The Ancients - Rumor of the Sixth Element

Chapter 1: Introductions

 I sat up suddenly, panting. Again… I thought, wishing I’d stop having that nightmare after every attack… I lifted my hand to my heart, still tasting blood in my mouth from the last few minutes. I’m in my room again… I noticed silently, as I glanced at the obsidian spear against the wall, and the two doors; one which connected to Sasuke’s room, and one to the hallway.

“You okay, Kusha?” I looked up as my door slid open, and a blond head poked its way in. “Sasuke brought you in after your lizard started acting up… I even made food even though it was your turn! Anyway, we’re waiting on you to eat.”

I nodded as Naruto left, standing up shakily. If Naruto made ramen again, I’ll kick him out of this house! I thought, slowly making my way towards the kitchen, where we all ate. With the house being just the three of us, we felt wrong using the family table.

Perhaps I should explain why Naruto lives with us, and why Maya doesn’t. That night, when everyone… died… I thought I’d healed Maya. And I did, mostly. However, her vocal chords had been severed, and I hadn’t healed those, so she was mute. A neighbor had offered to take us all in, but Sasuke and I decided we didn’t want any adults living with us, but since Maya was still breastfeeding, she got adopted, leaving just me and my twin brother in a house large enough for hundreds.

Naruto joined us a few months later… Sasuke and I were at the academy again, and the tragedy seemed to only increase my brother’s fangirls. As always, I was forgotten when it came to them… On our birthday, realizing that they’d never let me sit by my brother, I pranked them, actually recreating a prank Naruto had pulled on the clan heads a while back when they’d been at a meeting. The fangirls, all totally embarrassed at the state of themselves, avoided Sasuke. Naruto overheard Sasuke and I discussing the prank, and soon after that, when Naruto got blamed for it, we came to his defense. The teacher who had tried to get Naruto in trouble was fired(but not for what he did to Naruto… he said something to Sasuke he shouldn’t have, and the Hokage came and fired him personally), and afterwards, the Hokage dismissed our class, but offered to give a replacement lesson to anyone who wanted it. Naruto and Hinata stayed, as well as Sasuke and I.

After that, we hung out with Naruto a lot, and one day, asked him if he wanted to come over to our place and spar. He did, and when he got there, commented that it was so huge, he’d get so lost if he lived there. That’s when I got the idea. Sasuke and I talked it over(through a finger code we invented to be able to talk silently when we held hands… we got a lot of weird looks over it, but what the heck?), and decided we wouldn’t mind someone else to brighten up our empty home. With Naruto there, you could hardly call it empty… he made enough racket for a thousand people…

“Are you all right, Kusha?” Sasuke asked as I sat down next to him. “I heard you crying again.”

“Just… that dream…” I said, eating slowly. Truthfully, I didn’t want to eat, but today was our last day as academy students. Even Naruto had somehow managed to graduate(something about a traitor, a forbidden scroll, and Iruka-sensei), and we were eagerly awaiting tomorrow, when we all became genin. Of course, today we had light sparring, which made both Sasuke and Naruto absolutely giddy. Ah. Perhaps I should explain our schedules as well…

We wake up at five or six in the morning, and immediately head for the indoor training room. We usually start with me practicing my seals(which I am quite good at), while Naruto and Sasuke spar. Naruto uses a katana, Sasuke a ninja-to, and I use a spear. They each have unique abilities, but I’ll explain those later. Usually, after Sasuke totally kicks Naruto’s ass, we do a two-on-one; Naruto and Sasuke vs. me. The reason for this is not my superior skill; in fact, on light sparring days, they always win. Which is why they like it. The reason is gravity seals. Seals drawn on their bodies that force them to carry more weight and slow them down. I have some too, however, mine aren’t anywhere near as heavy. The reason for that is actually because Naruto and Sasuke both fail at seals. And, have you ever tried putting your own chakra onto yourself? I mean, all the gravity seal does is store chakra and convert it to weight, so it is easy for me to put it on Sasuke and Naruto. However, I struggle with doing the same to myself, and as such, am actually incapable of making my seals as heavy as theirs.

Anyway, after we do a two-on-one, it has usually been about an hour. On the days we wake up at five(school days), we put our weapons up, and take showers(one advantage to a large house is that we can all take one at the same time), and after that, we cook our breakfast. I usually make the breakfast, Naruto makes lunch, and Sasuke makes dinner. Whoever cooks also washes the dishes, while the other two clean the eating area and dry and put the dishes away. After we’ve eaten, we head off for school. After school, we come home, where Terren, a weapons expert in Konoha, is waiting. He gives us individual lessons(and is very cheap, too!), and often helps with any weapon-and-jutsu combinations we invented. He has dinner with us, then stays a few more hours to let us do a three-on-one against him(which we never win, even when we take our gravity seals off), then leaves. After he goes, we take another shower, and hit the sack.

On a non-school day though, we skip the showers and go straight to breakfast. After we’ve eaten, we each go off for our own private training. Naruto usually practices complicated control exercises, while closing his chakra(something he can do thanks to a complicated seal I put on him). Sasuke has actually been practicing a chakra change in nature to Lightning lately… as Uchiha, we’re both very adept at Fire, but Sasuke wants another one. I am usually either reading scrolls and books the Hokage gave me, or practicing my seals and medical jutsu(I happen to be very proficient in both… the Uchiha clan library has just about everything…), although sometimes I will take Naruto aside because a certain seal interests me. I haven’t done anything to it(yet), but I really think there’s something off about it… I mean, other than the Nine-Tails. I found out about him right after Naruto first moved in(almost four years ago now), when I was going to put gravity seals on the kid and saw it. I tapped the seal’s network, and got stuck in the Fox’s mindscape. I got out relatively unharmed(although completely drained of chakra), and later told Sasuke. We never talked to Naruto about it, because we were unsure whether he knew, and was just keeping quiet(who would blame him?), or if he was just ignorant, in which case neither of us wanted to explain.

Anyway, after we do some private training, we usually get together for lunch, then work on combinations and strategies. Sasuke and I actually have a couple of combination jutsu, and as we found out, never let Naruto devise a strategy. He just can’t think it all through… We usually do this for the rest of the day(coming up with plans and mock-executing them), until about seven in the evening, at which point we make dinner and eat. After that, we take a shower, and read. Sasuke studies for school a lot(I just copy off him during class), Naruto looks at different element scrolls(he hasn’t decided if he thinks a wind-type or an earth-type is cooler…), while I am usually probing around more sealing scrolls and most specifically, containment seals. Around midnight, we all go to bed and the day starts over.