A/N: This chapter was SUPPOSED to be a quick two paragraphs or so about Natsu's night with Sakura's parents, and then straight on to the Team 7 meeting, and actual plot-development. INSTEAD, Sakura's parents completely took over, running roughshod over all my plans and leaving me to scramble to figure out how Natsu would react to everything they insisted on doing. Hopefully I kept him at least mostly in-character and y'all aren't too disappointed at the lack of plot-movement. Next time for sure though! Poor Naruto is about to have his heart absolutely broken… so maybe it's for the best he gets one more chapter of happiness.
Thanks for reading!
Sakura-chan's mother stares at him uncertainly a moment, then goes back into the sitting room and starts gathering up the cups to take to the kitchen just visible on the other end of the hallway. Kizashi waves a hand, smiling.
"I promise we don't bite." he jokes, waiting for Natsu to approach before turning and walking through the sitting room and then away from the bathroom, towards a stairwell. Natsu follows a little uncertainly, not quite sure what he's supposed to say to these people. Kizashi pushes open a door halfway down the hall, striding in without hesitation. Natsu follows, entering a room with a bookshelf next to a desk, filled with scrolls and books alike, a dresser, and a makeup table that he stares at suspiciously as he skirts around to where Kizashi is standing half-in a closet, rummaging around.
"Aha!" the man cries, stumbling back with a rumpled outfit. He tosses it lightly, and it all but lands directly into Natsu's arms, without the younger man even having to move.
"I'm not quite sure what sort of sleepwear you prefer, Natsu-kun, but this is something we bought for Sakura for one of the Academy's camping trips, since she didn't want to ruin her nicer bedclothes sleeping in the dirt. It should still fit, the last trip was only two months ago. Are you going to need anything else tonight?"
Natsu looks down, picking through the clothes to find a deep red shirt, long-sleeved and soft, and a pair of black pants of the same material.
"Sakura-chan didn't seem like someone who liked dark colors…" Natsu says, tossing the clothes on the bed and pulling off his dress.
Kizashi groans, and when Natsu glances over the man is leaning against the doorpost, hand draped over his eyes.
"Huh?"
The older man cracks an eye open at Natsu's confusion, and sighs. "You're going to have to be more careful about that in the future, Natsu-kun. It's not really appropriate for a girl to just take her clothes off like that."
"But you're her father, right? So why would it be a big deal?" Natsu has to sit down to figure out the straps on Sakura's kunai holster, but it slides off after a moment and he tosses it over to land on the desk. It clatters, and Kizashi winces.
"Oh this is not going to be easy…" the man mutters, coming over to sit in the desk chair as Natsu pulls off the undershorts Sakura was wearing and puts on the sleepwear. Everything does fit, even if it's weirdly soft and not what Natsu is used to, and the pinkette rubs at the hem of his sleeve, wondering what it's made out of to feel like that.
He looks up when weight settles on the bed, Kizashi holding Sakura's kunai pouch in his hands, holding it out to Natsu.
Natsu glances at it, then back up to the man who joined him unexpectedly. "What're you doing?"
"I understand you don't have any shinobi training, Natsu-kun, but at the least, you should still take care of Sakura's weapons." He drops the pouch in Natsu's lap, grabbing a case off her nightstand.
Natsu looks down at the pouch, reaching in to pull out one of the weapons. It doesn't seem as well-made as Erza's swords, or perhaps just not enchanted to withstand wear, with how beat up it looks.
"Do you know how to do it?" the older man asks, whetstone in hand. Natsu shrugs.
"I've never done it myself, but Erza used to do it a lot, back when she was younger, before she could afford the nicer weapons that didn't need it. I mostly just fight with my body though, I wouldn't know how to use one of these anyway. They look so beat up, too. Wouldn't Sakura-chan want to buy new ones instead of using these, later?"
Kizashi nods easily. "We promised to buy Sakura a new set if she passed her final exam, but I think it would be better if you kept these for now. That way you can practice with an old pair, instead of ruining a new one."
"P-practice? I don't need these!" Natsu drops the pouch back into his lap, crossing his arms as he faces Sakura's father. The man shakes his head, dropping the whetstone between them and settling back against the wall.
"We'd all like a fast solution to this, Natsu-kun. But I don't think you realize. Inoichi-san is one of the greatest masters of mental techniques in the entirety of the Elemental Nations. If there were a quick solution, it would already be done. As such, it's really better if you learn everything you can. The number of people in this world good enough at Taijutsu to fight exclusively with it is very small. Kunai are a staple for a reason - if you can get close enough to punch someone, you can get close enough to stab them, and the latter is always more effective, more likely to get you out alive, end the fight fast and get you back to safety than the former."
"But I don't want to kill people!"
Natsu grimaces at how Sakura's softer voice turns that statement nearly to a whine, as he twists around and stares at the man sitting beside him. "Erza's good enough not to kill with her swords, but she works so hard to be that good, there's no way I could equal her, I don't want to use weapons, I don't know how to control them like she does! I know Erza has killed people, back when she escaped that place, she always smells a little like blood, most people who've killed do, but I don't… That's not something you should do if you have any other choice, that's not something I want to do, when I've always been strong enough not to…"
Kizashi sighs, reaching out to ruffle Natsu's hair. "It's rather hard to see your face like that… this really will take some getting used to, won't it?" The man muses, as Natsu tenses under the man's hand, pulling away. He yanks out Sakura's headband that he'd forgotten about until Kizashi's hand brushed it, setting it on top of the kunai pouch. The man's face flickers with upset, though he masks it quickly, and Natsu bites back a grimace.
He hadn't meant to hurt the man, but…
This entire situation sucks. Dammit!
Kizashi gathers himself quickly enough, carefully looking away from Natsu for a moment as he speaks. "It'll be a while yet before your team is sent on any missions against other humans. But even so, isn't it better to know a skill and not need it, than the reverse?"
"No!" Natsu crosses his arms again, staring down at the pouch and the kunai and headband laying atop it. "I don't want to have a skill like that! I don't want to need a skill like that! They don't even want me leaving the village, that Hokage guy said something about needing his direct approval before we were even let out of the gates, so it doesn't matter! I shouldn't have to learn how to kill someone just in case I need to kill them. Why is this world the kind of place that would require something like that? It's not right!"
Kizashi reaches over, dragging Natsu against him in a half-hug, and Natsu snarls, trying to push away, but the man doesn't budge. Doesn't pull him any closer either, but it feels like every hair on Natsu's body is standing on end, and he leans tensely against the other man, entirely unequipped to deal with Kizashi's actions.
"That really bothers you, doesn't it? I suppose, to those of us who live here, it's such a normal part of life, even most civilians don't bat an eye at the existence of shinobi, even if they sometimes think of us as monsters or evil. I couldn't handle it, asked to retire shortly after my first kill, but even then I understood it was necessary - kill your enemies before they killed your friends, I was just not strong enough to do it myself… The land you come from, I wonder what it must be like, where something like death isn't necessary to protect the ones you love. But, Natsu-kun, I don't think you'll be able to live like that here. Any enemy you leave alive behind you is someone who can stand up again and kill your teammates after you've turned your backs. Any man you leave unconscious is just a man who may seek to retaliate for his wounded pride, hunting you down to take revenge. I won't say that you have to throw away your morals, but… at least understand that this world isn't the kind of place that will treat you well for refusing to. You should learn how, and if you're lucky, you'll never need the knowledge. If you're lucky, you'll go your entire time here without having to feel the sensation of blood on your hands. But, if you aren't… at least if you choose not to kill, at that time, you'll be choosing so because you have a choice, and not because you can't do anything else. I don't want my daughter to die because of you, but at the least, if you're going to kill the light of my life do it on purpose so I can hate you fairly."
The man's fingers tighten harshly on Natsu's arm, and the pinkette finds himself frozen at how blatantly he said something like that, unable to shake the older man off even as his grip becomes painful.
"I-I…" he bites his tongue at the stutter, unsure of what he even wants to say, what he even could say to a declaration like that, and Kizashi's grip disappears suddenly as the man stands up and walks to the door, Sakura's weapon pouch and headband whisked from Natsu's lap and settled gently on the desk.
"Good night, Natsu-kun." he offers, and closes the door behind him, leaving Natsu to sit uncomfortably on the bed, staring at the door, so far beyond uncertain he feels almost numb.
Voices start up, Sakura's parents talking to each other, about him, and he can hear every word, as Sakura's mother cries and her father reassures his wife, and Natsu can't stand it, swiping the pillow and blanket off the bed, climbing out the window and up to the roof, thankfully far enough away that all he can hear is voices without individual words as he closes the window behind him, and it only takes him a few minutes to find a comfortable spot where he's certain he won't fall and settle down, pulling the blanket over his head and praying to every god he can think of that he'll wake up back home, with Erza and Lucy and Gildarts and even Gray.
If he dreams, he remembers none of it, only an impression of warmth and comfort that fades with the rising sun.
Wha-? Where…?
Natsu sits up blearily, rubbing his eyes as he tries to piece together why he's woken up damp. It takes him a moment, shifting to look around and realize he's on a roof, before the previous day rushes back to him.
"Dammit!"
He falls backwards, laying spreadeagled on the roof and staring up at the dawn sky, anger burning fiercely, at the world, at himself, at whatever ridiculous magic caused this situation.
"I didn't even talk to Sakura-chan this time… I wonder if there's anywhere to catch something to eat. Man, why couldn't Happy be here too? He could totally scout for me-"
"Natsu-kun?"
"Eh?!" Natsu bolts up, crawling to the edge of the roof and looking down.
Kizashi stares up at him from Sakura-chan's window, eyebrow raised in question. "Did you sleep up there?" he asks, sounding amused, and Natsu grimaces.
"I prefer sleeping outside, there's nothing wrong with that!" turning around, the pinkette gathers up Sakura's blankets and pillow, trudging back to the window. Kizashi ducks inside, and it only takes Natsu a moment to figure out how to get back in without dropping anything. There's a stack of clothes on top of Sakura's dresser, Sakura's kunai pouch and headband on top.
"I'm afraid Sakura isn't much for boys' clothes, if her dresses bother you my wife got permission to take today off, so you should be able to go shopping with her if you need. For now, I put her clean laundry up there for you so you don't have to look for everything. Breakfast will be ready in a few minutes."
Natsu finds himself quickly standing alone, arms full of blankets. He drops them on the floor after a moment, turning to grab the clothes and walk out of the room. There were a couple doors on the second floor, but he knows which area Sakura's parents were talking in before, so he avoids that one, opening the others until he finds a bathroom.
He gets his first look at Sakura outside a mindscape then, staring at himself in the mirror in his sleep-rumpled clothes, bright green eyes looking back at him from under messy pink hair that's nearly as wild as his usually is and quite a bit longer.
He closes the bathroom door with his foot after a moment, setting the clothes down on the counter and offering the toilet a vicious glare before he reluctantly walks over to it.
He looks at the shower a moment, after he's finished, but grimaces and turns away, shuddering. "...let's not." he grumbles, pulling off the sleepclothes and taking a moment to be grateful that Sakura-chan is shaped nothing like Lucy.
Not that there's anything wrong with Lucy! But there's no way changing clothes can be that easy for her… she takes so long to get ready all the time!
It doesn't take too long to figure out how to put Sakura-chan's outfit back on, black shorts first, then the dress. It takes a couple tries to rewrap the bandages and attach the kunai pouch to his leg, and Natsu is still nowhere near comfortable with the idea of using it, but… somehow, something about Sakura-chan's body feels off balance without it, like she's so used to wearing one that nothing feels right, even to him, without it.
And then all that's left is a headband he doesn't want to wear, and hair he'd really rather cut off than deal with but…
This is Sakura-chan's body… it'd be really rude to cut all her hair without even asking. So maybe… pull it up like Erza does sometimes?
There's no brush in the bathroom, but when Natsu shoves the headband into the kunai pouch and takes the sleepwear back to the bedroom, he finds one in the drawers of Sakura's vanity, surrounded by all sorts of weird hair things that he ignores, shoving them around until he finds a simple band buried in the very back.
He never realized how hard brushing hair could be.
At one point he yanks so hard against a knot that he rips out strands of hair, biting back a yelp, but no matter how many times he tries, the brush always gets tangled and he's half a second from just giving up and cutting all her hair off anyway when Sakura's mother knocks on the door.
"N-Natsu-kun? Breakfast is ready…" Natsu growls, barely even recognizing the nervousness in her voice as he glares into the mirror of Sakura's vanity, brush so thoroughly tangled in her hair that even after he lets go it just hangs from the side of his head.
"Natsu-kun?"
The woman opens the door, and Natsu meets her eyes through the mirror with a glare as she stares in horror at the mess atop his head.
"O-oh, here, let me-"
"I'm fine!" Natsu snaps, crossing his arms and looking away from the reflection. He doesn't need help, he'll figure it out on his ow-
Her fingers pressing against his scalp take him by surprise, and his eyes jolt back to the mirror. She's working out the hair around the brush, detangling it inch by inch, and something about looking into the mirror, seeing Sakura's childish face look back as the older woman extracts the brush with extreme care cause an unusual emotion to curl through his chest.
"I don't know your name." He says eventually, trying to avoid thinking anymore about the odd sensations.
"Oh." she smiles at him over Sakura's head in the mirror, fingers still moving smoothly, and at last the brush falls free. "I'm Mebuki, I apologize for not introducing myself sooner." She hands the brush back to him, and Natsu stares at it even as he closes his grip around the handle.
"If you would rather do it yourself, long hair is easier to brush if you start at the bottom and work your way up." Mebuki offers, and her hand moves toward the top of Sakura's(his?) head, before she pulls it away with an uncomfortable look and walks out of the room.
Natsu shifts uncomfortably on the stool for a moment, glaring at the hairbrush as though it were the root of all his problems, before taking her advice and brushing from the bottom. It works much better, the second time around, and eventually Sakura's hair doesn't look like his at all, neat and straight and smooth, and somehow Natsu finds it upsetting.
Grimacing, he grabs the hairband he found earlier, trying to pull Sakura's hair up in a tail like Erza's done before. He gets it fairly good the first time, but Sakura's bangs slip out, falling in front of his face, and he pulls everything out and tries again.
It takes a few goes, before he manages to set the tail high enough on his head that Sakura's bangs reach the band and don't slip out. He shakes his head vigorously a couple times, but all her hair stays, and Natsu sighs in relief.
He walks downstairs after that, following the smell of food more than any remembered path. He nearly hesitates in the doorway, but dammit he is Natsu Dragneel and he is not afraid of eating with Sakura-chan's parents! He marches up to the table and starts grabbing food almost before he sits, stubbornly ignoring the uncomfortable feeling, because it's nothing like eating food in the guild, or even on missions with the rest of his team, but Natsu refuses to acknowledge the difference, saying hello around a mouthful of food as he settles everything on his plate.
"You put- your hair up?" Sakura's mother asks curiously, and Natsu shrugs, suddenly uncertain as to why he did. It hadn't bothered him too much yesterday, hanging loose, but…
Did I get so sentimental I decided to copy Erza?
He fights back a shudder, shoving more food in his mouth as a distraction, and it's actually pretty good. Not the best he's ever had, but Mebuki-san isn't a bad cook, and Natsu tells her as much after a moment, between bites.
"Thank you."
Natsu stares oddly at the blush on her cheeks, but decides to ignore it and go back to eating. Kizashi finishes first, and puts his dishes in the sink before saying goodbye, leaving Natsu and Mebuki to finish in stilted silence.
Like the day before, Natsu finds himself feeling both full and hungry at the same time, like his body can't make up its mind, and for a second he wonders what would happen if he just kept eating, if the feeling would go away.
Mebuki grabs his empty plate before he can, sweeping it away with her own to place in the sink, turning back to pack away the leftovers into the fridge, and Natsu finds himself unsure of what to do now, what to say.
He's quickly saved by a knock on the door, just as Mebuki puts down a washcloth to clean the table, and Natsu jumps up, rushing over to answer it before she can move. Kakashi is the one standing outside, shoulders in a relaxed slump and orange book present in front of his mask.
"It occurred to me," the silver-haired man muses idly, "That you actually have no idea where the bridge is. So, I decided to be nice and escort you. Wonderful, ne?"
The man offers him a cheery smile from behind his mask, and Natsu gives him a suspicious look, even as he bends down and puts on Sakura-chan's sandals.
"Works for me." He mutters back, hesitating a moment before calling a goodbye to Mebuki and stepping out of the house. He closes the door before he can hear her response, leaping ahead and walking off in the direction he remembers coming from, before.
Kakashi catches up after a moment, taking the lead seamlessly as he heads more toward the outskirts of Konoha, toward the walls. Natsu follows easily, hands linked under his hair as he takes in the sights of the city waking up and coming alive.
At least it's pretty. He muses idly as the bridge comes into sight, Inoichi and the two kids from before coming into view. The younger blond waves energetically, and Natsu waves awkwardly back.
This is gonna suck, isn't it?