Starting over

#23 Henge

Naruto POV

I comforted Temari until her sobbing slowly became sniffling which then became a comfortable silence. “Why aren't you sleeping?”, I asked the blonde girl in my arms. She just looked at me before burying her face in my shoulder and mumbling something that I could not understand. I lifted her head and looked her in the eyes. “What did you say?”, I asked smiling. “I had a nightmare.”, she whispered. “So what? It was just a dream, it will not become reality.”, I whispered back. “How can you be so sure?”, she asked for an explanation. “Because it was just a dream and now that you know what you are afraid of you can work hard to become stronger so that you can prevent.”, I whispered smiling at her. “But I wasn’t able to safe Kakuro even though I have been training since I was seven.”, Temari mumbled and again began to cry. I just pulled her in my chest and stroked her back trying to comfort her. It was gonna be a long night.

When dawn broke I found myself lying in my tent with Temari sleeping peacefully next to me. I got slightly confused since I remembered that I had fallen asleep outside with Temari in my arms. I looked up and saw Akira sitting in front of the entrance smiling mischiefly at me. I just shook my head at her and went outside. Since I was a very early riser the others weren’t awake, so I decided to send some clones to get some firewood while I myself went back into my tent and gently put Temari back in her own bed. After that I went to the fireplace and lit the wood my clones had brought with a simple fireball. I sat down in a lotus position and started to meditate until the others woke up.

I found myself in my mindscape sitting next to Kurama who was curled up in the sun and almost filled the whole clearing with his massive body. “Hey Kura.”, I greeted the fox while getting up and jumping onto a tree to be able to look him in the eyes. He just opened his eyes and looked at me questioning. “I just came here to tell you that we are about to go into enemy territory and that we are up against a shinobi that has killed a few squads of Iwa chunin. So be ready, I might need your help again.”, I said while patting the fur on his snout. The fox just growled lowly in agreement. “Can you tell me about my parents?”, I asked, earning a curious look from the almighty fox. “You already know who they were, what do you want to know from me?”, he asked his eyes looking straight into mine as if searching for the reason for my question. “I know that my mother was the jinchuuriki before me , i want to know how they have lived, what their hobbies were, if they were happy with how their life turned out.”, I explained. “Hmm, let me think for a second.”, Kurama began. I closed my eyes and listened to him while he told me about my parents the thought, of why i had never asked him that in the time before crossing, my mind.

When I opened my eyes the sun shone in all its glory and the fire was almost out. I made a few clones to collect new wood when one of Bakis clones came down to me and stood in front of me. “That won't be necessary, we will move out in ten minutes. Wake up the others.”, he said before disappearing in a cloud of smoke. I saw Baki moving in his tent and went to wake up my teammates.

“Okay, from now on, we are in Iwas territory, so hide your hitai-ate and your abilities. We will use the roads from here on. Also I would suggest a henge since,  Naruto and Gaara are easily recognisable by their features. We will travel under the disguise of a family that is on vacation. Everyone understood?”, Baki explained to us once we were about to cross into the Land of Earth. We nodded and Baki henged first into a big male, with brown long hair, blue eyes and pale skin. Gaara changed second into a boy, the same height as himself with brown short hair blue eyes and slightly darker skin than Baki. Temari then henged into a beautiful girl, a bit shorter than her brother with pale skin and blue eyes. Her brown hair almost reacher her waist while she had two bangs framing her face that were just short enough to not fall onto her shoulders. I grinned at them and disappeared in a cloud of smoke. When the smoke cleared there was a boy in my place, a good bit taller than Gaara with shoulder long brown hair, which had a few blonde strands. I too had blue eyes and pale skin. We all had decided that our henges wear normal pants and shirts, although Temari had decided to give herself an vest over her shirt. “Alright what are our names?”, I asked looking at Baki. “Well our last name will be Yakusa. My name will probably be Kiro. Your first names are up to you.”, our sensei said. “Then my name will be Shukaku.”, Gaara noted smiling. “I think my name will be Kiara.”, Temari said before turning to me and waiting for my response. “Well, I was thinking about Kurama as a name so I'll go with that.”, I said smiling at my team.