"Yukiko-san, Yukiko-san! You're back! You won, right? Hey, hey, is your arm okay?"

Naruto barely stopped himself from crashing into Yukiko as she stood in her apartment doorway two days after leaving Kashiwa. The village was three days' walking distance from Konoha, but without the need to keep a civilian's pace, the genin had raced back in a day and a half. She'd stopped by the hospital to get her arm checked again -- the Kashiwa guards had only a basic first aid station, and the village doctor sent tricky cases to Konoha anyway -- and a medic-nin had applied a mixture of herbs, potions, and seals to repair the burns and torn muscles, wrapped her arm in a sling, and ordered Yukiko not to break the seals for a week.

She'd agreed, haggled out a bill payment at the front desk, and hurried home, eager to see how Yusuke was handling her building and what Naruto had done in her absence. It seemed he'd been living in her rooms and skipping school. Yukiko grinned and tapped his nose with her good hand; he scrunched up his face and grinned back.

"It's good to see you too, kid. We came in fourth. My arm's hurt, so don't bump into me, but I'll be okay pretty soon. And shouldn't you be in school?"

Naruto bounced on his toes. "Yeah, yeah, but it's boring. So you're a chuunin now, Yukiko-san?"

Yukiko shook her head, leaning against the doorframe. "No, not yet. I still have to pass the third test."

"But you're hurt! That's not fair, making you fight again when your arm's all hurt."

Yukiko grinned at the scowling kid. "You're right, it wouldn't be very fair -- which is why the third test isn't until a month from now. That means Iruka and Naga will be over here most days to practice, and if you're very good -- if you stop skipping school and sneaking out for ramen instead of eating your vegetables -- you can help us. How does that sound?"

"I can help? Really? Thanks, Yukiko-san!" Naruto beamed and threw his arms around her waist in a hug. "Hey, hey, so I gotta get to school," -- he grimaced at the idea -- "but you gotta tell me everything when I get back. Um, and watch out. I made a lot of traps, and they're really good, but your arm's hurt, and I didn't know that, and--"

"Kid, I'll be careful, I promise," Yukiko said, cutting off his jumbled warning. "Now shoo."

Naruto rushed out the door in a blur of orange and noise, hurtling past the bemused tenants in the lobby. Yukiko smiled apologetically at them and they nodded back, accustomed to the kid by now. They didn't like him and many pretended he wasn't there, but nobody had argued when Yukiko told them to keep any nasty comments to themselves the way they'd do for any of her other tenants.

The smile lingered as she inched her bedroom door open and reached up to steady the bucket of paint before it could spill onto her head. It was good to be home.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

"Yusuke?" Yukiko knocked on the doorframe as she peered into her office. "Are you in there?"

A narrow-faced teenager looked up from a jumble of papers on the desk, blinked, and then grinned. "Yukiko! I didn't know when you were coming back or I'd've asked Yura to make mochi or that green tea ice cream you like. Do you know how to fix radiators without shutting off steam to the whole building? Also, the monthly electric bill came but I couldn't pay it because I don't have access to the building account."

Yukiko grinned at her cousin. "I'm going to need you at least one more month, so remind me to fix that tomorrow afternoon -- we'll drop by the bank and get you set up. As for the radiators, there are shut-off valves on each unit, but you can also cut off each floor individually, front or back, to work on the inter-unit pipes. Who complained, and what's wrong?"

Yusuke pulled a notepad from beside the telephone. "Tsubume Emi-san in 3-F. She says the bathroom radiator is knocking against the walls again when the heat comes on, and she wants you to stop the noise." He looked at Yukiko, eyebrows furrowed in confusion. "Why does she have the heat on that high in this weather?"

"That's one of life's great mysteries," Yukiko said, groaning. "Kami, I hate Emi. Her radiator wouldn't be a problem if she'd just use the insulation sheet I got her -- it reflects heat back into the room and it muffles the noise -- but she says it collects dust. One of these days I'm going to break down and have central air installed."

"That'd be a big, expensive mess, and probably not worth the bother," Yusuke said, "but whatever. You can deal with Emi-san later -- I want to hear about your ninja thing! Did you pass the exam? Who's on your team? What happened to your arm?"

"The exam's not over yet, my team passed the second test, my teammates are Umino Iruka and Tonoike Naga, and I did something massively stupid with a handful of explosive notes."

Yusuke looked pointedly at her sling. "Yeah, stupid sounds right, but did it work?"

"Well... yes." Yukiko smiled at the memory. "Knocked the bastard ten yards away with kunai sticking in his chest, and then I used genjutsu to trick him into running into a cliff wall."

"That is so cool."

"You'd better not let Uncle Yutaro hear you say that -- he might think you want to be a ninja too."

"Nah, the old man knows better," Yusuke said. He leaned back in the chair and folded his hands behind his head; the sleeves of his oversized, tie-dyed sweatshirt sagged down around his elbows. "I don't want to do anything where people try to kill me -- I just like hearing about you being an idiot."

Yukiko snorted. "Brat. Your familial love and support are overwhelming me. Speaking of which, how is everyone? I haven't seen anyone but Yura lately, and that's only because I stop by her yatai sometimes."

"You just don't want to run into the old man," Yusuke said with a sly grin. "You should've heard him the day he told me I'd be working here -- 'Your cousin is throwing away her life, wasting her time on that soul-sucking shinobi nonsense, frittering away her business opportunities to play childish games...'"

Yukiko groaned, and Yusuke took pity on her. "Hey, it's not any more fun for us -- we live with him. Anyway, Yuichiro and Mei are doing well -- there's good money in clothing repair -- and they've started trying for a baby. That's going to be so weird, being an uncle, and Yuichiro as a father is so wrong."

Perfectionist, worrywart Yuichiro dealing with the chaos of children was definitely a strange idea, but Yukiko felt she ought to defend him -- she owed her cousin for letting her practice taijutsu and illusions on him while they grew up, something that had landed them both in trouble fairly often. "You never know -- he might relax once he has an heir. Uncle Yutaro might let up on him a bit."

Yusuke rolled his eyes. "The old man let up on anyone? Dream on. Anyway, Yura's started selling packaged desserts on the side. She says it's to exploit a new niche market, but I think she just got bored cooking only ramen and udon. She's still seeing that Iinuzuka jerk, but I don't think it's going to last much longer -- he's always gone, she hates worrying when he's away on missions, and the old man's stopped yelling at her for following your example, so I think she's getting bored of him too.

"Yume's going to apprentice to a hairdresser once school lets out, unless the old man and Yuichiro talk her into working at the cloth shop. They're planning to tempt her with a chance to design some new outfits, but I think she's on to them. Although," Yusuke said, with a thoughtful air, "she might agree anyway. She's gone awfully girly lately and she does like clothes."

"There's nothing wrong with liking clothes and hair," Yukiko said. "In fact, you could do with a bit of Yume's advice -- your outfit's terrible."

Yusuke grinned. "Say that again when your jacket isn't blown up and I might listen."

Yukiko looked at herself objectively -- battered brown jacket over a torn green shirt, dusty black pants with tattered cuffs, and mud-caked sandals -- and flushed. "Cut me some slack, Yusuke -- I just got back from Kashiwa. All I did was dump my pack and wash my face."

"Yeah, whatever. Anyway, Yui's gone crazy about the grocery store. She clerks, she stocks shelves, she's bugging the old man to let her track sales and make orders, she wants to start seasonal decorating themes and home deliveries -- she's driving everyone nuts."

"Huh. You weren't any better when you were eleven," Yukiko said. She started to cross her arms, then remembered her sling and braced her good arm against the doorframe instead. "You decided you were going to move out on your own and started skipping school to do odd jobs all over town. At least Yui's still getting an education."

"Hey, if ninja can start real work at eleven or twelve, I don't see why the rest of us are stuck in school until we're sixteen."

Oh, not this again. Every one of her cousins was secretly jealous that she'd been out in the real world at twelve while they were stuck behind desks or doing unpaid grunt-work for Uncle Yutaro. They didn't realize they were the lucky ones. "You really want to know? It's because otherwise you'd do the odd jobs they use to train genin in teamwork. It's because ninja have to start young, when they're still strong and have lots of stamina. And it's because you need more knowledge -- reading, math, things like that -- to run a business than to kill people."

Yukiko straightened from her slouch, trying to emphasize her seriousness. "That's what ninja do -- kill people. That's all we're good for. Sometimes we kill people in order to protect other people, but ultimately we only destroy things. You, on the other hand, can create things, keep things running. Don't ever think that's not important."

Yusuke pushed the chair back and stood up to meet Yukiko's eyes. "Yeah, I know. You think I don't hear this from the old man every week? I'm just blowing hot air and you know it, Yukiko. Besides, why are you still all anti-ninja? If you're trying out for chuunin, shouldn't you be a little more proud of what you do?"

"Um..."

Yusuke grinned. "You are such an idiot."

She was not an... well, maybe she was. Yukiko sighed. She was so used to convincing herself she didn't regret giving up her dreams as a shinobi that she was still trying to tell herself ninja were ultimately useless. "Okay, so ninja have our own skills that just happen to be learned through experience instead of in classrooms. And we protect people, we can use chakra to do impossible jobs, and we save a lot of lives, especially medic-nin. But other jobs are still important, and honestly, it was a lot harder learning to manage an apartment building than it was learning to fight."

"I believe that!" Yusuke said, nodding. "It's kind of fun to be in charge and it's so cool to get exempt from afternoon lessons, but I don't know how you deal with all these people. I've only been doing this for six days, and they're driving me crazy! Especially the fox-brat -- he kept coming in and asking questions in this incredibly annoying voice, and he wouldn't go away when I said I was busy. I had to push him out and lock the door to get some work done."

Yukiko felt her face freeze. Slowly, carefully, she asked, "Are you talking about Uzumaki Naruto? Blond, lives in 7-J, wears orange all the time?"

"Yeah, that's him. He's the Kyuubi, right? I sort of remember the name, and he has those creepy whisker marks."

"You pushed Naruto out the door."

"Yeah, because he wouldn't go away and I didn't want him behind me." Yusuke frowned at Yukiko's expression. "Hey, I didn't yell or hit him -- if he pays rent I won't say anything against him -- but really, you can't expect me to be friends with a demon. I don't have any fancy ninpou to protect me. Besides, sealed or not, he killed Mother."

Yukiko counted to ten, inhaled, counted to ten again, and then released her breath. "Okay. You didn't actually hurt him so I'm not going to fire you, but I'm not happy. Listen, Naruto is not the Kyuubi. He's the Kyuubi's prison. Any kid could have the fox trapped inside, but Naruto had the bad luck to be born on the right day. He's a six year old boy, everyone hates him, and he has no idea why. Think about that for a minute. And don't ever touch him again."

Yukiko held Yusuke's eyes. "Are we clear?"

Yusuke nodded. "Yeah, we're clear, whatever. No touching." He raked his hands through his navy-blue hair and shifted his feet uncomfortably; Yukiko knew she wasn't going to like what he had to say, and Yusuke obviously knew it too, but he seemed determined to say it.

He looked up, completely serious for the first time in the conversation. "Listen, Yukiko, I know you like the brat. But even if he was normal once, he's had the fox in him for six years. There's no way it hasn't done something to him. Normal kids don't have whiskers. Who knows what it could make him do? And if the fox ever breaks out, I don't want it to know who the hell I am or anything about the family. So you keep him away from me, I won't touch him, and we'll all be happy. Deal?"

Yukiko counted to ten again, and stuck out her good hand. "Deal."

They shook to seal it, and then Yusuke ostentatiously shuffled some papers on the desk. "So, about that radiator..."

Yukiko attempted a smile, grateful for the subject change. "Right, Emi's radiator. Come on and we'll take a look at it. And you can tell me all about Yura and that Iinuzuka boy."

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

The next morning, Yukiko rousted Naruto from bed, glared him into eating miso instead of ramen for breakfast, and -- not quite trusting him to behave instead of sneaking back to watch her team practice -- walked him to school and asked his teacher to help her. If the kid came home without a daily note swearing he'd been in all his classes, she'd know he was sneaking out. And then... then she'd get creative.

Naruto gulped, then grinned and told her he'd figure out how to make a fake note by tomorrow.

"Lots of luck, kid," Yukiko said, exchanging winks with the elderly chuunin who taught Naruto's class. The kid might be a genius at practical jokes and sneaking around, but forging the chakra signature on Otsumo-sensei's notes was a little beyond his skills.

Iruka and Naga were waiting out back when she returned to her building, Naga frowning at a scraggly young bird in her hands and Iruka attempting to throw shuriken under the cover of a wide-front fire jutsu.

"I hope you have some water on hand," Yukiko said, ghosting up behind him.

"Good morning, Yukiko. I have two buckets at the back door, and I already soaked the target tree," Iruka said calmly, then walked over to cool and retrieve his shuriken. Yukiko pouted; she'd hoped he was distracted enough that she could surprise him.

"So, any luck with the summoning?" she asked Naga.

Naga held her cupped hands out toward Yukiko; the scraggly black bird cocked its head and examined her, turning its head back and forth to peer at her from both eyes. "This is Akaruime," Naga said. "He's a few weeks old, better than I used to do. At least he can talk. But I want a raven that can fly."

"Learning!" the raven croaked. "Soon!"

Naga stroked its head with her fingertip. "I know. But soon isn't now."

"Still, any progress is a good sign, and you're getting to know each other for when he does learn to fly," Iruka said, joining them. "Now that we're all here, I think we should talk about the other genin we may be facing. If we know their skills, it's easier to plan a good defense and attack. Naga, you know the most about the Leaf-nin. I'll research the Mist-nin and Yukiko, you can research the Grass-nin."

"How? They won't be in the bingo books -- they're only genin. I could probably hide myself and spy on them, but that's hard when I don't know where they're training," Yukiko said.

Iruka attempted a superior smirk; he didn't quite pull it off, but it was a nevertheless a creditable attempt. "We ask their jounin 'clients' from the second test -- or if they're on missions, we can ask Maito Gai-san. I'm sure he'll be willing to help the passionate youth of Konoha strive for victory!"

Naga shot him a sour look; her miniature raven echoed the gesture. "It's not funny when he talks like that. Don't you start."

"Yes, please don't," Yukiko said. "But it's a good idea -- let's go."

Gai was nowhere to be found and the mission center staff refused to say which jounin had dealt with which genin, but they were able to get Gai's address and leave a message in his mailbox; if he wasn't away on a mission, Iruka said with satisfaction, they should get an answer the next day.

"So the green idiot finds us tomorrow," Naga said as they walked back to Yukiko's building. "What should we do until then? Play poker?"

Iruka held up his hand before Yukiko could answer. "Shh. Look down the alley."

Yukiko peered covertly down the narrow passage between a flower shop and a luggage store; a small orange figure darted from behind a trashcan to the shadow of a recessed doorway, heading away from them. She hissed and started forward, but Iruka snagged her jacket sleeve, shook his head, and grinned.

"Let me." He ghosted along the walls, black clothes blending into the shadows cast by the overhanging balconies and roofs, and grabbed Naruto from behind, slapping a hand over the kid's mouth to keep him quiet. "I didn't expect to meet you here, Naruto-kun," he said as he carried the struggling boy back to the street, "and I don't think Yukiko did either."

Naruto froze when he spotted Yukiko; she frowned. "What are you doing out of school, kid?"

Naruto gaped for a few seconds before coming up with an excuse. "Um... I'm practicing! Ninja have to be sneaky, so I'm being sneaky! Otsumo-sensei didn't even see me leave -- you're a good teacher, Yukiko-san!" Naruto snickered to himself before noticing that Yukiko wasn't laughing. "Hey, hey, I was gonna go back!"

"You know, he might be telling the truth," Iruka said, still grinning. "Ichiraku ramen stand is just around the corner, and it is lunch time."

Naruto nodded frantically. "Yeah, yeah! I just wanted ramen, not your stupid bento! Um, not that you can't cook, Yukiko-san, 'cause you're a good cook, but you should cook more ramen and not vegetables and seaweed. You make great ramen!"

Naga was trying to muffle a laugh behind her raised hands, and Yukiko rolled her eyes heavenward. "Kami, why me? Okay, kid, I'll let you off easy today -- I'll even buy ramen for you -- but if you keep doing this, I'll ask Otsumo-sensei to tie you to your chair."

"Ramen! You're the best Yukiko-san!" Naruto slithered out of Iruka's grip and hugged Yukiko around the waist; he had an awfully strong grip for a kid that small. "And I don't care if Otsumo-sensei ties me up -- it's good practice getting out of traps!"

"The brat's got a point," Naga said with a cockeyed grin. "He might not be half bad as a ninja."

Naruto pouted. "Hey, hey, I'm gonna be a great ninja. I'm gonna be Hokage!"

"Yeah, right. Dream on, brat." Naga reached over and ruffled Naruto's spiky hair.

"I'm not a brat!" Naruto scowled, ducked away from her hand, and kicked at Naga's shin, baring his teeth when she lazily stepped aside. "You take that back!"

Yukiko sighed. "Naruto, stop attacking Naga or I won't buy you ramen. And Naga, please be nice."

"No ramen? I'll be good! Ramen, ramen, ramen!" Naruto was easily distracted, easily pleased, and easily bundled back to school after lunch, with an apology to Otsumo-san for his behavior.

"That kid is a real brat," Naga said as they left the school. "What do you two see in him?"

"Determination. And a very lonely boy," Iruka said, his eyes going distant. "When I lost my parents I still had my clan, but Naruto-kun has nobody except for us."

"And Sarutobi Hokage-sama, but he doesn't have the time to be a real presence in Naruto's life," Yukiko added. "People hate Naruto for things that aren't his fault, somewhat like your and your relative. But he has a good heart, and I wish I had half his enthusiasm."

"People hate him? Why?" Naga frowned in confusion and fiddled with one of her earrings. "He's incredibly annoying, but that's not worth hating him."

Yukiko and Iruka exchanged looks; Naga was just a bit too young to remember what had really happened to the Kyuubi, and if she didn't know, they weren't allowed to tell her. The Third Hokage was probably trying to keep adults from turning their children against Naruto when he made that law, but children didn't need a tangible reason to dislike him. They just followed their parents' lead. And now Naga, who had more reason to sympathize with Naruto than most people, couldn't learn the truth.

"His family... had a curse," Yukiko improvised. "People are afraid that it might become active again, which would make him very dangerous."

"That brat, dangerous? Are they crazy?"

"No," Yukiko said softly, thinking of Yusuke and his worry about the family, thinking of Ame and Kasumi burned, trampled, and torn to shreds. "No, just scared. The last time the curse was active... it was very bad."

"Oh."

They walked in silence for a minute before Iruka cleared his throat. "In any case, we should get back to training. Until we hear from Gai-san, I think we should work on our weaknesses."

"Sounds good," Naga said.

Yukiko hastily agreed.

o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o-o

Back to Chuunin and Jounin
Back to team seven
Back to the main page