to do, but it was the start of a routine.

Chakra High: See it as the 'runners high' of this universe, except that it only happens the first few times you acces your Chakra. As time goes on the effects fade and become smaller and smaller each time as your body gets used to the Chakra actually being active.

AN: I know it been fricking forever, but life happenened and all that I was writing just didn't come out right. This chapter has been rewritten like four times as well as that other ideas just keep popping up all over the shop. In any case, now that this has come out right I'm going to see if my bigger projects also come out as I want them to be. Let me know what you guys think of this chapter by the way.

Cheers,

Ray the Red