Colliding Constellations

Chapter 6: Friendship

"I found a child, Sakura," Tsunade spoke softly.

"Shinshou?"

"I think he might be all that's left my bloodline."

"Stop following me," Kara growled.

"If you scowl all day long, it will be permanently plastered to your face," his white tousled locks flipped around in the spring breeze.

"Go away."

"We have history next, but I think Shino-sensei will probably start rambling about the Third Shinobi War, what do you think?"

"Leave me alone."

"You know where I'm from, the trees don't bloom at this time of the month," he chattered on, "But Konoha is a nice place. Do you have a PlayStation? I just downloaded Filtron, and it's sick."

"Stop talking to me."

It started early spring, Kara had watched as a group of boys had pushed around a boy with brilliant white locks and scarlet eyes. Though the boy seemed virtually unchanged by their bullying, Kara had felt an annoyance, and slowly stalked over to the trio.

They smirked and rose to their full height. Kara was six, they were at least twelve, and had a good fifty pounds on her.

They were feeling confident.

"Unless-"

Kara sidestepped and socked the bully in the face.

They didn't even stand a chance.

"That was," his eyes widened, and he took deep inhalation, "awesome."

He reached over, "What are you, four?"

"I'm six," Kara was insulted.

"My bad," he laughed, "I'm Kaito, Kaito Kobayashi."

"Bye," Kara ignored his introduction, and walked away, she had an appointment to make with Kakashi, though he often tended to be late.

"Wait! Where are you going?!" Kaito yelled out, "You have to introduce yourself!"

"Says who?" Kara raised a brow. Kaito sputtered, shaking his head in exasperation, "Says etiquette! But wait, that might be too much for a four-year-old."

Kara turned around her cheeks red, "I'm six."

"You don't look at it," Kaito rolled his eyes, "And you don't act it."

Kara's face burned scarlet, "Fine! I'm Karasu Uchiha."

"Nice!" Kaito smiled as if he had entirely forgotten their past argument, his eyes lighting up, "I just know we're going to be best friends!"

Kara could only gaze at him, completely perplexed.

"Hey, Kara-" Sakura stopped, "What's wrong?"

"There is a leech in my life," Kara stared at her, her eyes unfocused, "And it never. stops. talking."

Her brow rose, "Oh? Can you grab those onions for me?"

Kara clambered to her feet, grabbing the onions, she passed them to her mom. Sarada stepped out of her room quickly to greet them, and then head back inside. Kara's eyes flew to all the food on the table, her stomach grumbling from her harsh exercises with Kakashi-sama.

"What's all this?"

"We have guests," Sakura smiled, "they are coming soon."

No, oh kami, no.

"Kara!" Kaito yelled in greeting, swinging from beneath Tsunade.

"You guys are acquainted?" Sakura chuckled, greeting her Shinshou.

"No" "yes," They said at the same time. Kaito smiled brightly, and Kara's head fell to the table.

Kaito was talkative and aggravatingly brilliant. He had a knack for creating things and forming ideas. Like Kara, he ran on nothing but his own agenda, he was a troublemaker and chaos warmonger, an outsider, and yet could easily fool others into thinking he was an insider. Except there was one thing about Kaito that stood out from the rest; he was a genius.

Kaito hid his talent from underneath a layer of humor and charisma, he ditched just as often as Kara, following her wherever she went. Because like Kara, Kaito simply did not fit nicely into the standard. He was curious and not afraid, listening to no one but his own motives. Kaito and Kara were charmingly similar in mind and context, unable to be classified by Academy standards, unable to be arranged into a neat line of shinobi.

They were simply too bright, too clever, and too cunning.

Kaito had a hard time focusing in class, his mind ran too fast to follow the slow manicured shinobi laws, he was high energy, and rarely did well in written exams. Kara was unattached, purely finding boredom from the lessons, an opposing force of having too little stimulus.

Maybe in another time, in another era, both would have shone in the Academy halls. But now things were too structured, to particularly standard. Too containing.

But where Kara was nonchalant and unmoving, Kaito was ambitious and headstrong and determined to pool his own ambitions into Kara.

Kaito was an orphan and had been one for a very long time.

Kara hated to admit it, but Kaito was slowly growing on her.

It was hard not to, when they shared more similarities than differences.

"How do you even attend my classes," Kara murmured gazing at the group of students, "You're a year above me."

Kaito looked up, he had been munching on some rice rolls, "I just sneak in."

Kara gazed at him in disbelief, she had begun to freely hang around Kaito, "Sensei monitors the class the most right after the break, yet you come in without a problem. How do you even do that?"

"Well, most of the time he chooses to ignore me," Kaito shrugged, "Having obaa-san has its perks. But usually, I just offer a distraction. Do you know my parents immigrated to Iwa? The shinobi there were the same, they never suspected a kid, put a little chakra here and there and mayhem starts without them even knowing it was me. I broke into the school records, and it was a joke, but older reports are harder to find-"

"-Wait," Kara stared at him in disbelief, "You broke into the school records?"

"Yeah?" Kaito said carefully, "You going to tell?"

"What? No," Kara moved forward, "But since you can- would you be able to get student records of my parents?"

Kaito went very quiet, and for a while, Kara couldn't catch his gaze.

And then suddenly, a large smile ominously spread across his face.

"Can I?" he laughed, "Oh, Kara. I'm about to introduce you to the art of pranks."

"We created something horrible didn't we?" Tsunade stared at the duo in a daze.

"Yes," Sakura confirmed, "Yes, we did."