Chapter 14
Know-Your-Village Day 1 Part II
Who knew they made kitten-sized takoyaki?
Not Naruto, who popped a few of the miniature octopus spheres into his mouth. Enamoured with the exotic kitten riding on his head, the vendors gave him the whole box free. In fact, hanging from Naruto's elbows were handbags (also free) filled with boxes of snacks, juice, toys and anything else Sasuke merely glanced at.
They were getting heavy. And with the sun beating down unusually hot, carrying them around was increasingly draining. The blond contemplated dropping off the stuff at his apartment before heading to the Academy, which they still had not managed to visit – ouch.
At the sharp claws tapping his skull, Naruto merely blinked and held up an octopus ball to his head, where it was swiftly devoured. Sasuke did not mind baking in the sun apparently, and lay comfortably atop Naruto's head, his dark fur soaking in the rays.
"Naruto?" the muffled voice asked, still chewing some of the treat.
"Yeah?" came the equally muffled reply.
"Are you sure we can't go on the rooftops? Everyone's staring at me."
"Yeah," Naruto was familiar with the discomfort of being stared at, though for an entirely different reason, "but you're going to be living in the village now, Sasuke. You've gotta walk the streets eventually." He swallowed. "Everyone's just getting used to you. It won't be forever."
"Okay." Naruto fed him another octopus ball. "Naruto. Are they your friends?"
Naruto turned just as two pale shinobi leaped down from the nearest roof.
"Hello Naruto-kun," the greeting was accompanied by a small, annoying smile.
"Oh, hey Sai. And uh…"
The girl, whose hand Sai was holding, stared blankly at him. She was wearing a black body suit with a grey knee-length skirt. The look was a bit militant to Naruto, but to Sai the skirt was a small triumph. She had not allowed herself such vanities under Danzō's care.
Naruto, who expected her to introduce herself, leaned back a little when she simply continued staring. She did not blink.
"This is Tori," Sai said, after an awkward half-minute had passed.
"Oh. Nice to meet you. I'm Uzumaki Naru –"
"I know." Naruto's body jolted at the sudden movement in that eerily still face. "Who is the cat-human on your head?"
"Uchiha Sasuke," Sasuke introduced himself. Tori blinked, stared at him for a moment, then returned her gaze to Naruto.
Next to Sai, that was the shortest time someone had taken to come to terms with Sasuke.
"So, uh, why are you here?"
"We were walking around the village when we noticed that the streets were overly crowded. There is no special event happening in Konoha, nor any natural disasters, nor any fires, nor –"
"Yeah, I get it Sai."
"Tori and I jumped on the roofs to see what anomaly was causing the backup. It was then that we noticed that you have a very large crowd of people following you."
Naruto leaned a little to the side, taking in the unashamed faces of said crowd.
They had every right to be there. Most of them had risen before the sun and waited patiently and quietly – in the cold, for hours – at Naruto's abode to catch a glimpse of Konoha's prodigal and transfigured son, only for the dumb blond to go leaping off to Hokage tower without so much as a cursory glance to spare for them.
So now, to hell with the blonde's rights to privacy and personal space.
As soon as he looked at them, the flashes of several cameras went off uninhibited in the back of the still-civil mob. The ones in front probably had not had cameras on them, and did not want to lose their place to go get one.
"Yeah, they've been following us for a while."
"So, you and Sasuke-kun are the anomalies." Sasuke growled a little. Naruto stroked the kitten's ear with a placating finger.
"It'll die down."
"I hope so." That was Tori again. Really, she needed to blink or give some kind of warning before she talked.
"So, uh, you two are…" Naruto held up his pinky, and received similar blank stares. "Um, well, nice meeting you Tori, we're just gonna…"
"Sai-sama." She was still staring at Naruto. That was creepy. "He appears quite manly to me."
Of course, creepiness was purely subjective. Naruto was sure that she was a perfectly lovely girl once one got to know her.
"Are you sure he does not have a dick?"
As the crowd observing them tittered, passing the news to the back faster than Lee could burst into tears, Naruto mentally revoked every nice thing he ever thought about her during the ten or so minutes he had known her.
Sasuke squeaked. "N-Naruto, you don't have a –?"
"Don't listen to them, Sasuke!" Naruto yelled. "Sai is just a bastard, and his girlfriend is –!"
"Naruto-kun," Sai was still smiling. There was a small hint of danger in that smile. Naruto's eyebrow twitched. "Where are you going?"
"The Academy," Naruto said through gritted teeth.
"May we accompany you? Walking with you will be easier –"
"No."
"Thank you."
Naruto opened his mouth. Then closed it. He turned around and continued walking, leaving deep, angry footprints in the innocent street.
Sasuke frowned; jarred by Naruto's stomping, he tightened his grip on his bed of sunburst hair.
"You see, Tori? Even when someone refuses you, by saying 'thank you' you can insist on your way and avoid being scolded for being rude."
Naruto's stomping got worse. Sasuke tugged on his hair, but to no avail. He endured the bumpy ride with a groan.
"Naruto-sama," said Tori as they neared the blonde's apartment. "I am certain that this is not the way to the Academy."
The following crowd muttered its agreement.
Naruto sighed. Loudly. This would probably be a pain, but Sai was his friend. He should be nice to his girlfriend. And he had the secret feeling that Sai would knock his teeth out if he wasn't.
"I'm just going to put down these bags."
"There's a better way." And from the pouch on her hip she pulled out a slip of paper no bigger than her hand. A circle of sealing script was drawn on it.
"Put the bags on this and flow your chakra into the paper."
"Um, all of these probably won't fit in –"
"Do it."
Naruto hid the desperate twitch of his eyebrow as he put the paper on the ground and put the bags over it as best he could.
He followed her instructions. There was a small poof and all of his gifts, even the ones that were not touching the paper disappeared, sealed neatly away.
"W-whoa, that's pretty cool. How'd you –?"
"Here." She thrust a whole stack of similar homemade seals into his face. Naruto blinked and slowly took the stack.
"Uh, thanks."
Another awkward silence descended, and once again Naruto tried to leave.
"I have done you a favour, yes?"
Now Naruto was confused. In front of a female version of Sai, that was not good. Any word misspoken could lead to cripplingly embarrassing statements that stir up much anger.
Naruto had to be careful.
"Sure. Okay, yeah."
"Then, as social custom dictates, you must listen to one of my requests."
Now Naruto was lost. But so far, no one was talking about dicks or going into a diatribe about having no emotions, so it was all good.
"Okay."
"Then I wish to examine your Eight Trigrams seal."
"…. Huh?"
We ended up here anyway, thought Naruto as he stood in his apartment, trying not to giggle as Tori's feather-light fingers grazed his bare abdomen.
Sasuke, sitting on the kitchen table, watched in fascination. Naruto did not know why. Anything even remotely romantic about this was stamped out by the blank slate expression and glassed eyes that were Tori's normal look.
"This seal is beautiful," she muttered tonelessly. After Naruto's experiences with Sai, he believed that her words were heartfelt.
She made a few seals, her fingers working in lightning fast contortions. In the time it took Naruto to blink, she had already pressed palms warmed with chakra to his stomach.
The seal came forward, the black ink prominent even against Naruto's tanned skin.
"O-oi!"
"It's alright," Sai smiled. Tori's chakra, visible like a healing jutsu, disappeared into his stomach. "She won't be long."
Tori unrolled a blank scroll and pressed it against his seal with the flat of her palm.
She made a one handed sign. "Seal!" Naruto felt something tug from beneath his skin: with a distinct hiss, an exact copy of his seal was burned into Tori's scroll.
She inspected the imprint, nodded when she was satisfied, and then tied the scroll with a string.
As she straightened, a flabbergasted Naruto looked from his stomach to the scroll in her hands and back.
"Uh, what did you –?"
"My errand for Jiraiya-sama is now complete."
"Ero-sennin? What did he –?"
"I will be leaving now, Sai-sama."
"Hey, you didn't answer my –!"
"Will you be okay by yourself?"
"Hello! I'm talking to –!"
"Yes, Sai-sama. I believe I can go on my own from here. Naruto-sama." Naruto, at the sudden formal address, choked on his own rants. "I was surprised. Other than your and the Kyūbi's chakra, there are two more chakra signatures inside your seal."
Naruto, who was ready to start complaining again, stopped mid-breath, which left his mouth hanging open in quite the unflattering way. He was lucky that his small audience of three did not care much.
"They were… warm." She abruptly turned to Sai and bowed slightly. "Shall I see you when the sun is down?"
"Of course," Sai answered with a true smile.
Naruto shut his mouth.
When Tori left through the window, Sai opened his. "Thank you, Naruto-kun."
"For what?"
"She was one of Danzō's subordinates like me." He noticed the dulling of Naruto's eyes and subconsciously frowned. He did not want to make Naruto upset. But he did not want to lie either.
"She's gotten a lot better, but she's still… awkward."
"Like you?"
"Yes," Sai's smile did not waver, "She's been trying very hard, but she still makes many mistakes. Thank you for being kind to her."
"U-uh, yeah, no problem."
Sai nodded and went to the door. "As we agreed, in exchange for letting Tori inspect your seal, I'll get the crowd off your back so you can go to the Academy."
"Oh, uh, that's okay. You don't have to."
"I do." He turned to Naruto with one last smile. "It's a promise to a comrade, right?"
Unfortunately, Sai could only fulfil his promise for fifteen minutes. As he passed out free and absolutely darling paintings of baby Sasuke to the crowd, who were waiting until Naruto finished some vague and unknown errand in his apartment, a masked Anbu alighted in front of him.
Members of the crowd backed up, properly respecting the Black Ops' presence.
"Lord Jiraiya requests your presence in the Hokage's office."
Sai blinked. "Why?"
That one question produced an odd tremble in the Anbu's mask. He had obviously been hoping that Sai would not ask that.
"It's Tori."
Sai blinked again. "What about Tori? Did she not show up?"
"No. She's there." A silent moment passed. Sai's gaze did not waver as he sensed mild panic rising in the man in front of him. "There has been a breakdown in communication between Tori and Lord Jiraiya, and he wishes you to intervene as an intermediary," the Anbu explained in a single, long and relieved breath.
Sai, after spending his entire life under Danzō's command, knew more than well how to read between artfully woven lines.
"What did she say?" he asked dully.
The man flinched back a little. Obviously he was not expecting the acuity. He swallowed, but reported the incident in an overly detached tone.
"She defended the existence of Naruto's manhood, then posited that Lord Jiraiya was jealous because his own bodily stature was indirectly proportional to his – er – 'pride'."
Sai blinked. The crowd gawked. Sai sighed.
"She could barely speak before, but now she's chirping too loudly," he shook his head. And smiled. "At least she likes Naruto."
"It would seem so," the Anbu deadpanned.
And so, after apologizing to a groaning crowd (who realised by that point that Naruto had long left the apartment), Sai left them to go rumbling off after the blond again.
Well, fifteen minutes should have been enough time, right?
"Hello, Naruto."
"Hello… Shino."
"Where are you off to?"
"The Academy."
"I see." Silence. "My home is closer."
"Yes. I know. But I really should go to the Academ –"
"Naruto." Naruto flinched. "You should visit my home first. Why? It will prove beneficial to completing the Know-Your-Village mission."
"True, but I'll visit you later because right now I have to –"
"Naruto."
Sasuke was irritated. All this twitching could not be good for Naruto's health. That, and the sudden jerking motion almost threw him to the ground twice.
"That will not be acceptable. Why? Because you will forget about me and neglect to visit after your business in the Academy is finished. Just like you forgot about me when you first returned to the village after your two and a half year training journey."
The dark fog of an unforgotten grudge steamed off of Shino like a bad stench. Naruto glanced to Kiba, who was staring at some point in the sky with practiced detachment. Akamaru did the same.
Naruto had the sneaking suspicion that their noses were the reason for Shino's sudden appearance in his path. The guilty glances dog and dog-boy shot at him only confirmed it.
Naruto sighed. They were already a little late to see Iruka. What was another half hour?
Kikaichu terrified Sasuke. These three simple words took two and a half hours from Naruto's life.
When the kitten saw the sweeping black mass of loudly buzzing insects coming towards him, his eyes went so wide that Naruto could see the veins of their whites, and then he was gone.
Gone.
Naruto stared at the spot where the kitten had sat for a few seconds before his brain registered the information sent from his eyes.
He and Kiba blinked simultaneously and slowly looked at each other. Shino stood silently, his kikaichu lazily returning to their hive.
Naruto looked around. They were in the thick forest surrounding the Aburame compound, similar to Kiba's but much more moist, and darker.
"Naruto?"
"Yeah Kiba?"
"Did you know that Sasuke can hide his scent?"
Two and a half hours later, Naruto was speeding over Konoha's rooftops, pulling leaves and moss from his person every few seconds, and hugging a very embarrassed Sasuke-kitten close to his chest.
"Iruka-sensei?"
Silence.
"A lot of stuff happened – I really tried to get here on time."
Silence.
"So the lunch thing you planned didn't work, but the kids still really liked him. And we busted up that dumb quiz –"
A fiery glare shot in his direction.
"Uh, I mean, we interrupted –" the glare intensified, "– rudely interrupted an important exam by jumping through the window, but the kids loved it! Aren't the kids what matter?"
Burning sulphur and ash rained from the dark skies of Iruka's gaze.
Naruto was a statue, sitting like a jockey on the lone swing, staring at his impending doom. And the worst part was that Iruka was holding Sasuke, so he did not even have the adorable kitten on his head to deter his sensei's anger.
The loveable blond look just did not work as well without him.
But, as a true friend, Sasuke pulled through for him.
"Are you mad at Naruto, Iruka-sensei?" the kitten mewled. "It's not his fault. I just saw those bugs flying at me and I…"
The effect was instantaneous. "No, well, I am upset, but not so much." Iruka closed his eyes and sighed. "It's not like I can't understand, but Naruto made a promise to me and –"
"Bye Sasuke-chan!" a girl walking hand in hand with her mother called out, waving energetically. "Come to the Academy tomorrow too, okay?"
Her brother spotted Naruto. "Are you gonna come too, Naruto-niichan?"
"Yeah! Make sure you can hit that target next time!"
"Yeah! I'll show you!"
Their mother nodded at them with a smile. They lived only about a hundred yards away from the school. Iruka barely remembered what this woman looked like. In fact, several similar parents who Iruka had only seen once in the Academy's entrance ceremony had taken a sudden initiative to personally pick up their kids.
The fact that all those parents had eyes stuck fast to Sasuke brought their seemingly responsible intentions to light.
Iruka sighed. "Let's go somewhere more private."
"So you haven't thought about it."
Naruto slowly shook his head, half for Sasuke's sake, who was resting comfortably in his usual spot.
"How did you expect Sasuke to become a genin?" Naruto had no answer. Iruka sighed again.
"Naruto, right now you have unofficial custody of Sasuke. Really, the only reason it's not official is because of your age. Still, while he's like this, no one is going to take him away from you. You know what that means, don't you?"
The blond nodded. "Luckily, you have people like me and Jiraiya-sama to help you. But you need to think of some of these things for yourself as well."
Iruka folded his arms as he leaned against the school's backmost wall: the one facing the sparring grounds where genin hopefuls practiced taijutsu and shuriken techniques.
Even though school just let out, the usual stragglers who stayed behind to practice were missing, courtesy of parents hoping to catch a glimpse of Konoha's returned Uchiha.
"How are your finances?" Iruka asked, passing an envelope full of Academy forms for Naruto to fill out. "Surely the money you made from that last mission must be running out."
"I don't have problems with money," Naruto said quickly. "I'll just take some more missions and –"
"Leave Sasuke here alone?" Naruto's argument died in his throat. "Who is going to take care of Sasuke when you start taking missions again?"
A low growl started in Sasuke's throat. "Quit bullying Naruto."
Iruka reached out and rested a warm hand on the kitten's head. The kindness of his smile disarmed Sasuke's anger.
"I wouldn't dream of it. I'm just trying to bring a few things to Naruto's attention." Iruka's smile faded. "You might not understand, Sasuke, but Naruto's been alone for his whole life. It's this village's fault, and it's my fault as well."
"Iruka-sensei, that's not –"
"Don't interrupt," he said gently. "Naruto has always lived alone, fended for himself. It's made him very independent. But that means that he's less likely to think about making arrangements for someone else's life.
"To watch over and protect the lives of those precious to you is something that Naruto knows very well." Iruka met the blue gaze that had not left his face. "But being responsible for another's life is something he still has to learn. After all, you're only responsible for the people who belong to you. This is Naruto's first time bearing that kind of weight."
"I don't understand," Sasuke complained softly.
Iruka smiled. "I didn't really say it for you to understand."
Sasuke pouted. "That's not fair."
Iruka chuckled and stroked the kitten's soft hair. "It's not something you have to understand just yet. But, as long as the right person gets what I'm saying, you'll be all right."
While Sasuke tried to figure out his sensei's words, a whiskered smile bloomed beneath him.
"I hear you, sensei."
"Naruto, you understand?" Sasuke's jealousy was plain. "Explain it to me," he demanded.
"Well… I can't really say all that stuff over again."
"Naruto," Sasuke meowed in frustration. Iruka laughed and patted the kitten's head.
"Hey Sasuke, Naruto's going to enrol you in the Academy, right?" The kitten's ears stood up. Iruka had struck gold. "Think you'll be my top student again?"
"Of course," Sasuke sniffed. Below him, Naruto laughed. "What's so funny?"
"You'll barely fit in the seats, Sasuke. You're so small your ears will be the only part of you Iruka-sensei can see."
Iruka chuckled: that was true after all, even if Sasuke scowled at him for it.
"Don't worry, we've made arrangements concerning that. Sasuke won't have any problems. Before you know it he'll be graduating from the Academy and I'll be giving him his headband –"
"I will." Iruka blinked. Naruto looked straight on at him, his gaze set. "When Sasuke graduates, I'll give him his headband."
Iruka's eyes widened for just a moment. Under his ex-student's gaze, he could only smile.
"I wasn't thinking. That's right… You're the only one qualified to do that, Naruto."
Sakura put down the book she was reading with a sigh. It was a well-written romance, one of her favourites, but after her third perusal of it she could not help but put it aside.
She looked out the window. The paper thin curtains fluttered under the slight breeze, their paleness quickly absorbing the burning orange light of the setting sun.
Orange, huh?
She smiled. The look on Naruto's face when he was called out on that was just too hilarious. But even that could not entertain her for long; she had used the memory as entertainment too many times.
Instead, she raised her hand, and flinched when her fingertips touched tender skin. During her death sprint back to Konoha her body, thirsting for chakra, had almost drunk from the forbidden dam. The precious culmination of nearly three years of chakra storage was almost drained in an instant because of mere impatience.
Those thoughts agitated Sakura, so she had taken to rubbing the centre of her forehead to calm herself. For the skin to be tender like this, how many times had she rubbed that spot over the past few days?
Sakura exhaled. It was getting to her, the quiet boredom of her room, the monotony of her days. She missed her studies, she missed helping out with patients, she missed arguing with Ino, she missed Naruto's idiotic chatter about ramen, she even missed his terrible attempts to ask her out on a date.
Wow. She really was bored. At least during Naruto's hospitalization,.he could not even keep awake long enough to become bored in the first place.
"Uh, did that lady say room one-o-one, or room one-one-one?"
Great. Her senses were so numbed with inactivity that misfired synapses in her brain were filling in the gap.
"Room one-one-zero, Naruto." Wait, it couldn't be.
"See why I have you around 'suke?"
"That's not a compliment, Naruto."
The door opened. "You smartass little –"
"Language, Naruto."
"Oh now you know – hey Sakura-chan – now you know language but what about when Tori said 'dick' huh? How'd you know about that?"
"Shisui-nii liked bawdy jokes. Nii-chan told him not to say them around me, but he slipped up sometimes."
"Uh, 'bawdy'?"
"It means pervy, Naruto."
"Oh, like Ero-sennin!" Sasuke scratched between his ears with his tail, his eyes closed in a troubled expression.
Finally he said, "You don't have a very big vocabulary, do you Naruto?"
Naruto blushed, then tried to act like he hadn't. "Hmph! I know words 'n stuff."
"'N stuff?"
"Shut it you little –"
Sakura's shock finally dissipated enough for her to intervene.
"Naruto?"
Naruto's mouth snapped shut. He blinked and seemed to take in where he was. When he spoke, his voice was much softer.
"Hey, Sakura-chan."
Sasuke, who was lying atop Naruto's head, waved meekly.
"Hey yourself. What are you doing here?" She eyed the thick brown envelope in his hand. "What's that?"
Naruto half lifted the arm carrying the envelope, rotated his shoulder a bit and let the arm fall.
"Oh uh, just some stuff Iruka-sensei gave me."
Naruto's eyes wandered over her body. Her arms, her legs, her neck, and even dipping under her pyjama top; she was wrapped from head to toe in bandages.
She was better. The colour was returning to her skin. Her face looked fuller. Her eyes were calmer. Her hair was pretty and clean like it was supposed to be. And she had gotten the drips removed a day or two ago.
But that crutch was still leaned up too close to her bed. And there were still so many, too many bandages…
"I'm sorry."
Sakura blinked in surprise. "For what?"
"I –" Naruto gestured weakly, "I didn't go to Baa-chan about Sasuke. If I had, she would have stopped the mission sooner, and then you wouldn't have gotten hurt trying to –"
"Naruto," she was laughing. "That's the last thing you should be apologizing for. It's our own fault that you lost faith in us."
That was a physical blow to Naruto. He fell back a step, causing Sakura's mirthful eyes to harden.
"You were afraid of Danzō's power," her voice lowered to a solemn tone. At Naruto's shocked gaze, she added, "Kakashi-sensei and I talked about it."
She looked away from him for a moment, to the rapidly darkening sky. The sun had already set.
"Think about it. Itachi. Pain. All the dangers in this world, all the perils we face everyday. And yet Konoha civilians don't revile their weakness and cower in fear. They have no reason to. Why do you think that is?"
Naruto barely needed to think about it. "Because they've got the Hokage and us protecting them."
Sakura's smile was sad. "Huh, that's the first question I've ever asked you that you've gotten right, Naruto." At the indignant protest, she chuckled. "Yes. They have faith that we'll protect them. They know this. Therefore they aren't afraid."
When she turned back to the silent boy, her smile was still sad. "You see? You were afraid of Danzō. That's proof that you lost any faith in us to protect you. And –" she cut off Naruto's weak protest, "you were right to do so. We failed you. Miserably. It was your mission, and we let another steal your place. Naruto…"
She bowed her head in utter repentance. "I'm sorry."
It was silent. The air in the room held on to Sakura's remorse, making itself heavy.
Sakura stayed with her head bowed, until she felt two gentle and slightly trembling fingers come under her chin and lift it.
Her eyes met shimmering blues and a shaky smile. "Don't do that, Sakura-chan. I'm not worth that."
"But we –"
Naruto shook his head vigorously. Sasuke held on, too fascinated by the scene before him to protest.
"If what you said is true, then I'm the idiot who lost faith in his friends. But not anymore," now Naruto cut off Sakura's interjection, "I'm not afraid of Danzō anymore. Your words slapped some sense into me, Sakura-chan. So hold your head up, okay? Please."
Somehow, having her face so close to Naruto's softened her voice. "Okay."
Naruto looked relieved. Sasuke purred, noticing their position, especially with Sakura's chin tilted upward like that. He had a good memory; Shisui-nii told him there was only one thing for a man and woman to do when in this position.
"Kiss her," he whispered in Naruto's ear. Loudly.
Naruto's eyes turned white. As did Sakura's.
And then, a bandaged but powerful palm thrust into Naruto's chest, sending him stumbling out of control into the opposite wall.
"Wha-wha-wha-wha-what are you doing?! Idiot!" Sakura screeched, clutching the front of her pyjama top closed (though it was never open in the first place).
"S-sorry, Sakura-chan." Naruto's voice was a bit tight as he struggled to pull himself out of the him-sized dent in the wall.
"How did she do that?"
"Sasuke? Hold on a sec, I'm really kinda stuck here."
"No. Naruto. How. Did. She. Do -?" Sasuke gasped. Sakura, with a guilty look on her face, was slowly coming off the bed, reaching for her crutch. "Stay there!" The shrill fright in his voice startled them both.
Naruto pulled and finally came free of the wall. Sakura was staring at Sasuke with plain hurt, while Sasuke glared at the girl with distrustful fear.
The kitten looked back at the Naruto-shaped dent in the wall and trembled. "Monster. You're a monster!" he accused, pointing at Sakura's pale face.
"Sasuke, enough."
"But Naruto -"
"Her name is Sakura Haruno. She's -"
"She's sick! She's in the hospital because she's sick right? So how -?" He looked back to the crumbling drywall.
"Oh please, that's nothing."
"Huh?" The blond took Sasuke from his head; the kitten stared at Naruto, stupefied.
"One time she punched me so far she actually broke a Konoha record!" Naruto smiled. Sasuke blinked, even he knew it was not normal to smile at the memory of being punched.
"And another time, one punch from her broke up a rock as tall as this entire hospital!"
That was an exaggeration, but Sakura only smiled a little, her cheeks warm. Sasuke was looking at her again, childlike awe swiftly replacing his fear. "She did that? She's got no muscles."
Sakura's cheek swelled a bit, and she decided it was time for her to defend herself.
"I don't need to be bulked up like other ninja," she sniffed, flipping a bit of hair out of her face. "I can keep a womanly figure and still be stronger than all of them."
Sasuke's eyes widened. "You're stronger than all of them?"
Sakura blushed but, well, it was not a lie. "Yes. I am. The only person stronger than me is my Shishou."
"That's Baa-chan," Naruto supplemented.
"That pretty nee-san?"
"Ah, yeah. Actually Sasuke, she's more of a lying old hag -" That was when Naruto was rather rudely interrupted by a hardcover romance novel flying at his head. He dodged, leaving the poor book to make its own dent in the wall.
"Wow," Sasuke whispered, peeking at the book over Naruto's shoulder.
"Naruto. Bring Sasuke-kun over here please."
The last place he wanted to go was to a Sakura whose smile could frighten the dead, but if he did not, she would come to him.
Naruto was at her bedside in less than a second.
"Now Sasuke-kun, my Shishou is known as the Strongest and Most Beautiful Woman Alive. You know that ninja can make themselves stronger using chakra, right?" Sasuke nodded. "Well, my Shishou perfected that technique using razor-sharp control of her chakra. With her precision, she can split the earth using only her finger."
Sasuke's jaw dropped and his ears stood straight up, floored as his imagination undoubtedly ran wild.
"And you… you're…?"
Sakura grinned. "Not quite." She leaned forward, the sudden movement making Sasuke jump. "But I'm close."
Sasuke did not smile, or nod. His gaze was undecided; he no longer disliked her, but she was no Hinata. Both of his former teammates saw plainly what he was thinking, and Naruto decided to act.
His jaw worked a moment before he nodded, his decision made. He plucked Sasuke from his shirt and deposited the startled kitten into the arms of an equally startled Sakura.
"Naruto?"
"Uh, Naruto – wait –"
"Sasuke." The two fell silent. "Sakura was your friend, before you lost your memories. She's been waiting a long time to see you."
Sasuke tilted his head, obviously confused. Sakura was way too old to have been any of his friends.
Naruto continued. "She's wanted to see you more than anyone. So, just talk to her, okay?"
"Naruto?" Sasuke asked again, reaching out as Naruto went for the door. "Wait, Naruto…"
"I'm right outside," he assured, holding up the envelope he had somehow managed to keep a hold of even after Sakura pushed him. "I'm just gonna see if I can fill some of these out."
"But –" The door shut with a soft click.
The two were alone.
Sasuke let his arm drop. After a few moments of silence, he slowly leaned back until he flopped on his butt. His back was still to Sakura, his tail swinging slowly back and forth. He purred unhappily in his throat; the sound was loneliness itself, audible yet wordless. Sakura swallowed nervously, but kept silent. She had learned from her childhood failures: when Sasuke was brooding, sometimes the best thing to do was shut up and let him brood.
Finally, the kitten stood up and turned three-quarters to her, blushing faintly.
"You're… really stronger than all the ninja in the world?"
Sakura smiled, and stabbed a hole in the bedside table with a single finger.
"So Lee-san was the one who taught you about the Will of Fire?"
"Yeah. Lee's awesome. But I think Hinata-neechan's the best."
"You really like Hinata huh?"
Sasuke nodded shyly. He looked around the empty room as though expecting Naruto to burst in any moment, which was not all that unlikely, and stood up on tiptoes to whisper in Sakura's ear. She still had to bend down almost to the mattress to meet him.
"She kinda looks like my mom."
Sakura never heard such sweet and painful words. Her eyes suddenly filled; she blinked rapidly as she straightened.
'I think she's the prettiest nee-chan here.'
"Sakura-neechan?" Sasuke noticed that her eyes seemed just a bit too wet.
"Sakura." Sasuke's ears twitched. "Call me Sakura."
Sasuke squirmed, his shoulders rotating. "I don't really know you all that well. And Kaa-san said it's rude to use a big sister's first name."
The old Sasuke never cared about being respectful - he would have called her by her first name whether she wanted it or not. He never cared for his mother's words.
Or perhaps he could not bring himself to be that child who followed them.
"You call Naruto by his name, right?"
"Naruto's Naruto," Sasuke insisted stubbornly. "You're not Naruto."
Those words hurt. They caused a pain in her heart almost as bad as the one three years ago when he…
'Sakura. Thank you.'
After all this time, she still had not caught up to Naruto. 'You're not Naruto. I have no bond with you like I do with him.'
That… was the truth. She had no real bond with Sasuke – she knew very well that her affection for him was one-sided, and they were barely friends before he left.
It hurt. Damn it. If it was going to hurt either way, she might as well insist on her real name.
"I'm Sakura," she affirmed solemnly. "That's what you've always called me. I'm not your 'nee-chan' like Hinata. I'm Sakura."
Sasuke's tail wagged in agitation. Sakura kept firm, meeting his gaze head on.
She thought he would grunt, or hiss and run off to Naruto. 'I don't like her. She's weird,' his complaints echoed clearly in her mind.
But he did none of this. After a few tense moments, Sasuke pouted and looked away, tracing a circle in the bedspread with his tail.
"Fine. Sakura."
The pain in her heart receded. Sakura gave him a toothy smile. "So, Lee-san and Hinata sparred huh? How was it?"
Sasuke grinned and, forgetting all about his recent defeat, went into an animated description, jumping and flailing with his arms and tail, making appropriate noises for Hinata's 'chakra hands' and Lee's 'super-fast speed'.
And, in the midst of Sasuke spinning wildly to demonstrate the Kaiten, her eyes filled again.
When had Sasuke ever talked to her like this? When did the dream of simply sitting with him and listening to him talk about his day come within her grasp?
Sasuke fell down, tottered back to his feet and started spinning again. Well, the reality was not quite what Sakura had in mind, but it was more than she ever thought she would receive.
The old Sasuke had barely looked at her, even when she tried from morning till dusk to catch his attention, to have him say one small word of acknowledgement to her. But the Sasuke who sat on her bed, rambling on and on about the friends he'd made like Hinata-neechan, Kunai-neechan (Sakura giggled at Tenten's new nickname) and Lee, had told her with serious eyes that he wanted to make friends with her too, even if he did not remember her.
She had happily accepted his friendship with teary eyes, and silently promised that she would punch Sai and Shino when next she saw them. Sasuke had not named them as friends, so it was fine. Tori would be exempted, since it seemed she honestly did not know any better. If she got the little bird out from under Sai's wing soon enough, there might still be time to make her a normal, functioning member of –
"Sakura?"
Sakura snapped out of her reverie. Sasuke was staring at her, or trying to – his eyes were a bit unfocused from all that spinning.
"What's a sensory screen? Kunai-neechan said Hinata-neechan used the Kaiten as a sensory screen."
Sakura thought on that, replaying the battle as best she could from Sasuke's playacting.
"I think she used the Kaiten's chakra to sense her surroundings, rather than defend her." She reached for the book she had been reading; before realising that it was still embedded in the wall from when Naruto had made her throw it by being an idiot.
So she picked up her water glass instead. "Pretend this is the Kaiten." She raised her fist. "Normally, the Kaiten would repel oncoming attacks like this." She bounced her fist off the glass. "Hinata did it different. By removing his leg weights and opening the Third Inner Gate, Lee was moving way too fast for even the Byakugan to track. So she gave up on sight completely and used her chakra to see for her. As soon as Lee's kick touched the Kaiten's wall, Hinata was able to feel it and react faster than if she had relied on her sight."
"Oh! That's why she could dodge it that time!"
"Right," Sakura tapped him on the nose.
Sasuke smiled. "You're real smart, Sakura."
At the unexpected compliment, her cheeks turned the same shade of pink as her hair. She did not even notice the room's door open.
"And you," she reached out and gently pinched Sasuke's cheeks, "are the sweetest little kitty I've ever met."
The cheeks turned tomato red between her fingers. Sakura laughed and, despite the bandages, wiggled her fingers menacingly.
Sasuke saw it coming and tried to run, but got tangled in the white bedsheets. With a cartoonish roar, Sakura pounced.
This was the scene that stopped Naruto's approach, a raven and rosette tumbling around in a sea of white, squealing and laughing with abandon.
Sakura was so relieved. She had been so worried about so many things. Worried about Sasuke's amnesia, worried about how they could change Sasuke back. Wondering if it was right to change him back, wondering if she could build a bond with him this time.
But now all those troubles dissolved.
Sasuke was here. Sasuke was smiling. Sasuke was laughing.
When had he ever done those things beyond a forced chunk of sound, a piece of a grunt if so much?
Hatred and the cruel duty of revenge had weighed down everything – had crushed Sasuke's smile. His laugh.
But now he was free.
Sakura threw back her head and laughed.
Naruto left the room with a smile, letting them play a little while longer.
"By the way, Sasuke-kun," said Sakura after a nurse passed by and gave a warning that all visitors were to leave.
Her fifth warning. By the nurse's twitching and razor thin smile, the next time she came around and saw Naruto in the room, she was calling the Anbu.
Sakura tightened her fists. She wanted her to try something. Her body already ached from playing with Sasuke, and she was not in the mood for that woman's power trip.
Naruto saw this, and to him, it only made her honey-sweet smile and warm eyes that much more frightening.
"I've been wondering for a while. How old are you?"
Naruto was holding Sasuke, so he could not gesticulate with his arms. Instead he opened his eyes wide, so wide that Sakura could see the complete circle of his sky-blue irises. The view did not last long, as in the next moment he was shaking his head wildly from side to side.
Sakura worried that his neck would snap, but she would cross that bridge when she came to it. Her curiosity was a bit more important right now.
Sasuke, who had started yawning at five minute intervals, sat up a little.
"How old?"
"Yeah. Do you remember? Are you like three? Four? You speak very well, and you have an impressive vocabulary. Five perhaps?"
Sasuke blinked bemusedly. "Five what?"
Sakura blinked in perfect imitation. "Five years, of course."
Sasuke frowned. "I'm a kitten." Sakura blinked again. Naruto rolled his eyes to the ceiling. There was no helping her now.
"Yes, I know. But how old are you?"
"Kitten."
Sakura's eyes widened slightly. Naruto's eyes found a fly staring right at them as it hung upside down from a fluorescent bulb.
"Wait… 'Kitten' is how old you are?"
"Yes."
"Your age is 'kitten'?"
"Yes."
Sakura was struck dumb. The fly moved to another bulb.
"But, that doesn't make any sense Sasuke-kun."
"What do you mean?"
"If you use 'kitten' as your age, how can you tell when you're getting older?"
Naruto made a sound as if he was subtly trying to hack up a chicken bone. Such a sound could never be subtle. Sasuke glared at him for his obvious failure before turning to Sakura and holding up three fingers.
"Right now, I'm a Kitten. When I'm older like Nii-chan, I'll be a Cat. And when I'm all grown up," Sasuke's eyes sparkled in aspiration, "I'll be a Lion!"
Sakura stared. The fly's buddy landed on the same bulb. Naruto's eyes started watering, but that was of minimal concern.
"Lion?" Sasuke nodded with a huge grin. "Naruto?"
Naruto was partly grateful for a reason to look away: the two flies had started mating. He looked at Sakura, or more accurately at the multi-coloured spots making stuttered movements across her face.
Rare for the boisterous blond, he only spoke three words. "I warned you."
"But surely you told Sasuke-kun that he's wrong."
"Didn't work."
"But surely you taught him the proper way of using years to –"
"Didn't work."
"But surely you explained that –"
"Didn't work."
"But surely you –"
"He said he already compromised on the bird-eating. He's not giving up on being a Lion," said Naruto in an impressive monotone.
Sakura closed her mouth. There was nothing left for her to say.
Knuckles knocked raptly on the door. The voice behind it sounded like its owner had eaten nails. "Excuse me. Visiting hours are –"
"He'll be gone in the next five minutes!" Sakura snapped.
"Ma'am I must insist –"
"Gah, you're annoying! He won't burn down the building by staying a little longer!"
Naruto could not help but appreciate the irony. Was it only a few years ago when he was the one who would be yelled at and told he was annoying?
He smiled. "It's okay. Sasuke's half-asleep already. We should go."
"O-oh." She glanced at the clock. It was late for a baby to be up. "Okay. You two head on home."
Sakura's poker face was almost as bad as Tsunade's. Even Naruto could tell her smile was sad.
A somewhat devious plan formed in his mind. He glanced at the envelope of unfinished forms.
"Sakura-chan, you mind helping me out a bit?"
Half an hour later, Sakura filled in the last empty space in the last Academy Application form.
Idiot.
Even if it did not matter who filled in the form as long as the guardian's signature was on it, that did not mean that over three quarters of it should be filled by proxy just because a certain dimwit could not remember Sasuke's blood type.
Okay, maybe that was a bit harsh, but they were on a team together once. Blood type was elementary information about his teammates that the idiot should have burned into his memory.
No telling what could happen on a mission.
She sighed. It was only because he promised to bring the kitten first thing in the morning when he came to collect the forms that she was going through this.
The envelope still had a sheet of paper inside. Rolling her eyes, she turned the envelope upside down and watched it slip out and fall on her matching white bedding.
She blinked. That was unexpected.
It was a list of Shinobi Day Cares. Unlike normal day cares, these were large houses equipped to care for children whose parents were away on missions. Any child could easily stay a month in one of them.
Naruto had ticked off two – probably looked at pricing and location.
She would have done the same, if she did not personally know the matrons for these houses. The hospital was usually on close terms with them, seeing as they cared for a large percentage of Konoha's children.
She immediately scratched off one of Naruto's choices. Matron or not, that woman was a troll.
"Did you have fun today, Sasuke?"
"Yeah. It was real fun. Are we gonna walk around tomorrow too?"
"Yup. We've still got a lot of Konoha to see."
"Oh. Okay."
Sasuke, warm and sleepy after their bath, slowly ate his cream. Naruto ate his (burned) hamburger steak and a few vegetables. It was a huge break from the usual cup ramen, but after talking with Iruka, Naruto figured he needed to set a good example.
Though the vegetables weren't going down as easily as he'd hoped. He knew he messed up that recipe somewhere – or everywhere – but he was sure that carrots were not supposed to be black. Or crumble like ash at the slightest touch.
Well, no worries. With that recipe book Ero-sennin bought him, which also doubled as a primer for beginners, he should be able to perfect his technique. After all, the note that Jiraiya had written on the book's first page openly challenged him:
'If you can master the Rasengan in a week, you can master half this book just the same. Cook me up something good when I come around next time.'
Naruto stabbed his leather-tough steak. He never backed down from a challenge.
Sasuke yawned loudly, his head drooping. Okay, time for bed.
After they cleaned up and brushed their teeth, Naruto bundled the kitten in his arms and went to put him down to sleep in his new bed.
Sasuke's claws dug into his pyjama top. "Sasuke." Sasuke pressed closer to him, a rumbling purr escaping him.
Naruto sighed and went to his own bed, which he had pushed up against the wall, right under the window. He sat there, looking up at Konoha's starry sky.
For the first time, it struck him just how special the village was. Its peace was unique. He had travelled more places than he could remember with Ero-sennin, and never came across another place like it.
No. He would go so far as to say that gentle, easy days like this were near impossible anywhere else. Despite all it had done to him in the past, Konoha was the only place he felt at ease.
The only place he wanted to see Sasuke grow.
"Naruto?" Sasuke had released his shirt, and was looking at the stars too. "Today was a good day."
"Yeah. It was."
"I had days like this with Nii-chan sometimes. When I found out my clan was dead, and Nii-chan… … … I thought I wouldn't have good days anymore."
The wind blew, cool and scented with the changing leaves.
"You're my Nii-chan, Naruto."
"Yeah. I am."
"So we'll have more days like this?"
"Yeah. As many as you want, Sasuke."
Sasuke's ears suddenly drooped. "Am I a burden to you, Naruto?"
A little startled, Naruto asked, "Where'd that come from?"
"Iruka-sensei said that you used to live alone. I bet you did anything you wanted to. But, now that I'm here… you can't do as you like anymore. Am I a weight to you, Naruto? Like Iruka-sensei said?"
"Ba-aka. That's not what he meant. Besides –" Naruto easily tossed Sasuke into the air and caught him. Surprised, Sasuke could only stare at the lightly smiling blond.
"You're so light. You barely weigh a thing, Sasuke."
Sasuke was confused. Even he understood that Iruka was not talking about physical weight. What was Naruto…?
"Yup, you weigh nothing at all," Naruto chuckled, tossing him up again. "You're so light you make me feel light. You're the best and lightest weight I've ever had to carry, Sasuke."
"That's – that's so cheesy Nawuto."
"Why're you crying then? And talking like a baby?"
"Shut up," Sasuke wiped at his eyes as he was tossed up again.
Naruto smiled and hugged him close, pretending to ignore it as Sasuke dried his tears in his shirt.
"Naruto? We're family, right?"
"Yeah."
"So, we'll stay together like this?"
"Yeah."
"For as long as I want?"
"Until you can't stand it."
When Sasuke yowled unhappily at that, Naruto could only laugh.
And when the kitten whispered 'thank you' as he tumbled over the edge into sleep, Naruto could only smile.
He tucked Sasuke into his new bed and climbed into his own. As he followed his little family into the land of dreams, he had a whispered thought.
'If everyday could be like this, that wouldn't be bad at all.' A small smile. 'Too bad we never opened that ice cream…'
When the clock struck midnight, Sakura was long asleep. Naruto's application forms and a checklist of all the day-cares she approved of were stacked neatly atop the finger-wide, inch deep hole poked into the table's surface.
The dent in the wall had its outline strategically flattened to hide its conspicuous shape. When this obviously failed, the room's desk was pushed in front of it and decorated with the vases of flowers Ino and her parents had brought for her.
Sakura then went to sleep with the furtive hope that her camouflage would be enough. Destroying the walls of two hospital rooms would be too trying on her Shishou's patience.
As tendrils of guilt reached her even in her dreams – "no Shishou, it's Naruto's fault" – an especially strong wind blew through Konoha. Sakura's hair moved. The two events should have been simple cause and effect, but could not have been.
The nights had gotten too chilly, so Sakura had closed her window.
Her hair moved again. A piece of her scalp, previously no different from any other piece, suddenly stretched up and away from her skull like autonomous taffy.
Sakura only moaned. Her dream was especially captivating, no doubt influenced by the rebellious piece of scalp that was rapidly asserting that it was not a scalp at all.
The 'scalp' groaned as the last of it detached from Sakura's head and dropped dully to the ground.
A line suddenly grooved itself along the side of its body; the 'mouth' opened, filled with block-like and unevenly spaced teeth. "That was rough."
It had every right to complain. The last few days had been awful. It had to endure two days of non-stop travel attached to someone it was now convinced was half insane.
No. Anyone who would punch through a tree rather than move just an inch or two around it was insane.
But, just its luck, this insane girl was important to the Hokage, which meant that she was monitored non-stop, giving it no chance to even move a centimetre let alone stretch its mockery of muscles.
By the time the security and medical examinations calmed down, the girl was healthy enough to stay awake for considerably long periods of time.
But now, finally, she was asleep, and no one was watching her.
It quickly took its chance. After all, for all its unpleasantness, being attached to this girl had yielded some valuable information.
Its flesh rippled and bulged, becoming soft and malleable so that it could be sculpted into form by an invisible will. Soft pale skin flowed over newly formed limbs and digits, and disappeared under the sleeves and hem of a newly moulded kimono. Grain by grain, black shoots of hair emerged from innumerable pores in its scalp, growing rapidly till they fell to shoulder length and settled around a distinctly shaped face. New eyes blinked, a small bump of a nose rose, and a small mouth (wholly unlike its gross predecessor) drew itself above the chin in a serious line.
The metamorphosis ended, and the creature-turned-human looked at its hands in mild wonder.
Sakura moaned again. And opened her eyes.
"Shizune-san?" she asked.
It smiled. "Sorry, I didn't mean to wake you."
The girl shook her head with a small smile. "What are you doing?"
"Just an errand. I thought I'd check up on you."
"Geez, you and Shishou worry too much. I'm fine." She was fixed with a severe look. "I'm… better?"
Shizune smiled. "Indeed. Goodnight Sakura."
"Goodnight…" the girl drifted off to sleep.
Shizune smiled and closed the door softly behind her.