Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Mokushita Hyuuga ❯ Chapter 11
[ T - Teen: Not suitable for readers under 13 ]
By: Moghedian 
Disclaimer: Naruto and all related characters belong to Kishimoto, not me.
Anime/Manga: Naruto Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 11.06.2006 | Updated On: 02.11.2007 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.9K | Visits: 756 | Status: Work In Progress
Disclaimer: Naruto and all related characters belong to Kishimoto, not me.
Anime/Manga: Naruto Fan Fiction | Genre(s): Adventure | Type: Other | Uploaded On: 11.06.2006 | Updated On: 02.11.2007 | Pages: 3 | Words: 3.9K | Visits: 756 | Status: Work In Progress
Chapter 11
"You first." Kouden said. Shiro and Sasami were quick to nod. Kakashi rolled his eye.
"If you insist. My name is Hatake Kakashi, I have some likes, and some dislikes, and my dream is none of your buisness." Kouden's brow twitched as Kakashi clapped and pointed at Sasami.
We didn't learn anything other than his name! thought three genin. Sasami, eyed Kakashi with her brown eyes before saying,
"Ditama Sasami. I like practicing chakra control, and studying medicine. I hate people that are mean without reason, and my dream is to be a medic-nin like Tsunade-sama!" Sasami finished and realized she had her fist in the air. Blushing she brought it down and looked to her right. Kouden raised an eyebrow and Kakashi just pointed at Kouden.
"Me? Ok. I'm U..er, Hyuuga Kouden. I like Ka-chan's cooking, practicing jyuuken with Neji-ni-san, and reading about the Naruto legend." Kouden paused as Shiro's gaze became more focused. Even without his byakugan, he felt the stares. It made the hairs on his neck stand.
"Er...my dislikes are failing, and when the villagers stare at me with hatred. And my dream is to become a Sannin!" Kouden said, his voice drowning out the other's thoughts on his last statement.
"Ok, well, you, with the dark hair. You're next." Kakashi said, rather emotionlessly. Shiro nodded and took a moment to gather his thoughts, and to tuck a few strands of his long hair behind his ear. Shiro took one last glance at Kouden before speaking.
"Un, Oketsu Shiro," Kakashi made a sound that sounded suspisously like a giggle, "My likes are udon and practicing my family jutsus with Kaa-san, and my hates are people who tell other people that their dreams are impossible." Shiro paused for a moment, and then let his entire body relax. But Kouden didn't miss his fist clench until his knuckles were white.
"I don't really have a definte dream right now, talk to me in a year." Sasami clicked her tongue and Shiro's serious face cracked slightly to reveal a small grin. Kouden relaxed, but continued to watch Shiro out of the corner of his eye.
A loud clap brought their eyes to their teacher. Kakashi regarded his new students before saying,
"Well now, It seems that despite the full class this year, only 12 students graduated. That presents a problem." Nodding, Kakashi observed the slightly confused glare of a certain blonde.
"So which team gets booted?" Sasami said. Kakashi grinned. She was smarter than he first thought.
"Depends. Tomorrow, right here, we are going to have a small test. A survival test. If you lose, you go back to the academy." Kouden's mouth dropped, Sasami's eyes widened, and Shiro snorted.
"7 am, and don't eat. You'll throw up." The grey haired jounin said before disapearing in a poof of smoke a leaves.
Kouden, Sasami, and Shiro just stared for a minute. The silence sooned turned awkward and Kouden finally suggested that they go to Ichiraku's. Sasami immediatly agreed, and Shiro shrugged, but followed.
When Kouden ducked under the flaps above the entrance, he was greeted by two friendly voices, both bidding him welcome.
"Oi, jii-sama! Miso ramen for me, and beef for Sasami-chan! Uh, what kind do you want, Shiro?" Kouden said, scratching the back of his head. Shiro sat down, but not before he noticed the small sigh that both Ichiraku and his daughter gave off.
"I'll have shrimp." The girl, Ayame, nodded and grinned, prepping his ramen.
Shiro directed his gaze at Kouden, who was busying himself with emptying his pockets looking for his wallet. When he finally found it, Shiro always flinched on how full it was. Kouden told him that because he was a part of the Hyuuga clan, he got an allowance, but he also did odd jobs for his mother.
Although, what really was irking Shiro, was Kouden's stumble earlier. What was he going to say before Hyuuga? Maybe he really knew his family name. He asked once, but his answer was anything but informative.
Kouden sat on a thick bough of the tree that he, Sasami, and Shiro had all claimed. He was using chakra to direct leaves into Sasami's pink hair, while she was using her own, more controlled chakra to move small masses of leaves into Kouden's face, so that he would leave her hair alone.
Shiro sighed, he'd seen these so called 'fights' before. Usually he never got involved unless Sasami or Kouden started blowing leaves at him as well. But he could never do it as good. His control was apparently lacking.
"Kouden, can you tell me how you, who to my knowledge can't even pull off a kawarimi, have that much control?" Kouden stopped for a second, which was a mistake, as Sasami filled his mouth with leaves. Spitting them out, he looked at Shiro. Kouden blinked and one of his eyes, right near the pupil, and almost invisible to the normal person, jittered. Shiro blinked and was about to ask, but Kouden cut him off.
"Oh, I guess you didn't know? I practice jyuuken with Neji-ni-san, and Hanabi-sama." Shiro wrinkled his nose as he watched Sasami direct one small leaf towards Kouden, and then down his shirt.
"Jyuuken? Isn't that a clan only taijutsu? Besides, don't you need byakugan?" Kouden looked to his left, before fishing the leaf out. He still his his hand down his black and orange jacket when he said,
"Uh, well, It seems that I might have a bloodline, faintly similar to byakugan. Uh...I can...I can see how chakra flows, kinda. Might give me a clue as to who my real parents are." Kouden said, unsteadily.
In truth, Kouden was lying completly, Shiro suspected a lie, or a twist of truth, but he couldn't help but ask another question.
"Have you any idea at all? Like, I'm sure you had caretakers, before you joined Konoha. Did they ever tell you?" Sasami's control slipped, and the slightly bigger leaf that she had been controlling at the time fluttered away. Kouden looked at Shiro, warily.
"No. The leader-lady from the orphanage said that my okaa-san had dark hair, and pretty eyes. But she died giving birth to me." Shiro nodded and looked away, missing both Kouden and Sasami glance at each other before resuming their game of 'who could stuff the most leaves down the other's shirt first'.
Shiro snapped out of his thougts as a piping hot bowl of ramen was placed in front of him. Shiro nodded a thanks to Ayame and inhaled. The smell nearly made his mouth water. He reached for chopsticks and noted Kouden and Sasami already digging into their ramen.
Kouden, although his happy facade was up, was silently cursing himself about his slip up. He was sure Shiro noticed, and quite possibly Sasami.
Kakashi knew who his real parents were, so it didn't matter, but even though Sasami knew his mother, Kouden had never indulged his last name to her. Hinata had told him that his father had many enemies, and could attract unnessesary attention. On top of that, Kouden was surprised that Sasami, as smart as she was pretty, didn't put two and two together.
Kouden had been able to convince Sasami that his mother was a distant cousin of the Hyuuga, thus was why he had the byakugan. With a few words, Kouden convinced her, with no difficulty at all, that his mother was mearly named after the tragic princess.
Sometimes Kouden surprised himself with his ability to lie.
Sasami on the other hand, was completely missing this silent battle between Kouden and Shiro, and had completely missed the slip-up her best friend made. She happily slurped away at her ramen as she thought of the beautiful new anklet that Kouden had bought her for her birthday.
He had presented it today, just after graduation. He also kissed her cheek, causing her to blush so red that her face hurt.
A small splash and she fell back to reality when she noticed that one of her chopsticks were missing, and both her teammates, AND the ramen cooks were all staring at her.
Sasami gave a small squeak and blushed.
Kouden raised a yellow brow and said,
"Why are you blushing? Are you hiding something from us, Sasami-chan?" Sasami turned redder and glared at Kouden. Shiro shifted in his chair and Sasami directed her glare at him. Her eyes daring him to say something.
Shiro just rolled his eyes and finished his ramen.
"Well, this has been fun. I'll see you tomorrow, Kouden, Sasami-chan." Shiro bowed, which was just a small incline of his head, and left.
"Wah! Hey! Shiro! Get back here, you didn't pay!" Kouden shouted at the rapidly disapearing form.
"Aaah. I'll get him back, the bastard." Kouden said, grumbling now to a laughing Sasami.
Twenty minutes and an empty wallet later, Kouden was shaking his sandals off into the closet.
"Tadaimasu..." Kouden said, trailing off. Neji was seated at the small table, drinking tea and reading a few papers he had from a small stack of to his right. Looking up, Neji didn't say anything at first, but as soon as he spotted Kouden's forhead, his white eyes visably lit up.
"Ohh! Omedeto! What team did you get?" Kouden grinned, closing his eyes. Neji was struck, again, with how much Kouden looked like his father.
"Guess!" Kouden said. Neji shrugged. Kouden sighed.
"I got Kakashi-sensei! And Sasami-chan and Shiro are on my team! Ino-ne san stopped and laughed at Kakashi-sensei too." Neji was laughing quietly by now, holding a peice of paper in front of him.
"So that's what this is for!" He said. Kouden took a seat beside him and tugged on the paper.
Resignment ApplicationName: Hatake Kakashi
Reason: I need to take a temporary break. I need to relax, read, maybe bother a few people... I'll probably be back in a few days.
~Love Kakashi
"Hahaha, that idiot. Kakashi signed his ANBU resignation like a letter. I was gonna go tell him to shove it. He can't just up and quit...but I guess he has a reason after all." Still smiling, Neji put the paper down and looked at Kouden.
"So have you seen Tenten yet?" Kouden nodded.
"She said we were gonna celebrate, so we can't leave. Is Aiko-chan here?" Neji nodded this time.
A few minutes of silence later, and Kouden looked around before saying a whisper,
"Neji-ni-san, my eyes are starting to hurt... and holding this henge up all the time is starting to hurt. I found a burn near my nose yesturday when I went to sleep yesturday...Is there a way I can just, well, not henge anymore?" Neji stared at Kouden for a few minutes.
"Well, have you told anyone other than Sasami about your Byakugan?"
"I told Shiro that I had a bloodline like byakugan, but not exactly, and that it started to activate last year."
Neji nodded. He ran his hand through his long hair. Kouden sat back farther.
"How about, you slowly change the colour of your eyes, fading them, and after a while, maybe 3 or 4 months, you can claim that you're bloodline did it. I'll let you make up a name for it and everything."
"Ah! That's an awesome idea! You're so cool, Neji-ni-san!" Kouden nearly shouted.
"What's so cool?" A voice from the front door said. Kouden twisted his head and shouted,
"Ka-chan! Neji-ni-san said he'd buy me a bowl of ramen for getting genin!" Neji snorted, and Kouden could barely keep a straight face. Tenten just smiled.
"Well, if you want ramen, I guess you can't have my present." Tenten said, making it obvious that she was hiding something behind her back.
Kouden started to jump up and down in his seat.
"What'd I get? What'd I get?" He said, shouting loud enough to attract Aiko, who was reading in her room, down to the top of the stairs.
"Shut up niichan! I'm trying to read!" Aiko huffed and turned around, but her protests fell upon deaf ears. Kouden was too excited about presents than anything.
Tenten brought out her hands, and presented two parcels about a foot long, wrapped in purple velvet. Kouden's eyes were like dinner plates as he hurridly grabbed the parcels. Nearly quivering with excitement he looked up at Tenten's face.
"Well, open them!" Tenten said, and not a second later, Kouden was staring at an unwrapped peice of steel in his hand. Neji blinked and carefully, as to not attract attention, scooted a few inches away from his little cousin. Kouden opened the other present and saw that it was a twin to his first.
Kouden hefted both presents into his hands. The handles were made of dark wood, and attached to the handles were round blades. They made a shape almost like a question mark. The points both had a small barb on them, no longer than the blades were wide.
Kouden looked closer at the extremly sharp looking weapons and saw that near the handle, was a single kanji inscribed on both the blades. One said 'heaven' and the other said 'earth'.
"Do you like it? I made these a while ago, and decided that you could have them when the time was right." Tenten smiled wide and continued. "I thought that combined with your jyuuken and the fact that you might have a similar bloodline to Neji, that they would suit you perfectly." Kouden grinned and looked up at Tenten.
"What are they called?" He said, in little more than a whisper.
"Kama. They are one of the oldest ninja tools. A long time ago, farmers used to use scythes to fend of enimies, because only samurai could use weapons. They eventually got smaller, and made of steel."
"Cool!" Kouden shouted, placing them carefully on the table, Kouden stood up and hugged Tenten hard enough to make her complain with a laugh.
Picking his new kama up, Kouden went through a simple jyuuken form, making sure he wasnt in anyones path.
"Now careful, those are really shar- Ah! Kouden-chan!" Tenten tried to say, but was cut off as Kouden proceeded to drop a kama and have it slice his leg neatly from knee to ankle. He cried out, and dropped the other one, which missed any of his limbs, but stuck straight up in the tatama rugs that covered the floor.
Neji, who had sucessfully snuck to the corner, now stood up and rushed to his little cousin.
"Yaa! Neji, do you know any healing jutsu?" Neji quickly shook his head and rushed to get a few towels from the closet upstairs. Tenten was busy holding Kouden's wound closed and trying to calm his screaming down.
When Neji came back with his towels, Tenten had gotten Kouden to quiet down to sobbing, and was now stroking his blonde hair with one hand, holding a tea towel to his large gash with the other.
Neji kneeled down beside the sobbing blonde and discarded the blood soaked tea towel. Tenten rushed to the cupboard above the stove and pulled out a roll of bandages. Both her and Neji then proceeded to tie the fresh towels around Kouden's leg.
"What's closer, the hospital, or Sakura-san's house?" Tenten said, now smoothing her step-son's hair, which was now more of an orange colour, due to the fact that Tenten's hands were covered in blood. Neji hesitated.
"I think the hospital, but Sakura will treat him faster." Tenten nodded and helped Kouden to stand up and hoist himself onto Neji's back.
"You alright, kid?" Neji said as he opened the front door. Kouden nodded and said,
"Yea...My leg really hurts though. I'm never gonna drop one of those again though..." Kouden said as Neji started to dash through the streets of Konoha. Neji just laughed and Kouden grinned.
"Hold on, it's just around the corner." Neji said, after a few minutes of running at chakra induced speed.
Dashing in through the large gates of the Uchiha compound, Neji made the now familar set of turns to get to the main household, the only one inhabited.
One last turn got them to the front door, where Neji stopped with cloud of dust, and started to bang on the door. A few seconds later, and Neji heard the pattering of feet and the door slid open to reveal a short dark pink haired 4 year old.
"Ah, Oshimakuru-kun, is your Okaa-san home?" The little boy slowly nodded and turned around and ran back into his house. Neji took a step inside, and closed the door. Carefully letting Kouden climb off of his back, Neji watched in amusement as Kouden glanced around everywhere.
Not even a minute later, both Sakura and Sasuke rounded the corner.
"Yo, Neji-san. Can I help you?" Sakura said, waving her wooden spoon in the air, nearly hitting Sasuke. Sasuke calmly plucked the spoon from her hand and glanced at Neji.
"Ah, yes. Sakura-san, I'm afraid that I am in need of your medical assistance. Rather quickly too, or else I wouldn't have to disturb you." Neji said, inclining his head a few inches.
"Oh! No bother, what's wrong?" Sakura said. Neji gestured at Kouden's leg. The towels were now blotted with red as his blood was leaking through.
Sakura gaped and ushered Neji and Kouden into her living room, Sasuke was close to follow.
As soon as Sakura reached the spacious room, she grabbed a bunch of pillows and piled them onto the floor. Pulling Kouden out of Neji's grasp, she sat him down on the pillows and set herself to slowly and carefully unwrapping Neji and Tenten's hasty work. Sasuke took this oppurtunity to speak to Neji.
"So, how's life been holding up?" He said. Neji didn't turn his head, but Sasuke knew that he was looking at him.
"Fine, fine. How has Sakura been holding up? With her baby and all, I mean." Sasuke slowly moved his head up and down before saying,
"She's fine. Over-eager, but fine." Sasuke said. Neji's mouth twitched into a grin. Sasuke had walked into the ANBU office last month to personally tell him the news.
"So what did he do?" Sasuke said, after a small cry was emitted from Kouden. Sakura was removing the final towel, and the dried blood was pulling at his skin.
"Dropped his Kama. Gift from Tenten for passing his genin exam. Sliced himself from the knee to his ankle." Sasuke wrinkled his nose, imagining the pain.
"You say he passed his exam? Do you know what team he got?" Sasuke said, sounding intrested. Neji wrinkled his nose this time and shifted his feet. Sakura has taken the last towel off and Kouden's gash looked worse than before. The skin around the edges were an angry red colour, and to Neji's trained eyes, he could see the indvidual muscles in his cousin's calf twitching.
Sakura's face was one of concentration as she lit both her hands up with the green fire of medic-nin jutsu. Placing her hands on the wound, Neji never failed to be amazed as the severed calf muscle started to knit itself together before his eyes.
After a good minute or so, the gash was still bleeding slightly, but it looked like a long shallow cut, instead of a long deep gash. Kouden had stopped sobbing and was looking at his leg with intrest.
"Stay here, Kouden-kun, I cant heal it all the way, I don't have enough chakra. But I can bandage it so it heals faster." Sakura said, rising and leaving the room. Kouden looked at Neji, and blushed slightly.
"So you didn't answer me. What team did Kouden get?" Sasuke said. Neji blinked, but Kouden replied before Neji could.
"Ne! I got Kakashi-sensei, Sasuke-nii-san!" Sasuke felt his mouth open slightly, as he watched the blonde grin so hard his eyes closed. A splash of water snapped him out of the momentary daze he was in. Looking to the hallway that Sakura had disapeared into, he saw a white bowl laying on the ground, and it contents splashed all around it. Sakura herself had her mouth wide open, and Sasuke saw from his position on the other side of the room, that a tear was starting to form in her bright green eyes. A long and tense moment passed before Sakura spoke, He voice wavering on the edge of tears.
"G-gomen...I, I just...uuu...I made s-such a mess..." Sakura bent over to pick up the fallen medical supplies and Sasuke went over to help.
"Ahh, it's ok. Here, I'll go fill this up. You just sit here and relax." Sasuke said. Neji slowly kneeled next to his cousin. He didn't know what had just happened, but he respected their privacy. Placing his hand on Kouden's shoulder, the smaller blonde looked up at Neji with a faded grin and slightly pale green eyes.
"You started the eye colour thing? When?" Neji said, in a low whisper.
"While riding on your back. How noticable is it?" Kouden said, barely moving his lips. Neji grinned.
"I can barely tell, dont worry, sshh..." Neji said, trailing off as a now calmed down Sakura apologized and started to clean and bandage Kouden's wound.
"I have two tips for you. Eat a big break fast tomorrow, despite Kakashi-sensei's orders, and no matter what he says tomorrow, work as a team. Remember that, even if you forget to eat, work as a team." Sakura said. Kouden nodded and Sakura ruffled his bloodstained hair. Wrinkling her nose, Sakura then said,
"And take a shower, you have blood all over you." Neji let out a laugh and Kouden tested his bandages.
End Chapter 11
"You first." Kouden said. Shiro and Sasami were quick to nod. Kakashi rolled his eye.
"If you insist. My name is Hatake Kakashi, I have some likes, and some dislikes, and my dream is none of your buisness." Kouden's brow twitched as Kakashi clapped and pointed at Sasami.
We didn't learn anything other than his name! thought three genin. Sasami, eyed Kakashi with her brown eyes before saying,
"Ditama Sasami. I like practicing chakra control, and studying medicine. I hate people that are mean without reason, and my dream is to be a medic-nin like Tsunade-sama!" Sasami finished and realized she had her fist in the air. Blushing she brought it down and looked to her right. Kouden raised an eyebrow and Kakashi just pointed at Kouden.
"Me? Ok. I'm U..er, Hyuuga Kouden. I like Ka-chan's cooking, practicing jyuuken with Neji-ni-san, and reading about the Naruto legend." Kouden paused as Shiro's gaze became more focused. Even without his byakugan, he felt the stares. It made the hairs on his neck stand.
"Er...my dislikes are failing, and when the villagers stare at me with hatred. And my dream is to become a Sannin!" Kouden said, his voice drowning out the other's thoughts on his last statement.
"Ok, well, you, with the dark hair. You're next." Kakashi said, rather emotionlessly. Shiro nodded and took a moment to gather his thoughts, and to tuck a few strands of his long hair behind his ear. Shiro took one last glance at Kouden before speaking.
"Un, Oketsu Shiro," Kakashi made a sound that sounded suspisously like a giggle, "My likes are udon and practicing my family jutsus with Kaa-san, and my hates are people who tell other people that their dreams are impossible." Shiro paused for a moment, and then let his entire body relax. But Kouden didn't miss his fist clench until his knuckles were white.
"I don't really have a definte dream right now, talk to me in a year." Sasami clicked her tongue and Shiro's serious face cracked slightly to reveal a small grin. Kouden relaxed, but continued to watch Shiro out of the corner of his eye.
A loud clap brought their eyes to their teacher. Kakashi regarded his new students before saying,
"Well now, It seems that despite the full class this year, only 12 students graduated. That presents a problem." Nodding, Kakashi observed the slightly confused glare of a certain blonde.
"So which team gets booted?" Sasami said. Kakashi grinned. She was smarter than he first thought.
"Depends. Tomorrow, right here, we are going to have a small test. A survival test. If you lose, you go back to the academy." Kouden's mouth dropped, Sasami's eyes widened, and Shiro snorted.
"7 am, and don't eat. You'll throw up." The grey haired jounin said before disapearing in a poof of smoke a leaves.
Kouden, Sasami, and Shiro just stared for a minute. The silence sooned turned awkward and Kouden finally suggested that they go to Ichiraku's. Sasami immediatly agreed, and Shiro shrugged, but followed.
When Kouden ducked under the flaps above the entrance, he was greeted by two friendly voices, both bidding him welcome.
"Oi, jii-sama! Miso ramen for me, and beef for Sasami-chan! Uh, what kind do you want, Shiro?" Kouden said, scratching the back of his head. Shiro sat down, but not before he noticed the small sigh that both Ichiraku and his daughter gave off.
"I'll have shrimp." The girl, Ayame, nodded and grinned, prepping his ramen.
Shiro directed his gaze at Kouden, who was busying himself with emptying his pockets looking for his wallet. When he finally found it, Shiro always flinched on how full it was. Kouden told him that because he was a part of the Hyuuga clan, he got an allowance, but he also did odd jobs for his mother.
Although, what really was irking Shiro, was Kouden's stumble earlier. What was he going to say before Hyuuga? Maybe he really knew his family name. He asked once, but his answer was anything but informative.
Kouden sat on a thick bough of the tree that he, Sasami, and Shiro had all claimed. He was using chakra to direct leaves into Sasami's pink hair, while she was using her own, more controlled chakra to move small masses of leaves into Kouden's face, so that he would leave her hair alone.
Shiro sighed, he'd seen these so called 'fights' before. Usually he never got involved unless Sasami or Kouden started blowing leaves at him as well. But he could never do it as good. His control was apparently lacking.
"Kouden, can you tell me how you, who to my knowledge can't even pull off a kawarimi, have that much control?" Kouden stopped for a second, which was a mistake, as Sasami filled his mouth with leaves. Spitting them out, he looked at Shiro. Kouden blinked and one of his eyes, right near the pupil, and almost invisible to the normal person, jittered. Shiro blinked and was about to ask, but Kouden cut him off.
"Oh, I guess you didn't know? I practice jyuuken with Neji-ni-san, and Hanabi-sama." Shiro wrinkled his nose as he watched Sasami direct one small leaf towards Kouden, and then down his shirt.
"Jyuuken? Isn't that a clan only taijutsu? Besides, don't you need byakugan?" Kouden looked to his left, before fishing the leaf out. He still his his hand down his black and orange jacket when he said,
"Uh, well, It seems that I might have a bloodline, faintly similar to byakugan. Uh...I can...I can see how chakra flows, kinda. Might give me a clue as to who my real parents are." Kouden said, unsteadily.
In truth, Kouden was lying completly, Shiro suspected a lie, or a twist of truth, but he couldn't help but ask another question.
"Have you any idea at all? Like, I'm sure you had caretakers, before you joined Konoha. Did they ever tell you?" Sasami's control slipped, and the slightly bigger leaf that she had been controlling at the time fluttered away. Kouden looked at Shiro, warily.
"No. The leader-lady from the orphanage said that my okaa-san had dark hair, and pretty eyes. But she died giving birth to me." Shiro nodded and looked away, missing both Kouden and Sasami glance at each other before resuming their game of 'who could stuff the most leaves down the other's shirt first'.
Shiro snapped out of his thougts as a piping hot bowl of ramen was placed in front of him. Shiro nodded a thanks to Ayame and inhaled. The smell nearly made his mouth water. He reached for chopsticks and noted Kouden and Sasami already digging into their ramen.
Kouden, although his happy facade was up, was silently cursing himself about his slip up. He was sure Shiro noticed, and quite possibly Sasami.
Kakashi knew who his real parents were, so it didn't matter, but even though Sasami knew his mother, Kouden had never indulged his last name to her. Hinata had told him that his father had many enemies, and could attract unnessesary attention. On top of that, Kouden was surprised that Sasami, as smart as she was pretty, didn't put two and two together.
Kouden had been able to convince Sasami that his mother was a distant cousin of the Hyuuga, thus was why he had the byakugan. With a few words, Kouden convinced her, with no difficulty at all, that his mother was mearly named after the tragic princess.
Sometimes Kouden surprised himself with his ability to lie.
Sasami on the other hand, was completely missing this silent battle between Kouden and Shiro, and had completely missed the slip-up her best friend made. She happily slurped away at her ramen as she thought of the beautiful new anklet that Kouden had bought her for her birthday.
He had presented it today, just after graduation. He also kissed her cheek, causing her to blush so red that her face hurt.
A small splash and she fell back to reality when she noticed that one of her chopsticks were missing, and both her teammates, AND the ramen cooks were all staring at her.
Sasami gave a small squeak and blushed.
Kouden raised a yellow brow and said,
"Why are you blushing? Are you hiding something from us, Sasami-chan?" Sasami turned redder and glared at Kouden. Shiro shifted in his chair and Sasami directed her glare at him. Her eyes daring him to say something.
Shiro just rolled his eyes and finished his ramen.
"Well, this has been fun. I'll see you tomorrow, Kouden, Sasami-chan." Shiro bowed, which was just a small incline of his head, and left.
"Wah! Hey! Shiro! Get back here, you didn't pay!" Kouden shouted at the rapidly disapearing form.
"Aaah. I'll get him back, the bastard." Kouden said, grumbling now to a laughing Sasami.
Twenty minutes and an empty wallet later, Kouden was shaking his sandals off into the closet.
"Tadaimasu..." Kouden said, trailing off. Neji was seated at the small table, drinking tea and reading a few papers he had from a small stack of to his right. Looking up, Neji didn't say anything at first, but as soon as he spotted Kouden's forhead, his white eyes visably lit up.
"Ohh! Omedeto! What team did you get?" Kouden grinned, closing his eyes. Neji was struck, again, with how much Kouden looked like his father.
"Guess!" Kouden said. Neji shrugged. Kouden sighed.
"I got Kakashi-sensei! And Sasami-chan and Shiro are on my team! Ino-ne san stopped and laughed at Kakashi-sensei too." Neji was laughing quietly by now, holding a peice of paper in front of him.
"So that's what this is for!" He said. Kouden took a seat beside him and tugged on the paper.
Resignment ApplicationName: Hatake Kakashi
Reason: I need to take a temporary break. I need to relax, read, maybe bother a few people... I'll probably be back in a few days.
~Love Kakashi
"Hahaha, that idiot. Kakashi signed his ANBU resignation like a letter. I was gonna go tell him to shove it. He can't just up and quit...but I guess he has a reason after all." Still smiling, Neji put the paper down and looked at Kouden.
"So have you seen Tenten yet?" Kouden nodded.
"She said we were gonna celebrate, so we can't leave. Is Aiko-chan here?" Neji nodded this time.
A few minutes of silence later, and Kouden looked around before saying a whisper,
"Neji-ni-san, my eyes are starting to hurt... and holding this henge up all the time is starting to hurt. I found a burn near my nose yesturday when I went to sleep yesturday...Is there a way I can just, well, not henge anymore?" Neji stared at Kouden for a few minutes.
"Well, have you told anyone other than Sasami about your Byakugan?"
"I told Shiro that I had a bloodline like byakugan, but not exactly, and that it started to activate last year."
Neji nodded. He ran his hand through his long hair. Kouden sat back farther.
"How about, you slowly change the colour of your eyes, fading them, and after a while, maybe 3 or 4 months, you can claim that you're bloodline did it. I'll let you make up a name for it and everything."
"Ah! That's an awesome idea! You're so cool, Neji-ni-san!" Kouden nearly shouted.
"What's so cool?" A voice from the front door said. Kouden twisted his head and shouted,
"Ka-chan! Neji-ni-san said he'd buy me a bowl of ramen for getting genin!" Neji snorted, and Kouden could barely keep a straight face. Tenten just smiled.
"Well, if you want ramen, I guess you can't have my present." Tenten said, making it obvious that she was hiding something behind her back.
Kouden started to jump up and down in his seat.
"What'd I get? What'd I get?" He said, shouting loud enough to attract Aiko, who was reading in her room, down to the top of the stairs.
"Shut up niichan! I'm trying to read!" Aiko huffed and turned around, but her protests fell upon deaf ears. Kouden was too excited about presents than anything.
Tenten brought out her hands, and presented two parcels about a foot long, wrapped in purple velvet. Kouden's eyes were like dinner plates as he hurridly grabbed the parcels. Nearly quivering with excitement he looked up at Tenten's face.
"Well, open them!" Tenten said, and not a second later, Kouden was staring at an unwrapped peice of steel in his hand. Neji blinked and carefully, as to not attract attention, scooted a few inches away from his little cousin. Kouden opened the other present and saw that it was a twin to his first.
Kouden hefted both presents into his hands. The handles were made of dark wood, and attached to the handles were round blades. They made a shape almost like a question mark. The points both had a small barb on them, no longer than the blades were wide.
Kouden looked closer at the extremly sharp looking weapons and saw that near the handle, was a single kanji inscribed on both the blades. One said 'heaven' and the other said 'earth'.
"Do you like it? I made these a while ago, and decided that you could have them when the time was right." Tenten smiled wide and continued. "I thought that combined with your jyuuken and the fact that you might have a similar bloodline to Neji, that they would suit you perfectly." Kouden grinned and looked up at Tenten.
"What are they called?" He said, in little more than a whisper.
"Kama. They are one of the oldest ninja tools. A long time ago, farmers used to use scythes to fend of enimies, because only samurai could use weapons. They eventually got smaller, and made of steel."
"Cool!" Kouden shouted, placing them carefully on the table, Kouden stood up and hugged Tenten hard enough to make her complain with a laugh.
Picking his new kama up, Kouden went through a simple jyuuken form, making sure he wasnt in anyones path.
"Now careful, those are really shar- Ah! Kouden-chan!" Tenten tried to say, but was cut off as Kouden proceeded to drop a kama and have it slice his leg neatly from knee to ankle. He cried out, and dropped the other one, which missed any of his limbs, but stuck straight up in the tatama rugs that covered the floor.
Neji, who had sucessfully snuck to the corner, now stood up and rushed to his little cousin.
"Yaa! Neji, do you know any healing jutsu?" Neji quickly shook his head and rushed to get a few towels from the closet upstairs. Tenten was busy holding Kouden's wound closed and trying to calm his screaming down.
When Neji came back with his towels, Tenten had gotten Kouden to quiet down to sobbing, and was now stroking his blonde hair with one hand, holding a tea towel to his large gash with the other.
Neji kneeled down beside the sobbing blonde and discarded the blood soaked tea towel. Tenten rushed to the cupboard above the stove and pulled out a roll of bandages. Both her and Neji then proceeded to tie the fresh towels around Kouden's leg.
"What's closer, the hospital, or Sakura-san's house?" Tenten said, now smoothing her step-son's hair, which was now more of an orange colour, due to the fact that Tenten's hands were covered in blood. Neji hesitated.
"I think the hospital, but Sakura will treat him faster." Tenten nodded and helped Kouden to stand up and hoist himself onto Neji's back.
"You alright, kid?" Neji said as he opened the front door. Kouden nodded and said,
"Yea...My leg really hurts though. I'm never gonna drop one of those again though..." Kouden said as Neji started to dash through the streets of Konoha. Neji just laughed and Kouden grinned.
"Hold on, it's just around the corner." Neji said, after a few minutes of running at chakra induced speed.
Dashing in through the large gates of the Uchiha compound, Neji made the now familar set of turns to get to the main household, the only one inhabited.
One last turn got them to the front door, where Neji stopped with cloud of dust, and started to bang on the door. A few seconds later, and Neji heard the pattering of feet and the door slid open to reveal a short dark pink haired 4 year old.
"Ah, Oshimakuru-kun, is your Okaa-san home?" The little boy slowly nodded and turned around and ran back into his house. Neji took a step inside, and closed the door. Carefully letting Kouden climb off of his back, Neji watched in amusement as Kouden glanced around everywhere.
Not even a minute later, both Sakura and Sasuke rounded the corner.
"Yo, Neji-san. Can I help you?" Sakura said, waving her wooden spoon in the air, nearly hitting Sasuke. Sasuke calmly plucked the spoon from her hand and glanced at Neji.
"Ah, yes. Sakura-san, I'm afraid that I am in need of your medical assistance. Rather quickly too, or else I wouldn't have to disturb you." Neji said, inclining his head a few inches.
"Oh! No bother, what's wrong?" Sakura said. Neji gestured at Kouden's leg. The towels were now blotted with red as his blood was leaking through.
Sakura gaped and ushered Neji and Kouden into her living room, Sasuke was close to follow.
As soon as Sakura reached the spacious room, she grabbed a bunch of pillows and piled them onto the floor. Pulling Kouden out of Neji's grasp, she sat him down on the pillows and set herself to slowly and carefully unwrapping Neji and Tenten's hasty work. Sasuke took this oppurtunity to speak to Neji.
"So, how's life been holding up?" He said. Neji didn't turn his head, but Sasuke knew that he was looking at him.
"Fine, fine. How has Sakura been holding up? With her baby and all, I mean." Sasuke slowly moved his head up and down before saying,
"She's fine. Over-eager, but fine." Sasuke said. Neji's mouth twitched into a grin. Sasuke had walked into the ANBU office last month to personally tell him the news.
"So what did he do?" Sasuke said, after a small cry was emitted from Kouden. Sakura was removing the final towel, and the dried blood was pulling at his skin.
"Dropped his Kama. Gift from Tenten for passing his genin exam. Sliced himself from the knee to his ankle." Sasuke wrinkled his nose, imagining the pain.
"You say he passed his exam? Do you know what team he got?" Sasuke said, sounding intrested. Neji wrinkled his nose this time and shifted his feet. Sakura has taken the last towel off and Kouden's gash looked worse than before. The skin around the edges were an angry red colour, and to Neji's trained eyes, he could see the indvidual muscles in his cousin's calf twitching.
Sakura's face was one of concentration as she lit both her hands up with the green fire of medic-nin jutsu. Placing her hands on the wound, Neji never failed to be amazed as the severed calf muscle started to knit itself together before his eyes.
After a good minute or so, the gash was still bleeding slightly, but it looked like a long shallow cut, instead of a long deep gash. Kouden had stopped sobbing and was looking at his leg with intrest.
"Stay here, Kouden-kun, I cant heal it all the way, I don't have enough chakra. But I can bandage it so it heals faster." Sakura said, rising and leaving the room. Kouden looked at Neji, and blushed slightly.
"So you didn't answer me. What team did Kouden get?" Sasuke said. Neji blinked, but Kouden replied before Neji could.
"Ne! I got Kakashi-sensei, Sasuke-nii-san!" Sasuke felt his mouth open slightly, as he watched the blonde grin so hard his eyes closed. A splash of water snapped him out of the momentary daze he was in. Looking to the hallway that Sakura had disapeared into, he saw a white bowl laying on the ground, and it contents splashed all around it. Sakura herself had her mouth wide open, and Sasuke saw from his position on the other side of the room, that a tear was starting to form in her bright green eyes. A long and tense moment passed before Sakura spoke, He voice wavering on the edge of tears.
"G-gomen...I, I just...uuu...I made s-such a mess..." Sakura bent over to pick up the fallen medical supplies and Sasuke went over to help.
"Ahh, it's ok. Here, I'll go fill this up. You just sit here and relax." Sasuke said. Neji slowly kneeled next to his cousin. He didn't know what had just happened, but he respected their privacy. Placing his hand on Kouden's shoulder, the smaller blonde looked up at Neji with a faded grin and slightly pale green eyes.
"You started the eye colour thing? When?" Neji said, in a low whisper.
"While riding on your back. How noticable is it?" Kouden said, barely moving his lips. Neji grinned.
"I can barely tell, dont worry, sshh..." Neji said, trailing off as a now calmed down Sakura apologized and started to clean and bandage Kouden's wound.
"I have two tips for you. Eat a big break fast tomorrow, despite Kakashi-sensei's orders, and no matter what he says tomorrow, work as a team. Remember that, even if you forget to eat, work as a team." Sakura said. Kouden nodded and Sakura ruffled his bloodstained hair. Wrinkling her nose, Sakura then said,
"And take a shower, you have blood all over you." Neji let out a laugh and Kouden tested his bandages.
End Chapter 11