Naruto Fan Fiction ❯ Faith of the Heart ❯ Chapter 7: The Teapot Lady ( Chapter 8 )

Faith of the Heart

 

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Chapter 7: The Teapot Lady

 

When Naruto caught up to Hinata in the next chamber of the cave, she was sitting on a large flat boulder with her knees pulled up against her chest and her arms wrapped around her legs.

 

“Want to talk about it, Hinata-chan?”

 

Hinata shook her head `no' without even turning around to look at him. Knowing she didn't really mean it, Naruto sat down behind his girlfriend with a leg on either side and wrapped his arms around her waist. It was obvious she'd been crying, which explained why she'd run away. Hinata wasn't as shy as she use to be, but she still had a habit of trying to hide when she was upset. Naruto knew it wasn't so much a desire to be left alone, as an instinct she developed growing up in a clan where displays of emotion, especially something like crying, were frowned upon.

 

“I-I'm s-so s-s-sorry, N-naruto-kun,” Hinata sobbed. “I s-shouldn't have t-told your secret. P-please, don't be m-mad. I-I d-don't w-want to l-lose you!”

 

“Hey, hey, you've got nothing to be sorry for. We needed to tell Sakura anyway. It's better that she heard it from one of us than from someone in Akatsuki, ya know. Besides, it was our secret, not just mine. You had just as much right to tell her as I did,” Naruto replied as he tried to comfort Hinata. He couldn't stand seeing her cry. Naruto gently put a couple of fingers under Hinata's chin and turned her head so she was looking him in the eyes. “And I love you, so you're not going to lose me…ever. If anything, I should thank you for sticking up for me.” He leaned forward and kissed her on the lips.

 

After breaking the kiss, they sat in silence for a while longer, just enjoying being close to each other. For two people who had experienced true loneliness in their lives, there was something almost therapeutic in each other's touch. For Naruto, ever time he felt Hinata's soft, warm skin touch his own it served to remind him that he was no longer alone in the world, and as long as she drew breath he never would be again. He knew Hinata felt the same.

 

Hinata was the first to break the silence, “Naru-chan,” she asked, using the pet name she sometimes called him by when they were alone, “why do you let Sakura-san treat you the way she does?”

 

Naruto sighed, “Sakura-chan doesn't really treat me that badly.”

 

Hinata gave her boyfriend a look that practically screamed, `Yeah, right.'

 

Naruto had to laugh at the unexpected expression on Hinata's face, “Okay, okay, I admit it. She's violent, bitchy as hell sometimes, and is more temperamental than baa-chan when Shizune-nee-chan hides her sake, but you have to remember that her, Sasuke-teme, and Kakashi-sensei were three of the first bonds I ever had. Yeah, I do wish she wouldn't hit me so much, but I know that when push comes to shove, Sakura-chan is a true friend and will be there when I need her. It's just that we've always interacted like that, and in the past I was just so grateful to actually have anyone in my life I could call a friend that I didn't care.”

 

Hinata started to get a sad look on her face.

 

“And before you say anything, I know you wanted to be there for me earlier in my life and it's okay,” Naruto said as he lovingly stroked his girlfriend's cheek. “You tried your best, and while I didn't know it was you, I at least knew there was someone out there who cared about me,” he smiled at her, when he remembered all the gifts that would mysteriously appear at the doorstep to his apartment on his birthday and the holidays. At first, he'd thought they were from Old Man Hokage, Iruka-sensei, or the man at the Ramen shop and his daughter because who else could possibly care enough to get him anything. But when they all denied any knowledge of the gifts, Naruto had realized there was someone else out there that cared about him. For the life of him, Naruto couldn't figure out who it could be, but he often dreamed up wild fantasies about the identity of the person who left the gifts when he was feeling lonely or when the villagers were being especially cruel to him. For a while he'd hoped it was Sakura, but he was realistic enough to realize that it couldn't possibly have been her, especially after she'd called the goggles he'd found on his doorstep the morning of his tenth birthday `stupid looking.' Although he knew it was nothing more than a fantasy, he'd also imagined that the gifts came from his parents who were actually elite ANBU operatives who were on a super-secret mission vital to the safety of Konoha and weren't allowed to reveal to him that they were still alive. While his daydreams mainly served to make his curiosity grow stronger, they also gave him the little bit of extra hope necessary to survive some of his darkest moments, when he felt like giving up and wondered if everyone would be better off if he just disappeared or died. It was this curiosity, hope, and his desire to thank the gift giver, which drove Naruto to spend years trying to catch his mysterious benefactor in the act of leaving a present. However, no matter what he tried, he could never even catch a glimpse of the person leaving the gifts. It was like he or she always knew when he was watching, no matter how well he hid himself. `Maybe that's because she really did always know I was there when I tried to catch her,” Naruto chuckled to himself at as he looked into Hinata's pale lavender eyes that were a trademark of her clan's kekkei genkai. `I really should have figured that one out sooner.'

 

As it was, he hadn't realized it was Hinata until the first birthday party she and Jiraiya had thrown for him during their training mission when Hinata finally worked up the courage to give him a gift in person. Naruto grinned; it had also been the first time he kissed Hinata, even if it was only on the cheek. The first thing Naruto noticed when he opened the card attached to the gift was Hinata's handwriting was identical to the way his mystery gift giver wrote "To Naruto" on the small little card attached to each gift. At first he'd stared at the card in shock, unable to move or say anything as his mind tried to accept the truth of what he just learned. Then he suddenly jumped to his feet so excited to finally know the identity of the person who had been giving him gifts for so long that he scooped Hinata up and twirled her around and around in circles while yelling, “THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU,” at the top of his lungs and smothering her cheek with kisses. She'd turned as red as a lobster and fainted after the second kiss, but Jiraiya had been laughing so hard at Naruto's antics that it took the sannin the better part of five minutes to get around to pointing out Hinata was unconscious. Naruto was mortified because he thought it meant he had somehow injured her, which of course only served to make Jiraiya break out in another laughing fit when the blond-headed boy attempted to perform CPR in an effort to `revive' her. Hinata momentarily regained consciousness when Naruto laid her down on the floor, but immediately fainted again when she opened her eyes and saw her crush's puckered lips descending toward hers to perform mouth-to-mouth. If Jiraiya hadn't taken pity on Hinata and stopped him, there was no telling how many times she would have fainted before Naruto calmed down.

 

`Speaking of blushing girlfriends,' Naruto grinned when Hinata blissfully smiled back at him while closing her eyes and putting her hands over the one he was using to rub her cheek, as if she was savoring his touch and wishing it would never end. It was one of the many reasons Naruto loved her so much. Hinata reacted to even the smallest displays of love and affection from him as if they were the most priceless gift anyone had ever given her. It warmed Naruto's heart like nothing else because he took it for what it was, a sign of just how much she truly loved and accepted him for who he was, and because he loved being able to make her so happy just by acting the way he felt. The opposite sex, not to mention people in general, had always been a mystery to him. He never knew what to say or how to act, so he just plowed forward through life doing his best and hoping he didn't screw things up too badly. But with Hinata it was so simple. There were no games, no unexplained anger, and no attempts at manipulation. There was nothing but two people deeply in love who acted like it. If he didn't understand something or was confused, he knew he could ask her without her thinking less of him or making fun of him. She did sometimes giggle when he asked an especially clueless question, but she'd still answer his question while wearing that loving smile of hers. He knew she found his occasional confusion `cute,' as she put it, and was laughing with him, not at him. Most of the time he'd end up laughing along side her while playfully acting like he was trying to `get her.'

 

“Naru-chan, maybe you should tell Sakura-san how you really feel about the way she treats you. If she really is your friend, I'm sure she'll understand,” Hinata said when she opened her eyes and woke Naruto from his reminiscing

 

“Maybe I should,” Naruto admitted. “But there'd be a big downside," he paused for dramatic effect before a mischievous grin broke out on his face, "I wouldn't get to watch you slap her around again. You were awesome!” He then launched a tickle attack on his girlfriend's sides causing Hinata to let out a squeal and curl up in a ball in a vain attempt to protect herself.

 

“Hey! No fair!” Hinata gasped when Naruto let up for a brief moment to let her catch her breath.

 

“All's fair in love and war, Sweetness,” Naruto replied before stealing a quick kiss and shoving his hands under Hinata's t-shirt to go after her bare ribs and arm pits which he knew to be especially ticklish. When Temari came to find them a couple of minutes later, Naruto was crouched between Hinata's legs with his hands still up her shirt tickling her mercilessly while she lay on her back laughing so hard tears flowed out of her eyes.

 

“Hey lovebirds! The sandstorm is dying down, and we need to get moving,” Temari said with a laugh when she saw the Naruto and Hinata laughing and wrestling on the floor of the cave.

 

“Man, we're going to have to start assigning you two a chaperone,” the Sand kunoichi jokingly added as an afterthought while she watched the couple dust themselves off. Hinata, and surprisingly Naruto, blushed in response.

 

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“Sasori's skills have grown. Poison is one of my specialties, but even I have never seen anything like this before,” the old woman said as stared at the injured Kankurou with a look of frustration etched on her wrinkled face. She had been working on finding a counter for the poison, but nothing she tried seemed to have any effect.

 

“What should we do, Chiyo-baasama?” Baki asked.

 

“Well, the only one who has more knowledge about neutralizing poisons than me is that damn slug woman from Konoha, Tsunade-hime. During the Third Secret Ninja War, she was able to figure out the poisons I created and mix antidotes immediately, constantly embarrassing me. All you can do is call her here and ask her to examine him,” Chiyo replied. “You're allied to Konoha now, aren't you?”

 

“But she's Konoha's Hokage now, she can't easily leave the village. Even if she could, it's a three-day journey from Konoha to Suna. By the time she got here it would be too late,” Baki said. “The team of specialists we requested from Konoha should arrive soon. Hopefully they'll have someone who can help.”

 

“Humph, stop relying on other people! You're so dependent on your alliances with other countries that you've allowed your own training to slip, and this is what becomes of it!” Chiyo snapped at the jonin.

 

Baki was grinding his teeth. Chiyo implying that Suna's shinobi had allowed their skills to deteriorate out of complacency was an insult to his professional pride; especially considering the charge wasn't true. If anything, Konoha's aid in reforming their training methods had led to a dramatic increase in the overall quality of training and readiness of their forces. “With all do respect, Elder Chiyo, we have by no means become dependent on our allies…”

 

Knowing how bitter his sister was about the alliance with Konoha, Chiyo's brother, Ebizo, interrupted in an attempt to head off the fight he saw brewing. “It doesn't matter. Whatever the case may be; it is because he lost his composure and confronted them without backup that he's like this. All the training in the world would not have made a difference.”

 

Ebizo's words did nothing to calm Chiyo though as she continued to lecture Baki, “That still doesn't change the fact that you are having to rely on Konoha, because you didn't make the advancement of our own village's power your first priority. Friendly alliances are just a fabrication. During times like these, all they can do is send useless underlings. THE MAIN POINT IS I CAN'T STAND THAT SLUG WOMAN!”

 

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“ACHOO!!”

 

“Are you alright, Hokage-sama?”

 

“Probably just allergies,” Tsunade said as she wiped her nose, “but thank you for asking, Ten-ten. As I was saying, the mission is the same as the one I gave Kakashi's team. You are to head to Sunagakure and provide the Sand with any support they may need.”

 

“RIGHT!” Gai said while giving the `nice guy pose' and one of his blinding smiles. “Alright Everyone! Let's get to Suna in one day!!”

 

“No, Gai-sensei! Let's get there in half a day!!!” Lee chimed in.

 

“You're friggin' insane!” a bewildered Kiba exclaimed. “There's no way in hell to make it there in less than three days!”

 

Lee put his arm around Kiba's shoulders, “But we are in the Springtime of Youth, Kiba-san! Nothing is impossible!!”

 

“Well said Lee!! Well said!!” Gai added. “We shall indoctrinate our new charges into our philosophy of Youthfulness!!” With that Gai pulled two green spandex body suits like he and Lee wore out of his backpack and thrust them into Kiba and Shino's hands.

 

Akamaru slowly inched away from Kiba, Shino, and the two green-clad shinobi with his tail between his legs. The large dog was terrified that Gai might have another body suit with a tail hole.

 

Meanwhile, Shino stared at the suit with one raised eyebrow visible above his sunglasses. However, his scientific curiosity was suddenly peaked when he noticed his bugs refused to approach it even when ordered. He pulled out a large plastic sample bag and careful placed the unusual article of clothing inside for later study before sealing the bag with yellow biohazard tape and returning it to his backpack.

 

“TO SUNA!” Gai shouted loudly enough to make Akamaru whine and all the shinobi, save Lee, wince in pain.

 

“What have I gotten myself into?” Kiba wondered aloud, as he started to have second thoughts about he, Akamaru, and Shino requesting to tag along with Team Gai for this mission.

 

Kiba felt a hand pat him on the shoulder and turned his head to see Ten-ten and Neji standing right behind him. Both wore looks of profound sympathy on their faces.

 

“Welcome to our world.”

 

 

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“…After that Kankurou-sensei pursued them, but he was wounded when he encountered the kidnappers,” Matsuri explained to Team Kakashi and Temari as she led them from the recently cleared main entrance where she met them through the streets of Sunagakure toward the hospital.

 

“WHAT?! They got Kankurou too?”

 

“Yes, Temari-sensei. The Akatsuki he fought managed to poison him. Chiyo-baasama has been treating him, but she has been unable to neutralize the poison. She said he has half a day left at most,” the young genin explained.

 

“SHIT!” Temari cursed. “First Gaara and now this!”

 

“Let's hurry, Temari-san,” Sakura interrupted, “I'll examine him.”

 

 

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“Kankurou!!” Temari cried out as she, Matsuri, and Sakura entered the treatment room.

 

The three girls were halfway across the room by the time Kakashi, Naruto, and Hinata reached the open doorway.

 

“THE WHITE FANG OF KONOHA!!” Chiyo shouted when she saw Kakashi.

 

“Huh?” Kakashi said as he came to a dead stop in the doorway.

 

Chiyo sprang toward Kakashi with such speed that she passed between Temari and Sakura before either realized she had moved.

 

Spotting the danger, Naruto slid by Kakashi and created a pair of shadow clones. Hinata slipped through the doorway right behind him and took a gentle fist stance midway between Kakashi and Naruto and his clones.

 

Naruto was surprised when the old woman managed to land a hard enough hit on the first clone she encountered to dispel it. He caught her next punch himself and tried to hold on, but was foiled when Chiyo kicked at the second clone. When the clone blocked the kick Chiyo used it as leverage to break free of Naruto's grip and propel herself backwards to gain enough room to make another attempt at attacking Kakashi.

 

`Damn, this old bat can fight!' Naruto thought.

 

Sensing an opportunity, Hinata darted forward through the cloud of smoke left by the dispelled clone and acted as if she was trying to slide tackle Chiyo. Chiyo leaped into the air as Hinata slid under her on the tile floor. The Suna elder threw a single kunai at Kakashi while she was airborne. However, the moment the Suna elder's feet left the ground Naruto closed the distance between them. He drew a pair of butterfly swords from a sheath concealed beneath his jacket and twirled the sword in his left hand, causing the blade to intercept the kunai, sending it clattering harmlessly to the floor. Chiyo then tried to throw a punch that Naruto blocked by using the large d-shaped finger guard of the sword in his right hand like a pair of brass knuckles. Chiyo jerked her bruised hand back in surprised. Naruto then crossed his arms to slash at the old woman as if he was going to cleave her head from her shoulders. However, Naruto stopped both swords in mid swing mere inches before the short, broad blades would have sliced into the woman's skin. He stood motionless with the swords still poised at Chiyo's neck like an oversized pair of scissors. Hinata, who had popped back onto her feet behind the Suna elder with her Byakugan activated, stood ready to close off the old woman's chakra points should she try anything else.

 

“Mind telling us why you're trying to attack Kakashi-sensei, you wrinkled old hag?” Naruto growled.

 

“Please, Elder-sama, we do not wish to harm you,” Hinata added in a gentler and more diplomatically tone.

 

Realizing she'd been out maneuvered, Chiyo didn't move except to cradle the bruised knuckles of her left hand, but she continued to glare at Kakashi. “Konoha's White Fang! How dare you come here, you wretched bastard! You killed my son, and I will get revenge for him today!”

 

“Ah! No! I'm not…” Kakashi attempted to say.

 

“THERE'S NO USE IN ARGUING, I KNOW WHO YOU ARE!!” Chiyo retorted.

 

“Nee-chan, take a good look,” Ebizo said as he approached his sibling's side. “There's a strong resemblance, but he isn't Konoha's White Fang.”

 

“Huh? Say what?!” Chiyo squinted at Kakashi as she followed her brother's suggestion.

 

Kakashi waved while giving an awkward smile.

 

“Besides, Konoha's White Fang died a long time ago. Remember? When you heard, you got really angry and started screaming about how you hadn't avenged your son yet. Isn't that right, Nee-chan?”

 

A bead of sweat was visible as it trailed down the side of Chiyo's face and a barely audible groan of embarrassment passed her lips.

 

A few seconds of awkward silence passed uninterrupted in the treatment room.

 

“Just kidding! I was only pretending to be senile!” Chiyo said in a singsong voice before she started cackling.

 

Kakashi let out a relieved breath of air.

 

“What a fruitcake,” Naruto muttered under his breath as he re-sheathed his swords. He was unsure why the strange western food everyone seemed to give but no one seemed to eat that he and Hinata had the misfortune to encounter during their travels came to mind, but it seemed like an accurate analogy. The old Suna woman certainly was as nutty as one.

 

“Let me guess, the Teapot lady?” Sakura asked from where she stood next to Kankurou's bed.

 

Temari gave an embarrassed nod.

 

Kankurou let out a loud groan and started clutching his throat like he was having trouble breathing.

 

“Well, now that that's over…get the hell out of the way! Kankurou needs my help,” Sakura said as she switched to full medical-nin mode and began shooing the two Suna elders and her teammates away from the hospital bed.

 

Sakura then began to check over Kankurou. She shined a penlight into his eyes and looked into his mouth before a scowl broke out on her face. “It's a heavy-metal based poison.”

 

Chiyo was impressed that Sakura was able to determine what kind of poison it was after such a brief examination. She was also curious as to how the pink-haired teen planned to proceed, as heavy-metal based poisons were notoriously difficult to treat since the human body had a difficult time flushing them out.

 

Sakura turned to the Suna medical ninjas and rattled off a list of medical supplies she was going to need. It only took a couple of minutes for them to gather the items on a cart they rolled next to Kankurou's bed.

 

“I need you to hold him down so he doesn't move,” Sakura told Temari and the Suna medical ninjas.

 

She then proceeded to gather the water from a basin on the cart into a sphere using her chakra. The others watched in amazement as Sakura forced the ball of the water into Kankurou's chest and out through the wound left by Sasori to the left of his heart. When the water exited Kankurou's chest cavity drops of a putrid purple liquid were visible in the water. She deposited the water, and the now diluted poison back into the basin.

 

“Next one, please,” Sakura requested with a nod toward a second basin of fresh water one of the medical ninjas was holding. He traded the basin for the one on the cart containing the poison. “Don't throw that out, I'm going to need it to make an antidote,” Sakura added while wiping a bead of sweat away from her brow.

 

Sakura repeated the process twice more to insure that she drew as much of the poison out of Kankurou's body as possible. By the second basin of water, the color slowly began returning to the injured Sand jonin's face.

 

“I don't think there's any need to worry about his life anymore,” Sakura said. “There are still trace amounts of poison left in his system, but I should be able to make an antidote from the samples we saved.”

 

Temari breathed a sigh of relief as she sat down on the bed next to her brother. “So, he's going to be okay?”

 

Sakura smiled, delivering good news was one part of being a medical ninja that she never tired of. “Yes, he should make a full recovery in a couple of days.”

 

Temari hugged Sakura, “Thank you. I'm sorry about what I said earlier…”

 

“You don't have to apologize, you were right,” Sakura cut her off. She glanced over to Naruto and Hinata who were deep in conversation with Baki and Kakashi. `Now, if I only knew what to say to them.'

 

“I wouldn't worry about that too much. I'm sure Naruto has already forgiven you,” Temari said, after guessing what was on the younger girl's mind.

 

“It's not Naruto, I'm worried about,” Sakura quietly replied as she looked at Hinata who had her back to them.

 

Chiyo interrupted before Temari could reply, “I'm surprised they sent someone like you. You're a lot like that slug woman.”

 

“Yes!” Sakura replied, grateful for the change of subject. “That's because I'm Tsunade-sama's apprentice. She's the one who sent us. In fact, we're all apprentices of the sannin. My teammates, Naruto and Hinata, spent the last two and a half years training with Jiraiya-sama.”

 

Chiyo was again surprised, while they weren't ANBU or elite jonin like their team leader, the three teens Konoha had sent were obviously something special. `If the other two are that pervert's apprentices that must make the boy the jurchuuriki of the Kyuubi, and the dark-haired girl the Hyuuga clan leader's eldest daughter,' Chiyo thought, after remembering hearing a report that the Toad sannin had taken on two new apprentices for the first time in a decade and a half. While Chiyo had officially retired, she still paid attention to what was happening around the rest of the shinobi world, especially when she heard familiar names from the old days.

 

“Maybe the times are changing more than I thought,” Chiyo said to Ebizo, who only nodded his agreement.

 

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Far away in the Land of the River, two cloaked figures stood before a large red-painted torii gate that rose from a flowing river. Past the torii gate was a large boulder covered in several paper seals. The largest of which was attached to the center of the boulder and had the kanji for the word forbidden written on it. The smaller of the cloaked men made a hand sign and the boulder groaned and rumbled as it slowly rose in the air to reveal the entrance to a cave.

 

The two members of Akatsuki walked across the surface of the river into the cave, a large bird made of clay carrying the unconscious Gaara close behind them.

 

“You're late,” the shimmering image of Akatsuki's leader said as Sasori and Deidara entered the cave. “Prepare it immediately.”

 

“The jinchuuriki was stronger than I thought, yeah,” Deidara replied as he placed Gaara on the ground.

 

“What's the matter, Deidara, couldn't handle the Ichibi by yourself? Good thing you didn't have to go after one of the other bijuu, or you might have lost the other arm, too,” a tall figure casually holding a large sword wrapped in bandages across one of his shoulders said from the shadows with a nod toward the Deidara's torn and blood soaked robes.

 

“Kisame, that's enough. Deidara has captured his assigned target. Which is more than you can say,” the image of Akatsuki's leader admonished the new arrival.

 

“Sorry, Leader,” Kisame chuckled.

 

“What are they doing here, yeah?” Deidara grumbled when he spotted Itachi standing next to his partner.

 

“We were in the neighborhood,” Kisame answered with a toothy grin. Itachi said nothing while meeting Deidara's glare with the same emotionless expression on his face he always wore. The lack of reaction only increased the blond-headed ninja's anger.

 

Pein made a series of hand signs then placed his palm against the rock floor of the cave. The ground began to rumble as a gigantic statue rose from the ground. The statue had nine eyes, a bit in its mouth, and a pair of chained hands that reached heavenward as if it were begging for mercy from some unseen tormenter.

 

“Now let us begin,” Pein said while looking up to the fingertips of the statue where the four members of Akatsuki who had just arrived in the cave leaped on top of, joining the ghostly projections of the four remaining members whose physical bodies were elsewhere.

 

End of Chapter 7