Her center of balance was drastically different and the waving tails didn't help a bit, so it was several minutes before she could get shakily to her feet
and walk closer to the bars. They were set easily three times her shoulder width apart, but while she could reach out between them with arms, legs, or tails
and even lean out to look at the front side of the gate, an invisible barrier around where her navel should be blocked actually passing through, no matter how
she tried to twist or turn.
That was an oddity in itself - there was a slightly deeper depression on her belly where a navel should be, but no real "innie" and curling up to
look at it (and wow, was she flexible! Some definite naughty potential there next time she felt playful!) revealed that it was smooth, without the tiny puckers
and folds of scar tissue from having an umbilical cord cut off.
The only conclusions she could draw were that yes, she really had become the kyuubi no kitsune, that the mythological ability of kitsune to shapeshift appeared
to have some truth despite the lack of other evidence in the Naruto material of *his* original world, and that, apparently, demons were not born like normal
creatures, even if they did look more or less like them. The follow-up worry, about what would happen to a demon with a human soul, was unexpectedly answered
by unfamiliar but ancient memory: That souls were all alike even though chakra and bodies were different, and adding a human soul would simply mean an
infinitesimally greater power, the reason some - mainly weaker demons, for whom the difference was easy to notice - made a habit of bargaining for mortal
souls.
To a ninetails, well, she might have grown a new hair follicle... for all the good it did her, sealed into a poor kid's belly. How long had she been out,
anyway? Was Naruto still a baby, or had a long time passed? At the very least, it had to be before that first mission for Tazuna, since the kyuubi had
intentionally flooded Naruto with demon chakra to heal him when the boy was sinking into the lake after forcing Zabusa to release Kakashi... but then, that
only happened in the anime, and he'd used a copy of the manga as the destination key.
Cupping her hands around her mouth, she took a deep breath and shouted, "OOOOOI, NARUTO! YOU HERE, KID!?" She could here faint echoes from the
corridor outside the bars, but nothing more except the faint dripping of water. "Well, crap," she sighed. She wasn't in the mood to play around
more, and moving for a few minutes seemed to have sorted out getting used to the altered balance. What next?
(OO(O)OO)
Alone in his new apartment, not-quite-seven-year-old Uzumaki Naruto woke up, wondering who had called his name. And what was with that wierd dream, about some
strange girl hugging herself and gasping in shadows and water? He rolled onto his side and reveled in the soft new bed and blanket, way better than what
they'd let him have at the orphanage, before falling back to sleep.
(OO(O)OO)
She'd decided to explore her cage, since the interior of the seal had never really been shown, and found that there wasn't much to see... it was
perhaps three times as deep as it was wide and very dark at the back, though with eyes fully adjusted she could still see easily there. At least the floor was
raised at the back third so she'd have a dry place to sleep. Did she even need to sleep anymore? She was a demon, and technically dead as well... an image
came to her, of young Naruto waking up to roll over in bed before going back to sleep.
"I wonder..." she mused. The original kyuubi hadn't been all that chatty, could she talk to the boy directly without waiting for Jiraya to toss
him off a cliff in the break before the Chuunin Exam finals? She jogged back to the front of the cage and shouted again. "NARUTO! NARUTO!! COME ON AND
TALK TO ME, BOYO! NARUTOOO!!"
(OO(O)OO)
Waking up again, Naruto rubbed his gritty eyes and mumbled, "Stop yelling at me, neechan no baka... stupid dream... man, it's like I can still hear
her." He flopped onto his back and squeezed his eyes closed, muttering, "Gotta clear my mind and get some sleep... gotta rest for tomorrow, so I can
be the best ninja ever... come on, just think of nothing and go to sleep, like when Gojo-sensei was having us meditate to get in touch with our
cha-tora..."
Calm...
Calm...
Hmm, he could go for some tea... no! Calm! Still, calm water, find his center and sleeeeep...
water...
calm...
he could almost hear it dripping, it was working!
Naruto bounced excitedly and crowed to himself, "Hah! Stupid sensei, I can too meditate! Hah!" Then he realised he'd sat up and started jumping
around in bed and had to start over. He growled, slammed his eyes shut, and lay back down.
"Calm, calm... no yelling girls and droning senseis, just still water and a blank wall..."
Calm...
Calm...
still water rippling gently...
Calm...
Blank wall...
Calm...
Find his center...
Calm...
Water...
A deep, slow breath...
Water...
He was sitting in water?
The young boy jumped up with an embarrassed yelp - he hadn't peed his bed in years! But he wasn't in his bed. He was standing in a hallway, ankle deep
in warm water, facing a blank wall... and he could hear echoing shouts coming from off to one side, that could almost be a girl calling his name.
Wierd. At least if he was dreaming again, that meant he was asleep, and Gramps Hokage had said it was important to make sure he got lots of sleep so he could
do good learning to be a ninja.
Not having anything better to do, and not feeling like standing around staring at a blank wall like Gojo-sensei seemed to think was so fascinating (The guy
kept the class trying to imagine it for a whole HOUR! Talk about lame!) the boy decided to follow the shouts, and tell that girl to let him sleep already.
He grumbled to himself as he sloshed along, heading the same way even though the voice stopped after a few minutes. Not long afterward he found a huge room, a
bit more brightly lit, with big columns marking the boundary of a darker part and a square pillar in the middle with some little sign on it. He couldn't
see anyone and it was still quiet, so he wandered over and peered around one, seeing nothing but a dimly lit space beyond that seemed to end in a wall with no
more corridors. He walked in further, calling out, "Hello, neechan? Is anyone here?"
(OO(O)OO)
Getting tired of yelling, she'd gone back to the dry end of the seal and laid down against one wall, wishing for a matress and trying to make herself
comfortable by using her now dry and fluffed out tails as pillows and to wrap over the more sensitive parts of her anatomy, to see if she could take a nap.
Young Naruto appeared a few minutes later instead, and she was surprised to see him halfway into her cell as she blinked her eyes open and sat up.
"Naruto?" she gasped, surprised to see him inside the cage. Did this mean she didn't have the terrifying presence of the original kyuubi? Maybe
that wasn't such a surprise, she wasn't exactly boiling over with hate and the desire to kill, even if the thought of blood brought up more of those
strange, remnant memories and made her mouth water. Seeing the boy freeze and peer at her cautiously, she walked slowly toward him, hands held out
reassuringly. "Don't worry, I won't hurt you... I was just surprised to see you here, even if I did hope you'd come."
Naruto staggered with shock. Someone... wanted him to be there? "You wanted me to come?" he repeated. "Hokage-jiisan is the only person who ever
wanted to see me around..."
"Well, I wanted to see you too," she assured him, taking one hand in hers. "Come on, let's go to the dry end so we can sit down."
Leading the dumbfounded little boy further into her cell, she tried to think of what to have him call her - the kyuubi's actual name had never been
revealed, and she couldn't use a western male name... she wanted something that would fit in, but she'd only ever known bits and pieces of japanese -
she didn't want to go into the whole kyuubi thing and scare him away, that would take time to build trust but judging by his size she had some of that.
Hopefully. Probably. A few years, at least.
Settling on something that hopefully wouldn't sound too wierd and which would help him remember to not tell other people about her, she introduced herself.
"Call me Himitsu, Naruto-kun. I'll be your secret big sister, okay?" The huge smile at that practically lit up the room... no, it was actually
brighter. Strange. He grabbed her waist in a tight hug and buried his face in her belly, and she couldn't help but smile down at him and ruffle his hair,
several tails wrapping around the small boy without conscious command.
He sniffled a couple of times and wiggled out from under her hand, looking up and saying guilelessly, "You smell funny, neesan, like spices and berries
and fur and-" (sniff sniff) "-a little bit like fish." Suddenly, he backed away and slapped his hands over his eyes, shouting, "AHHH!
HIMITSU-NEESAN, YOU'RE NAKED!"
Embarrassed, 'Himitsu' crossed her arms over her boobs and wrapped a few tails around her waist. "Sorry, Naruto-kun... I don't have any
clothes. I guess you didn't notice when it was dark, huh? I, uh, the smell, that is..."
Peeking with one eye, then slapping his hands back in place over beet-red cheeks Naruto told her, "I didn't mean you were stinky! You smell like that
restaurant where they have the fancy fish, that's all! But... you really don't have any clothes, neesan?"
She took a quick look around the cell to make sure a closet hadn't suddenly appeared - after the light changed, she suspected Naruto's will had a lot
to do with what this place was like, as well as the strength of the seal itself - but it was as bare as before, though there was a raised, sort of mat-like
area near where she'd been lying down that she didn't think had been there before.
"It's okay, I won't get mad just because you saw me. You wouldn't want to have other girls catch you seeing them naked, though... that could
be painful. Come on, let's sit down." Pulling gently at an elbow just made the embarrassed child press his hands more firmly into his cheeks, so she
swept him up into her arms and carried him over to the wide, low pad - it was definately new, the surface was soft like a firm mattress, and she'd have
noticed for sure even if she didn't trip over the edge while walking around the walls of the room.
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows
and walk closer to the bars. They were set easily three times her shoulder width apart, but while she could reach out between them with arms, legs, or tails
and even lean out to look at the front side of the gate, an invisible barrier around where her navel should be blocked actually passing through, no matter how
she tried to twist or turn.
That was an oddity in itself - there was a slightly deeper depression on her belly where a navel should be, but no real "innie" and curling up to
look at it (and wow, was she flexible! Some definite naughty potential there next time she felt playful!) revealed that it was smooth, without the tiny puckers
and folds of scar tissue from having an umbilical cord cut off.
The only conclusions she could draw were that yes, she really had become the kyuubi no kitsune, that the mythological ability of kitsune to shapeshift appeared
to have some truth despite the lack of other evidence in the Naruto material of *his* original world, and that, apparently, demons were not born like normal
creatures, even if they did look more or less like them. The follow-up worry, about what would happen to a demon with a human soul, was unexpectedly answered
by unfamiliar but ancient memory: That souls were all alike even though chakra and bodies were different, and adding a human soul would simply mean an
infinitesimally greater power, the reason some - mainly weaker demons, for whom the difference was easy to notice - made a habit of bargaining for mortal
souls.
To a ninetails, well, she might have grown a new hair follicle... for all the good it did her, sealed into a poor kid's belly. How long had she been out,
anyway? Was Naruto still a baby, or had a long time passed? At the very least, it had to be before that first mission for Tazuna, since the kyuubi had
intentionally flooded Naruto with demon chakra to heal him when the boy was sinking into the lake after forcing Zabusa to release Kakashi... but then, that
only happened in the anime, and he'd used a copy of the manga as the destination key.
Cupping her hands around her mouth, she took a deep breath and shouted, "OOOOOI, NARUTO! YOU HERE, KID!?" She could here faint echoes from the
corridor outside the bars, but nothing more except the faint dripping of water. "Well, crap," she sighed. She wasn't in the mood to play around
more, and moving for a few minutes seemed to have sorted out getting used to the altered balance. What next?
(OO(O)OO)
Alone in his new apartment, not-quite-seven-year-old Uzumaki Naruto woke up, wondering who had called his name. And what was with that wierd dream, about some
strange girl hugging herself and gasping in shadows and water? He rolled onto his side and reveled in the soft new bed and blanket, way better than what
they'd let him have at the orphanage, before falling back to sleep.
(OO(O)OO)
She'd decided to explore her cage, since the interior of the seal had never really been shown, and found that there wasn't much to see... it was
perhaps three times as deep as it was wide and very dark at the back, though with eyes fully adjusted she could still see easily there. At least the floor was
raised at the back third so she'd have a dry place to sleep. Did she even need to sleep anymore? She was a demon, and technically dead as well... an image
came to her, of young Naruto waking up to roll over in bed before going back to sleep.
"I wonder..." she mused. The original kyuubi hadn't been all that chatty, could she talk to the boy directly without waiting for Jiraya to toss
him off a cliff in the break before the Chuunin Exam finals? She jogged back to the front of the cage and shouted again. "NARUTO! NARUTO!! COME ON AND
TALK TO ME, BOYO! NARUTOOO!!"
(OO(O)OO)
Waking up again, Naruto rubbed his gritty eyes and mumbled, "Stop yelling at me, neechan no baka... stupid dream... man, it's like I can still hear
her." He flopped onto his back and squeezed his eyes closed, muttering, "Gotta clear my mind and get some sleep... gotta rest for tomorrow, so I can
be the best ninja ever... come on, just think of nothing and go to sleep, like when Gojo-sensei was having us meditate to get in touch with our
cha-tora..."
Calm...
Calm...
Hmm, he could go for some tea... no! Calm! Still, calm water, find his center and sleeeeep...
water...
calm...
he could almost hear it dripping, it was working!
Naruto bounced excitedly and crowed to himself, "Hah! Stupid sensei, I can too meditate! Hah!" Then he realised he'd sat up and started jumping
around in bed and had to start over. He growled, slammed his eyes shut, and lay back down.
"Calm, calm... no yelling girls and droning senseis, just still water and a blank wall..."
Calm...
Calm...
still water rippling gently...
Calm...
Blank wall...
Calm...
Find his center...
Calm...
Water...
A deep, slow breath...
Water...
He was sitting in water?
The young boy jumped up with an embarrassed yelp - he hadn't peed his bed in years! But he wasn't in his bed. He was standing in a hallway, ankle deep
in warm water, facing a blank wall... and he could hear echoing shouts coming from off to one side, that could almost be a girl calling his name.
Wierd. At least if he was dreaming again, that meant he was asleep, and Gramps Hokage had said it was important to make sure he got lots of sleep so he could
do good learning to be a ninja.
Not having anything better to do, and not feeling like standing around staring at a blank wall like Gojo-sensei seemed to think was so fascinating (The guy
kept the class trying to imagine it for a whole HOUR! Talk about lame!) the boy decided to follow the shouts, and tell that girl to let him sleep already.
He grumbled to himself as he sloshed along, heading the same way even though the voice stopped after a few minutes. Not long afterward he found a huge room, a
bit more brightly lit, with big columns marking the boundary of a darker part and a square pillar in the middle with some little sign on it. He couldn't
see anyone and it was still quiet, so he wandered over and peered around one, seeing nothing but a dimly lit space beyond that seemed to end in a wall with no
more corridors. He walked in further, calling out, "Hello, neechan? Is anyone here?"
(OO(O)OO)
Getting tired of yelling, she'd gone back to the dry end of the seal and laid down against one wall, wishing for a matress and trying to make herself
comfortable by using her now dry and fluffed out tails as pillows and to wrap over the more sensitive parts of her anatomy, to see if she could take a nap.
Young Naruto appeared a few minutes later instead, and she was surprised to see him halfway into her cell as she blinked her eyes open and sat up.
"Naruto?" she gasped, surprised to see him inside the cage. Did this mean she didn't have the terrifying presence of the original kyuubi? Maybe
that wasn't such a surprise, she wasn't exactly boiling over with hate and the desire to kill, even if the thought of blood brought up more of those
strange, remnant memories and made her mouth water. Seeing the boy freeze and peer at her cautiously, she walked slowly toward him, hands held out
reassuringly. "Don't worry, I won't hurt you... I was just surprised to see you here, even if I did hope you'd come."
Naruto staggered with shock. Someone... wanted him to be there? "You wanted me to come?" he repeated. "Hokage-jiisan is the only person who ever
wanted to see me around..."
"Well, I wanted to see you too," she assured him, taking one hand in hers. "Come on, let's go to the dry end so we can sit down."
Leading the dumbfounded little boy further into her cell, she tried to think of what to have him call her - the kyuubi's actual name had never been
revealed, and she couldn't use a western male name... she wanted something that would fit in, but she'd only ever known bits and pieces of japanese -
she didn't want to go into the whole kyuubi thing and scare him away, that would take time to build trust but judging by his size she had some of that.
Hopefully. Probably. A few years, at least.
Settling on something that hopefully wouldn't sound too wierd and which would help him remember to not tell other people about her, she introduced herself.
"Call me Himitsu, Naruto-kun. I'll be your secret big sister, okay?" The huge smile at that practically lit up the room... no, it was actually
brighter. Strange. He grabbed her waist in a tight hug and buried his face in her belly, and she couldn't help but smile down at him and ruffle his hair,
several tails wrapping around the small boy without conscious command.
He sniffled a couple of times and wiggled out from under her hand, looking up and saying guilelessly, "You smell funny, neesan, like spices and berries
and fur and-" (sniff sniff) "-a little bit like fish." Suddenly, he backed away and slapped his hands over his eyes, shouting, "AHHH!
HIMITSU-NEESAN, YOU'RE NAKED!"
Embarrassed, 'Himitsu' crossed her arms over her boobs and wrapped a few tails around her waist. "Sorry, Naruto-kun... I don't have any
clothes. I guess you didn't notice when it was dark, huh? I, uh, the smell, that is..."
Peeking with one eye, then slapping his hands back in place over beet-red cheeks Naruto told her, "I didn't mean you were stinky! You smell like that
restaurant where they have the fancy fish, that's all! But... you really don't have any clothes, neesan?"
She took a quick look around the cell to make sure a closet hadn't suddenly appeared - after the light changed, she suspected Naruto's will had a lot
to do with what this place was like, as well as the strength of the seal itself - but it was as bare as before, though there was a raised, sort of mat-like
area near where she'd been lying down that she didn't think had been there before.
"It's okay, I won't get mad just because you saw me. You wouldn't want to have other girls catch you seeing them naked, though... that could
be painful. Come on, let's sit down." Pulling gently at an elbow just made the embarrassed child press his hands more firmly into his cheeks, so she
swept him up into her arms and carried him over to the wide, low pad - it was definately new, the surface was soft like a firm mattress, and she'd have
noticed for sure even if she didn't trip over the edge while walking around the walls of the room.
--
"Anko, what you do in your free time is your own choice. Use it wisely. And if you do not use it wisely, make sure you thoroughly enjoy whatever unwise thing you are doing." - HymnOfRagnorok as Orochimaru at SpaceBattles
woot Med. Eng., verb, 1st & 3rd pers. prsnt. sg. know, knows