Instead of the constant muttering and being battered by people's emotions, he was actively listening to one person. Focussing on THAT individual as best he could.
Na-na-naruto-kun is looking at me again! He's smiling! Could this mean, could I hope, that maybe he likes me.
Naruto decided that maybe he ought not to do that too much. After all, Hinata had just fainted again. Well, not really fainted, but slumped into place in a daze. With a happy little smile, but still - she was going to drop out of school at this rate.
Trying to focus in on Sakura didn't help. When she saw him looking at her, the revulsion and annoyance was like a slap in the face. When she didn't focus on him like that, every third thought seemed to involve Sasuke Uchiha.
Sasuke was dark and brooding and had an undercurrent of nervousness. He might have to look deeper though. There was something going on there he wasn't sure about. It was like a dark cavern ringed with brambles down there below his surface concerns of what ambush his fanclub was preparing.
Kiba's dog Akamaru felt his mental touch and turned to growl at him. THAT was unusual enough to draw Kiba's attention.
"Trying to work out a new jutsu," explained Naruto with a wave of his hand.
"Eh?" asked Kiba, looking mildly intrigued but sending a deeper spike. He HAD suspected that the class clown had hidden depths. Roughly about the time that explosion with the 'fire jutsu' hadn't left Naruto with so much as a singe mark. "Let me know when you've got it worked out."
Naruto thought that encouraging enough that he decided to try and 'send' rather than just 'receive' and pushed.
Sure, I'll tell ya about it when I've got the bugs worked out.
Kiba was sufficiently surprised that he fell off the bench. Which REALLY upset Akamaru.
"Hey hey, no hurt intended," said Naruto when confronted with the upset canine.
"Oh man, can I ever see uses for THAT," said Kiba, images of silent communication in combat situations followed by the equivalent of passing answer sheets around in class.
Naruto held a finger up in front of his lips and winked.
As he'd figured, everyone else in class dropped their own interest (peaked by Kiba's reaction to apparently nothing at all) - figuring it was some other weird prank technique Naruto was working out. Like his Sexy Jutsu but only visible to a selected victim.
"Okay, we're going to have the final test today," said Iruka, moving to the front of the class. "Today we'll be doing the Clone Technique. Everyone form a line."
"Errr, sensei," said Naruto, suddenly nervous. "I think I should be last. And you might want to have someone with water techniques handy."
"Why, Naruto?" asked Iruka.
"'Cause last time I tried to do that, I set the floor on fire," said Naruto. "At least nothing blew up, but..."
"Right," said Iruka. "You're last. Sakura Haruno, you're up first."
Naruto let out a deep breath and looked up at the stars as evening fell. THAT hadn't gone well. Not at all.
He'd managed a Clone Technique, but it had exploded. In fire. He'd helped put out the fires but that hadn't been a good demonstration of his abilities.
He felt it coming. A dark miasma of twisted hate and bile, enough to nauseate Naruto the first few times he'd glimpsed what dwelt behind the gently smiling facade of Mizuki.
"Naruto! I know how you can graduate as a gennin," said Mizuki.
"Yeah?" said Naruto, not trusting Mizuki or liking him, but he still wanted to keep his abilities secret. "Tell me more?"
"Hey old man," said Naruto from the window as the Hokage looked up from his work.
"Eh?" asked the surprised Hokage.
"Mizuki tells me I can graduate by stealing this scroll and showing everyone I can use a technique in here, but I... got reasons not to trust him." Naruto shrugged. "Keep an eye on me and maybe I can get him to reveal what he's up to."
"What? Wait, Naruto!" vainly called out the Hokage as the boy in the window abruptly vanished again. "Oh bother. I'm getting too old for this."
Naruto leapt from building to building, heading in the direction that Mizuki had given him. He felt the alarms behind him. The quiet affection and exasperation of the Hokage. Iruka's confusion. Now that he knew enough to tune into specific people, if he had an idea of where they were - he could 'listen' in to what they were doing.
He passed by the Hyuuga compound and detoured as he felt Hinata's shame/fear/uncertainty.
"weak. Useless. How could I father such garbage!" said the man. He was radiating some disgust and a lot of frustration which veiled some genuine affection.
Naruto interrupted by leaping in and grabbing Hinata around the waist. "Hinata. I need a witness. The safety of the village is at stake."
"What?!" said the old guy.
"Huh?" said Hinata.
Naruto went through some fumbled one-handed attempts at hand-signs. Considering what he had felt off of Mizuki earlier, this would help Hinata out and having a witness around to see he wasn't doing anything wrong would help if Mizuki just denied everything. He grinned then, having wanted to try this idea out. "Wind Manipulation Jutsu: Fly Like An Eagle!" It wasn't a real jutsu, of course. It was just he was using that pick things up technique on himself.
"Wha- whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!" exclaimed Hinata as she was suddenly being whisked along behind Naruto and quickly left the ground behind.
"We got to get in position fast," said Naruto to Hinata as they went. "I lost Mizuki for a little while but he's coming along now."
"M-m-mizuki?!" asked Hinata. What's going on? Why are we flying? Naruto-kun is holding me close?!
Hiashi Hyuga frowned as the wind swirling around came to a stop. That had NOT looked to him like a normal jutsu, but he could also see the Hokage's point as had come out with some of Naruto's earlier pranks. Neither was this sort of thing really anything that you would have expected with a Ninetailed Demon Fox. In fact, Hiashi knew that after his questioning of the Hokage after one of Naruto's more flamboyant tricks - he was one of the few people in the village who knew the truth of Naruto's parentage.
A smile tried to quirk up at one corner of his mouth, but he retained sufficient control to beat it back down again.
"Sir?" asked one of the retainers.
"Get Jou and Ken," said Hiashi. "Those two I can count on to keep their eyes open and their mouths shut. Have them catch up with me while I follow my daughter. 'safety of the village' eh?"
Hinata quickly found herself deposited on the limb of a tree where she could see an old cabin of some sort. Probably a station used by ANBU or some local farmer. Hmmm. "byakugan".
Definitely a woodcutter's residence, though it looked as though nobody had used it for some time.
For a moment she felt faint. Naruto had held her hand! Naruto had taken her out into the woods! Naruto was counting on her and trusting her to back him up!
It was that last that made her straighten and focus. Naruto needed her help, needed her to focus. She would NOT fail him.
"Who's that?" whispered Jou as he edged into position next to Hiashi Hyuga.
"My daughter," said the clan head, an unexpected tone of pride creeping into his voice before he could crush that too.
"Hinata?! but her body language..." Jou pointed out.
Hiashi nodded. One of the things that the Hyuga clan learned was how to interpret body language. Necessary as their Byakugan only gave visual details. Being able to interpret what they saw required a constant honing of skills. As with everything else, some were better than others.
Hinata was usually uncertain, timid, full of self-doubt and a lack of confidence. Hinata's current body language was not displaying that so much as attention and an iron core of determination.
If this was due to her association with Minato's child, he would have to see how he could subtly nudge the two together more often.
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(Posted Mon, 04 May 2009 20:05)
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