Home Is Where The Heart Is || Naruto Fanfic

Chapter Six

Night fell and nearly everyone had gone to sleep. Hana had just finished defeating Sam in another round of pool. 

"Ah, you beat me again." Sam scratched the back of his head with a smile, then glanced back up at Hana. "You sure you've never played?" 

Shaking her head, Naruko said: "Nah, this is the first time I've ever played." 

"You play like a pro." Sam grinned, taking the wooden pool cues and putting them to the side.

"Thanks." Hana smiled back, finishing her self-assigned job of putting the sixteen balls in the right pattern inside the plastic triangle. The sandy-blonde girl then stepped up to Sam and looked up at him, due to the man being half a head taller than her henge. Hana smiled and patted his shoulder gently, not moving closer. "You're a sweet man, Sam." 

"I-I-" Sam's cheeks dusted a slight red. 

"I gotta go." Hana smiled at the flustered man, then turned to the door. She turned to look back at the man. "Bye, Sam." 

"Bye...!" Sam quickly called after gathering himself. 

When Hana exited the bar, she calmly walked over to a nearby alley and put her hands together in a hand-sign. Hana was covered by a small explosion of thick smoke and - when it cleared - it revealed the shorter ten year-old girl with crimson-tipped blonde hair standing in the woman's place. Naruko exhaled softly, then looked around, and let herself fall to the ground, moving to be hidden behind a bin, but not against the back of the alley. She refused to corner herself. 

Think everyone is asleep by now? Naruko asked Kurama.

"I don't know." The Kyūbi said with an annoyed tone of voice. "Maybe. Just spread a thin layer of your chakra and you should be able to feel if they are, or not." 

Did you miss nap-time, or something? You're more irritated than usual. 

"I'll tell you in a bit." The fox grumbled from within the depths of her mindscape. Naruko's blue-and-violet eyes narrowed suspiciously. 

The mostly-blonde girl then shook her head to clear it of its thoughts and closed her bright eyes. She spread her chakra around the large village and looked for the largest chakra signature. Upon discovering the one tails' worth of chakra, Naruko's eyes snapped open and a small smile rested on her face. He's alone. That'll make this easier. 

Naruko walked through alleys and in the shadows of buildings and stores, slowly making her way to the cleared out area where the Ichibi Junchūriki remained, focused on his prominent chakra signature. 

"Huh?" The mostly-blonde-haired girl murmured intelligently in surprise when her eyes saw the boy that sat against the sandstone-brick wall. "He's my age...!" She whispered loudly in shock.

The boy had messy red hair. His seafoam coloured eyes watched the night sky above him, his inability to sleep evident by the extremely dark - almost completely black - rings around his eyes. He also wore a loose, black full-bodysuit, his t-shirt-like sleeves reaching just before his forearms and letting the sleeves of a mesh shirt creep down to his elbows. The pant legs were shinobi-style-like and bandages covered his shins, then disappeared into blue shinobi sandals. A white cloth reached over his right shoulder to his left hip. A thick and wide leather strap hung from his left shoulder to his right hip and there was a large gourd attached to it - most likely filled with sand (Naruko could feel a small amount of chakra inside the gourd and chalked it up to being chakra-infused sand). There was a hitai-ate with Sunagakure's symbol attached to the base of the strap.