Lotus [Naruto]

From Orphan to Daughter

                                          Chapter 零

                         "I look for these qualities and characteristics in people.

                Honesty is number one, respect, and absolutely the third

                                        would have to be loyalty."

                                                      - Kasai Hairi      

The drunken ramblings of the unkempt blond man echoed in the alley way. Every village had it's slums, and that was where the man was now. Those areas always had the best sake and bars, something that relieved him of the stress of reality. He could shamefully admit that he drowned his sorrows on a daily bases. So much that it was rare for him to get a mission now. 

   The man knew how to hold his liquor which was why a stumbling him was a fearful one.

"There used to be a time that I believed

The soft pouring rain was just the pouring rain, it wasn't me

But every new light that wasn't shiny and bright."

He stopped singing when his mind went blank, his mind vacant of everything including the lyrics. He blinked and realized then just how dizzy he was and leaned against the brick wall of the back of the bar for support, only to stumble onto it's opposite when a cry of pain followed the action.

"What the hell?" His vision was blurry but he was sure there was only a wall there. "Walls talk now? Whoa." He murmured to himself before rubbing his eyes and checking again. For good measures he looked down at the floor and was genuinely surprised when a small girl stood up and dusted her stained rags. 

   "You'd think a gentleman would apologize for stepping on an orphan." She said sourly while nursing the arm the drunk idiot had stepped on. She eventually looked up at the shocked man, who seemed very surprised he had stepped on a child. "What? Never seen an abandoned kid before?"

He shook his head rapidly. "Okay, I'm not sure if this is a drunk hallucination or not, so I wont talk to y--" He soon found himself groaning in pain, his knees going weak thus causing him to collapse to the ground, holding his sensitive area in absolute agony. The girl stood proudly, not seeming insulted at how the man was now level with her on his knees. 

She smiled sarcastically, "Was that a hallucination? Or did you feel that?" The man stared into her fiery eyes and narrowed his own. Sure he was drunk but he could sober up just as easily. The orphan suddenly covered her nose, "You smell god awful."

He couldn't stop himself. "Says the orphan." She smiled with a hint of sourness before rolling her eyes. One would've thought he'd be even more insulted if it came from an orphan, but apparently not. She huddled back into her area between the wall and the pipe that always stunk of rum; a type of alcohol like sake just more responsible. 

"Can you try not to step on me when you show yourself out of my home?" The girl murmured before grabbing her shrunken shawl from the pipe and wrapping it around her, as if that would actually help her situation. The unkempt man groaned as he stood but allowed himself to tower over the annoyed figure below him.

He sighed and crouched down in front of her. "So what's yer story, brat?" He asked to make conversation. He hadn't met another orphan before, let alone one that settled for the slums rather than the orphanage. He could guess by her personality she didn't take pity very well.