Thirteen year old Uzumaki Naruto awoke to the soft urgings of the slim figure kneeling beside his rickety old bed. His vision cleared to see in the already hard sunlight the strands of dark almost ebony blue hair tickling his nose as two sky blue eyes peered down at him. A nymph like upturned nose took a relaxed intake of air and the soft looking pouting lips exhaled the remains a few moments later. Her hair, long and straight, framed a ageless face of a twenty something year old.

"Aoi..." He mumbled thinking about returning to bed when her hands griped his arm a little more and shook the sleepiness from his body. "...lemme sleep."

"Please wake up, master. It's almost time for school." A soft, very easy on the ears kind of voice came from those same pouting lips, neither chiding nor worried, yet somewhere deep in his brain he could hear both. The simple thought of disappointing her brought Naruto's mind into sharp focus and turned to the old broken clock upon the wall, it was something he had found looking for furniture after he had been evicted from his old apartment when Aoi had come to live with him. When the Landlord had found out he used the excuse only one person in Naruto's lease to kick the boy out without his items, using every cheap trick to leave the young child without anything. While The Old Man had done his best the only thing he could do to help was find another apartment. For weeks Naruto had looked for some furniture before finally succumbing to trash diving. It wasn't like he hadn't done it before, after all. In any sort, the item in question normally had three hands, A short stubby hour, a long and average minute, and a long needle thin second. He could never find all three, in all the clocks he had scrounged around in, and those hands had never worked with the only fixable clock he had acquired. So he made due with merely the hour hand. In a way it made it easier for him, as the position of that fat squat bit of metal showed he had only thirty minutes before the start of his third try, the second this year, of gaining his ninja status. He hopped out of bed, thanking Aoi who began folding his bedding. Once the bedding removed, and carefully stowed in the linen closet, the remainder of the bed could be used as a table, something he had created and used putting several things together. Aoi began bringing plates from the small kitchen corner as he poured them a glass of milk each. After thanking for the meal, the blonde boy began devouring the simple meal with great fervor, though not without some manners. Aoi had taught him those, among many other things, it was just one of the hundreds of small changes the girl had brought into his life. As he thought about it he looked over to find the girl chewing a small selection of meat and... something, together. He couldn't remember the exact reason for it, but he knew she derived the energy from food rather much the same he did, only using a completely different way, and that way would probably stay too confusing for him to understand all his life. He had never asked after the first time's four hour long explanation on consumption alone. Needless to say Aoi was very complex. So complex it sometimes worried him if she would... he never liked the word break, or anything that made it sound like she wasn't a real person.

Because Aoi was an Android, or Gynoid, both words probably hadn't be said since before the Rikudo Sennin's time. She was someone he would never be able to fix if something ever happened to her. However a simplified version he could under stand was she was mechanical, yet biological as well. All of her systems ran the same as a humans, and that alone made her amazing. She felt, sounded, and to a degree acted real too. She even bled something very similar in most ways to blood, though the iron content was twice that of a human. Healing was used with smaller not visible machines, and through these constantly creating items she could last another thousand years if not more. It was a sobering thought to the boy, when they laid the remains of her former master to rest, when he learned of the brilliant scientist's last wish.

Aoi had no emotion. Not that she could never have them, only they were locked away in a special part of her. Something only a certain person with a certain perspective could ever unlock. The eight hour explanation of the device in question was met with such confusion he actually passed out from sheer overload. It still made his head rattle a bit. But he had made a promise when she finished, one just as equal to his goal of becoming Hokage. He would make Aoi smile, even if it took him his entire life to do so. Finishing off his meal, he thanked Aoi for preparing it. She nodded, continuing to chew her own meal at a sedated pace. As he grabbed his usual goggles and an odd looking wrist device he paused and gave a small hug to the girl.

"Thanks for everything, Aoi. I'll try my best, okay?" Her hands pressed softly against his forearms in a replication of the hug.

"You are welcome, Master. I wish you good luck today." He smiled just as he always did in her presence, then left the smallish apartment. Aoi watched him leave for a moment, then finished he own meal. She cleaned up the table, pausing at the sink to bring her hands back up to where they had been when Naruto had hugged her. After a few moments she returned to her duties as if nothing at all happened.

Once the room was clean, the dishes done, and the laundry hung, the robotic girl picked up a basket, then headed for the door herself. She had much to do before dinner had to be started.

Linebreak

Naruto: Blue Dreams: The Genin Exams and Aoi's Mission

By

Hibiki

Aoi and some belong to me. All others and locations belong to Masashi Kishimoto.

Linebreak

He arrived early, having run the entire way.

Naruto just went too far for me to enjoy anymore and RL has left me with no interest in trying to keep writing in this , this fiction is as finished by me as it every will be, and any one may continue should they wish. PM's are always welcome if you would like to know where I was heading with the story. Adoption papers are a go.