CHAPTER VI: A CHANCE ENCOUNTER
Home didn't bring the relief he thought it would.
Restless.
Naruto felt restless.
He wanted to nap, but he couldn't sleep.
He wanted to read his comics, but his eyes wouldn't focus on the words and the pictures were only half as fun.
His radio was still a bust — I'll get that fixed next pay — so he couldn't listen to music.
What to do…? he thought, absently kicking his legs while he lay on the bed.
The day was nice and cool, and he had so much pent-up energy. Maybe I could go outside? Only… outside meant people, and people didn't like Naruto as the day had so kindly illustrated.
Then again, it's not like I needed to be Naruto. Not anymore. Naruto smiled, throwing himself off his bed. Of course! Nobody will bother Ayame. Nobody cared about Ayame, not like they care about me!
All he needed were some clothes.
Naruto didn't feel particularly guilty about "borrowing" anymore. At least, not today. The gods owe me for today, was his justification.
And, it wasn't like he was stealing stealing. He just wanted to disappear, to be someone else for the moment. They'd get their clothes back by the day's end.
So, he looked about for some clothes hanging out to dry, that had dried beneath the sun's rays, considering whether or not they'd fit on his Centrefold's larger frame. It took longer than before, but, by the end of his search, he had found some baggy trousers alongside a red shirt that looked like they'd fit.
He snagged them, shoved them into his backpack, and scurried back to his apartment.
Once safe inside, he stripped and transformed, taking a moment to get dressed in the pillaged clothes before taking in the sight.
The trousers were loose, but the drawstrings kept them secured around his waist. The shirt, however, was large. Far larger than Naruto assumed. It sat like a dress, a rather short dress but a dress nonetheless.
He stared, considering his newest outfit. It didn't look that bad, but it wasn't particularly special. He hummed, consideringly, twisting on the spot and pulling at the dress-shirt, admiring how it fell about his frame. Then, he shrugged. He was dressed. That's all that mattered.
Grabbing his things, he left to wander the streets of Konoha.
The park but it wasn't somewhere Naruto visited often. Not anymore, at least. Most of the time, he didn't have the time. The Academy took up much of it these days. Other times, it was the weather. Winter was too cold, and summer was too hot — though, if he was being honest, it was the bugs that made summer unbearable.
He missed it, though.
He missed exploring the lake, finding cool rocks by the water's edge, or wading through the undergrowth of the nearby forest. He was sure his old shuriken training ground was somewhere hidden amongst the trees, though after a year of disuse, he was sure it wasn't looking too good.
There were ducks, too, but Naruto never had enough money to buy them feed.
The jungle-gym was a pale reflection of the Academy's obstacle course, with climbing walls, monkey-bars, tunnels, but all on such a small scale he swore felt bigger than it really was. Of course, there also weren't any wire-fields, so it wasn't all bad.
At its centre was a castle: tall and made of wood, with towers and rope bridges and tunnels and even a few slides of dented metal jutting out like the legs of a deformed spider.
Or a turtle, now that he thought about it. If the castle were its shell…
He remembered having fun, exploring the maze-like interior, clambering up the wooden spires, feeling like the Hokage watching over his domain from on high. Of course, the other kids always had to ruin it. "Rats aren't allowed in the castle. Daimyō's rule!"
As Amaya, however?
"Aren't you too old for the monkey bars?"
Things weren't that different, apparently.
Naruto glanced up at whoever had spoken and regretted it immediately.
The sun was out, and he could barely make out the vague silhouette of a girl leaning out of one of the towers beneath the blinding glare.
With a scowl, he threw himself from the bars, flipping over and stumbling, tripping face first into the rough chips of the bark. Someone laughed — cackled, really, like a witch. A particularly nasty witch with warts on her toes.
He shot to his feet, face flushed hot in embarrassment. "What's it to ya, huh?" he asked, brushing wood-chips from his stolen shirt. "You some kind of playground ANBU?"
The girl laughed, then snorted. "Weirdo."
"I bet you couldn't do better!"
Before Naruto could retort, a new voice cut in. "Hey, what's going on over here?"
Naruto snapped around, defensive. "She's — "
Then he froze, stupefied.
It was the man from the grocery store.
"Takeshi?" Naruto all but shrieked. "What are you doing here?"
"Wait — wait, Ayame?" He looked just as Naruto remembered, though in different clothes. A blue shirt decorated with some kind of emblem — a band shirt, maybe?
"You know her?" It was the witch, again. "Is she your girlfriend?"
Naruto blinked, surprised, confused, then realised he was a girl, now, and blanched. "What? No!"
Takeshi seemed to agree, crossing his arms and glaring at the little witch. "Hana!" he snapped, sounding an awful lot like a teacher. Or, well, maybe a parent whenever they saw one of their kids "associating" with him.
'Hana' frowned. "Oh. Well, that's boring."
"You know this witch, Takeshi?" Naruto asked, brain swirling, struggling, as he tried to understand how these two knew each other.
Takeshi laughed. "Oh, yeah. Um. This is my sister, Hanako. Hanako, this is Ayame."
Naruto's head snapped around, looking at the witch, then back to Takeshi, and, much to his horror, he saw the resemblance. The same brown eyes, the same squat face — if slightly pudgy around Hanako's cheeks — and the same curly black hair, though Hanako's was, naturally, longer than her brothers. About the only difference was the visible scars across Hanako's face, running from her cheeks down her neck beneath her clothes. Burn scars, he noted.
"So, she is your girlfriend?" Hanako asked, leaning against the railing and looking put out.
Naruto flushed at that and huffed, crossing his arms.
"She's not my girlfriend." Takeshi was firm, much to Naruto's relief. Maybe transforming into a girl wasn't such a good idea? "We just met at the market awhile back."
"Well, she's still a weirdo," Hanako replied, dismissively.
Takeshi frowned. "What's going on?"
"She thinks I'm too old for the playground," Naruto replied with a harrumph. It was odd, actually. Hanako looked a few years older than Naruto, himself. Then again, that small part of him reminded himself, I probably look a few years older than her. "And stop calling me weird!"
"Okay, weirdo."
"Hana!" Takeshi looked exasperated. "Please be nice."
Hanako didn't reply.
He sighed, then looked at Naruto. "So, what're you doing out here?"
"Well, I was enjoying myself out on the playground," Naruto replied, and glared at Hanako who looked positively irreverent. "I just wanted to hang out at the park. I was bored."
Takeshi sighed. "Fair enough."
"What about you?"
"Ma asked me to babysit Hana, so here I am." He didn't sound too pleased.
"You make it sound like you're being punished!" Hanako whined. "Aren't you having fun? You even met your girlfriend!"
Takeshi snorted. "Chasing you around the park isn't my idea of fun, gremlin."
Hanako blew a raspberry then vanished into the castle.
"Ugh. Great." Takeshi muttered something under his breath, then looked to Naruto, and suddenly he was… different. He scratched his head, looking at the ground. "I'm probably gonna have to go chasing after her to make sure she doesn't hurt herself."
"Why not get a leash?" Naruto asked.
Takeshi laughed at that, then smiled. "Hey, um. If you're not doing anything at the moment, d'you wanna hang out?"
Naruto blinked. "What?" he asked, not sure he heard right. "Like… hang out as friends?"
"Yeah, sure. I mean, if you're not doing anything…"
Naruto had never been asked to hang out before, and wasn't sure how he felt about that. Good, he'd say, but it was such an alien feeling it left him feeling like he was standing with two left feet. "Sure," he replied, eventually. "Though, I'm not chasing her down."
Takeshi laughed again. "Didn't expect you to." He started walking, probably off to find his sister, and beckoned Naruto to follow. "Come on. She couldn't have gone far."
Naruto followed at a steady pace, quietly wondering what people did when they hung out together. He wasn't sure what to even say. Fortunately, Takeshi had the answer.
Small talk.
He asked her how she had been — "Good," Naruto lied — and what he'd been up to — "Nothing much. I did try out those cooking ideas you told me about." — and Naruto returned the favour. Takeshi was taking a break after a major test for his engineering degree, apparently, and, at Naruto's prompting, he told him all about his studies.
It was, in a word, fascinating.
Naruto hadn't really thought much about technology, but Takeshi was quickly revealing just how complicated it could be. Honestly, he was surprised engineering wasn't classified as some kind of jutsu. It certainly sounded like it.
"Right now, I'm just learning how to manufacture and maintain some of the tech we've got, radios and whatnot, but, someday, I wanna start working with that Old World stuff. Mass communication networks and the like." He shrugged, then smiled wickedly. "Maybe I'll even get my hands on one of those computers the Ninja are hoarding."
Most of what he had said had gone over Naruto's head, but one thing did stick out. "My raido's broken," he said suddenly. "I don't got much money to fix it up. Do you think you could look at it?"
Takeshi looked taken aback, then shrugged easily. "Sure. Always loved tinkering with that kind of stuff. You could always come by mine and drop it off, or something."
Naruto grinned, wide and toothily, and found himself almost jumping on the spot, hands flapping excitedly. "Thank you! Thank you! Thank you! You have no idea how boring it's been without being able to listen to the radio."
"No worries. If you live nearby, I can see about taking it home tonight?"
An emphatic agreement bubbled in Naruto's throat, only to be strangled by the realisation that he'd have to take Takeshi to his apartment. To Naruto's apartment. "Uh. We'll see. I don't know, yet."
Takeshi didn't seem too bothered by that, however, and they continued to talk like that for a time. Well, Takeshi talked. Naruto listened, only speaking here and there, still struggling to figure out what to say — what he could say. It wasn't like he could tell Takeshi about his day, about what he'd been up to, or anything like that. If you did, Naruto's brain told him, he'll know who you really are.
The thought scared Naruto. It scared him more than he'd ever admit.
So, he kept quiet and wondered what stories he could spin so he didn't make Takeshi feel bad for doing all the talking. Could he say he was an orphan? It wasn't like Naruto was the only orphan in Konoha. There were a lot, actually. But… what would his story be? What did he do? Who was Konohako Ayame?
Before Naruto knew it, they had left the castle and were sitting down at the swing-set a stone's throw away. How much time had passed? It certainly didn't feel that long. Naruto swung at a steady pace, while Takeshi simply lounged in his seat, talking about electricity and what could be accomplished with it. "The hard part is figuring out power," he explained, and Naruto listened enraptured. "The hydropower plant is fine and all, but there used to be so many different forms of power generation way back when. I'm sure if the Daimyō put resources into it, we could — "
But, like all good things, it had to come to an end.
"Tachan!" The witch had returned. "You're supposed to be playing with me!"
Takeshi huffed. "I'm just catching up with friends."
Yeah, you little brat! Naruto wanted to snap, stalling in his swing and coming to a stop specifically so he could scowl at the witch.
"But Mama said — !"
"Ugh." Takeshi rolled his eyes. "Well, what do you wanna play?"
The question stopped Hanako up short, surprise flickering across her face before being shrouded in deep thought. Briefly, she glanced up, looking at Takeshi, then at Naruto, then back to Takeshi. She grinned; mischief written across every inch of her dirt-smeared face.
A split second later, her hand shot out, slapping against Naruto's leg. And, with a cry of "Tag! You're it!" Hanako bolted.
Naruto blinked, recoiling as if struck, stunned and confused as he watched the witch run away, cackling all the way.
"Sorry about — " Takeshi began to speak, but Naruto wasn't listening.
Tag! You're it! The words repeated in Naruto's mind again and again. Then, like lightning, realisation struck. Chasey. Hanako wanted to play chasey, and she had just tagged Naruto "it."
Something big swelled in Naruto's chest, unfathomable in its magnitude, and the world seemed to vanish in a dark haze — the only thing being the little witch in her gaudy yellow flower-dress sprinting toward the castle. Without a second thought, Naruto threw himself from the swingset and bolted after Hanako, teeth bared in an almost feral grin.
Then, not two steps later, he stumbled, and then he tripped, and toppled like a tower.
Oh, Gods damn it! He snarled, eminently aware of how clumsy his new body left him.
But, he didn't give up.
He picked himself up and started running again and again and again, launching himself at the castle, clambering up ladders and throwing himself over the railing, searching for any sign of Hanako.
Another laugh and there she was, on the other side of a rope bridge. She blew another raspberry, and jumped down a nearby slide with a cry of: "You can't catch me!"
Clearly, however, Hanako hadn't expected Naruto to throw himself after her, landing just beside the slide's terminus. She startled with a shriek as Naruto scrambled to his feet, and with a tap of her shoulder, he laughed, victorious. "You're it!"
"How dare you!" she wailed, but Naruto was already long gone, scaling up the castle walls and onto one of the towers, higher ever higher until he was atop its roof, overlooking the entire playground.
"That's not fair!" Hanako glared at him from below, like an angry little ant, and jutted out her jaw stubbornly.
That's when Takeshi approached, a sly grin on his lips. "Well, you're the one who wanted to play chasey."
Hanako glared at her brother, then punched him in the leg. "You're it!" she screamed, then ran off again, cackling all the way.
"Oh, no you don't!" Takeshi growled, and he was chasing after her, into the castle.
For as much as Naruto hoped Hanako couldn't reach him, he was less certain about Takeshi — tall and lanky, he was sure Takeshi could simply stand on his tippy toes and tap him on the leg. Takeshi seemed to know this too, because after losing Hanako in the tunnels, he returned to glance up at Naruto, beginning his approach at a steady pace. It was like a game of chicken, Naruto felt. Takeshi's eyes were on him and him alone, yet Naruto wouldn't let himself be intimidated. Sure, Takeshi could get him, but all it took was a little jump and he'd be long gone. The question was: who'd make a break for it first?
"You're not going to throw yourself from the jungle gym, again, are you?" Takeshi asked, hoisting himself up and onto the wobbly bridge with a grunt.
Naruto harrumphed, and did just that.
So what if it meant he lost their game of chicken?
He could never pass up a challenge.
Of course, Naruto's new body failed him again, and so instead of bracing himself into the landing, he face-planted onto the rough wood-chips.
"Ow."
"Well, that was stupid," he could hear Takeshi say, and something tapped against the back of his leg, and Naruto stumbled and tripped once again, trying to pull himself up.
He could hear Hanako laughing somewhere, and Takeshi was laughing too.
Yet, it felt different. It wasn't a cackle, like the witch, and there was no edge to it. It'd been a long time since someone had laughed at Naruto like that — the only person he remembered doing so was the Old Man. It was an easy laugh, and Naruto found himself flushing at the sound.
"You're it, by the way," Takeshi said, and made to run away.
Unfortunately, he was too slow.
Naruto launched himself at Takeshi, tackling him to the ground.
"Now you're it!" he cried and then he was running.
Naruto couldn't remember the last time he had so much fun.