People of the Land

Chapter 5 - A Failed Pickpocket

Nato was incredibly bored. He knew that the people in Konoha were still celebrating, and would be for a while. He could practically hear them from all the way in the camp! Everyone else had fallen asleep around an hour ago, since they were all exhausted from the trip here and then the performance straight afterward. But Nato just couldn't sleep! Something was keeping him up, like a tug in his gut. He had asked Kurama if he had anything to do with it, but the old Fuzzball claimed that he didn't.

The golden-haired boy turned on the mat he laid on in the tent again, trying to find a more comfortable sleeping position. He laid there for a moment, still, and then frowned, turning on his side again. He sighed in defeat. There was no point in trying to sleep, because it obviously was not going to happen anytime soon. He stood up from his sleeping spot and carefully stepped over his aunt, uncle, and two cousins. He opened the tent flap without a sound and silently made his way to the edge of camp, easily climbing up a tree and sitting on one of its higher branches.

Nato looked out over the small expanse of forest that lay between him and the sparkling city not all that far away. He could be there and back long before morning, including the time he would spend at the second half of the festival. The tribe would be none the wiser. Well, that decided it! Nato was not going to sit here all night and attempt in vain to fall asleep. Nope, he was going to the festival! And the small fact that he was not supposed to go out at night all alone (especially not without asking his uncle or aunt for permission first) was no problem. First of all, Nato was technically never alone (he had the Fuzzball), and second, he did things like this all the time. Sure, it scared his uncle and aunt half to death, but he always returned (mostly) okay.

Besides, Nato would do much more good out there in the crowded streets keeping his pickpocketing skills sharp (don't ask how he got those skills in the first place) than sitting here all night. Of course, he wouldn't be stealing from people because he always put whatever he got back... eventually, and tonight would be no different.

With his mind made up, Nato snuck out of the campsite and headed towards the glowing lights of Konoha in the distance.

The drums didn't protest.

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Hinata walked down the crowded festival street, her absolute awe of her surroundings clearly written on her small face. She hardly noticed the glances at her eyes and bare forehead as she wandered the streets alone. There were so many different stalls and quaint little shops on the sidewalks, and Hinata was having a blast just looking at them. They were so strange and new to her, unlike anything she'd seen before, and the colorful, high hanging lanterns illuminating the streets, helped amplify the cheerful and merry air all about the place.

Eventually, she came across a storyteller at a dead end. There were flocks of little children sitting on the carpeted floor by the stool he sat on. Their parents stood nearby, listening to the storyteller too. It seemed that Hinata had come at the right time because he was just starting a new story, and it happened to be the one being told all around the continent on that very day. The story was titled The Lost Heir, as the people named it, instead of something like, The Tale of Prince Naruto, or The Land of Fire's Missing Prince. Even though she had heard this story thousands of times before, Hinata stood on the fringe of the crowd of adults, just opposite of the storyteller.

He began.

"Over eight years ago, it was announced across the continent that our Queen was with child. There were celebrations all throughout this beautiful country at the news of an heir to the throne. Of course, many of the people were worried too, for both the Queen and the unborn Prince. It wasn't that they feared that Queen Kushina was not strong enough to have children, no; she's an Uzumaki princess for goodness sake!" He chuckled lightly. "It was the fact that their Queen also happened to be a Jinchuuriki, and of the most powerful tailed-beast around, the Kuuybi. The Queen had many times proved that she was not the beast that resided within her, but again, that was not the issue. When a female Jinchuuriki is pregnant, the energy that is usually used to keep the seal in check is diverted to the nurture and growing of the small life within them. The seal would weaken and if not repaired in time, break, releasing the Kuuybi. And if a Jinchuuriki loses her tailed beast, then she is certain to die. This is what many of the people feared, and children, that is exactly what happened." The storyteller paused for effect as some of the younger members of his audience gasped.