Reaching

LilacLilyFlower © 2009

Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto. Unfortunately.

Beta'ed by the wonderful Sanctuaria!

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Omake Special 2 (NOT A PART OF THE ACTUAL STORY)

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"We did it!"

Arms flew into the air. Cheers abounded. Streamers streamed, poppers popped, and fizzy drinks fizzed.

Hikari grinned as Takahiro picked her up and spun her in his arms, laughing gleefully. She joined in on the cheering.

"We did it!" she whooped. "We finally killed off one of the team members!"

The cheers immediately cut. Takahiro let her down and stared at her.

"What?" she asked quizzically, returning the stares.

A heavy hand fell on her head, turning her face until she saw the owner of the hand. "We're not celebrating my death," Shoumaru said. "We're celebrating the one hundred review milestone."

"Oh." She bit her lip, aware of her mistake. "I thought it was to celebrate the character development that would follow your death."

"You're such a dork sometimes," Ino teased. She popped her popper. "Hooray! One hundred reviews!"

Everyone else joined in, this time including Hikari. "Hooray!"

Hikari found Eisuke and Takahiro in the crowd and drew them to a spot on the couch. Settling in, she sipped her soda and asked, "So what happens now?"

"What do you mean?"

"What happens now that our sensei is dead?"

"Well, we deal with the aftermath and angst," Eisuke replied. "And I come to terms with my first kills. I think. I'm not exactly sure what Authoress is planning."

Takahiro smiled, smug. "I know what she's planning," he sang. "And it's basically drama, drama, and more drama. Politics, broken relationships, brothers, a mysterious new teacher!" He took a huge gulp of his soda.

"You sound like a cheesy trailer," Hikari deadpanned.

"Hey, it gets the job done, Miss Concentration-that-gets-the-job-done."

"I can hear the hyphens in that. Spare me."

The couch sank as someone sat beside them. "Well, I'm glad I'm not going to be a part of this for a very long time," Shoumaru commented. "You'll see me at my funeral and maybe the occasional flashback, but that's about it."

"Lucky," Eisuke muttered. Hikari turned on him, offended. It was her story, after all.

He held his hands up in defense. "Hey, I don't like killing people, okay? Even if they're alive in these omakes, since Authoress likes to soothe her tortured soul by pretending that we're just actors."

Hikari blinked. "Aren't we actors though?"

"No, we're figments of her imagination. The canon Naruto characters are actors, but their personalities and actions, which are starting to diverge from canon, are figments of her imagination too," Takahiro explained.

"Right. Forgot about that. It's nice to know that I'm at the mercy of a 'tortured soul'."

"Stop with the quotes. Spare me."

"Now you're just teasing."

"But seriously, we've come a long way. One hundred reviews! And it's also almost our one year anniversary for publishing."

"I just can't wait until Authoress finishes her college applications. The story will be updated more frequently afterwards, and we'll actually know what's going to happen instead of waiting for a month for an update."

Hikari smiled, leaning back on the sofa. They'd reached one hundred reviews, killed Shoumaru off, and traumatized Eisuke.

It was a good day.

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A/N: Just something to soothe my tortured soul.

But really! THANKS SO MUCH FOR THE REVIEWS!

Brace yourselves for the impending drama. And go check out Strawberry Days.

See you next time!