"Hmmm," hmmmed Jiraiya, thinking that 'shy' and 'wanting encouragement' didn't sound like the sort who'd plot vengeance against someone who'd spurned her. Giving up entirely on the male gender might be more likely, but he didn't know too many shy girls to draw a conclusion.
"I think I know exactly what to get then," said Kizna, consulting a station map.
It had taken four weeks to travel to Kowloon, and for the repairs to be made on Nanoha.
Four weeks had also passed in their home universe, the time rates being fairly close. Reaching the Sargasso added another week, and experimenting with jutsu another four days. So it was six weeks later before the summoning attempt using a small courier-toad.
"Tsunade-sensei? You wanted to see me?"
Tsunade continued looking over the paperwork for a moment before looking up at her apprentice. She'd put this off, but now it was time to go ahead and tell her.
"Sensei?" asked Sakura. "If it's about the slug summoning exercises..."
"No," said Tsunade. "What do you know about Naruto's training journey?"
"Just that they left about a month ago," said Sakura, having a feeling she wasn't going to like this.
"They've disappeared," said Tsunade, regarding her pupil. "Everything regarding this is classified top secret. As Naruto was your team-mate, I thought I should let you know."
"Well, they wanted to disappear, right?" asked Sakura, aware of how Shizune and Tsunade had a VERY serious vibe going here. "Jiraiya is one of the Three Sages like yourself, right? Nothing could have happened to them, right?"
"Well, we-" began Tsunade, not wanting to say anything but...
"LADY TSUNADE!" shouted an ANBU operative as he suddenly appeared in the office. "Something just disturbed the wards around the village. It was a toad!"
Tsunade blinked and held up a hand towards Sakura. "Hold that thought." Turning to the ANBU operative. "Where is it?"
"The Hyuga compound!" said the ANBU operative.
"Well, it's about time you showed up," said the toad. "Hang on a sec." BLARGHHHHHHHHHHHHH!
"Ick," predictably said Hinata as a toad threw up on her floor. And kept throwing up a large... plastic bag?
"There ya go, missie," said the toad. "Whew! Man am I glad to be done with that!"
"What... what is it?" asked Hinata, still reluctant to touch the thing.
"It's a present from your sweetie," said the toad. "Oh, and there's a little package in the bag that's seperate. That's for the Hokage from Jiraiya."
"Jiraiya?" asked Hinata. Her eyes widened as connections were made. "This is from NARUTO?!"
"Yeah," said the toad. "Man, I deserve a good long soak and maybe a damselfly burrito after that. Gotta get the taste outta my mouth."
"Oh, okay," said Hinata, delicately opening the bag and pulling out the glittering thing within. As she did she noticed that it was a silver chain, with a locket at the end. She stared for a moment at it, wondering if this could really be from Naruto. Also why and a host of other questions. Not to mention, what was it made out of? She thumbed the clasp open, wondering if there was a note or something.
Go for it, Hinata. You can do it!
THUMP!
Now sitting on her butt on the floor, Hinata blinked and stared at the little transparent Naruto who'd just given her a thumb's up and was now grinning at her. "Na- Naruto?!"
CRASH! went the door to her room as her father, the Hokage, Sakura, and four ANBU operatives got jammed in the doorway.
"So why do they call it 'Catseye'?" asked Naruto as he flopped down on the hardwood floor.
"As I understand it, that's what the single continent on the world resembles, a green Catseye." Jiraiya flipped through an odd book as he considered next steps. "Not that we could tell with all the clouds in the way."
"Hmph, so what kinda training tomorrow?" asked Naruto. "I got used to everything being heavier."
"We've got a lead on some of that 'technowizard' equipment," said Jiraiya. "I'm looking forward to seeing what that's like."
"Oh?" said Naruto, a spark of enthusiasm showing again. "So something like Chidori maybe?"
"Chidori is useless without the Sharingan," said Jiraiya. "Unless the target is stationary. Since Sasuke used Chidori against Itachi, Itachi knows that manuever even if he didn't know it before. So Itachi Uchiha may use it - against you. It'd be better for your purposes if we found something that could defend against Chidori."
"Oh?" asked Naruto, though he still wanted a supercool jutsu he could unleash. Still, he could see the point.
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(Posted Sun, 20 Dec 2009 04:54)
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