Illusions of the Sunlight | Naruto FanFiction

[Illusions of the Sunlight] Chapter Three: Comatose

"My dear Kami!" 

Jiraiya sprung up from his seat, alarmed at the sudden yell. It had been a month since Naruto's demise, but none of them were willing to dig his grave and bury him as a member and a shinobi of Konohagakure no Sato. Speaking of Konoha, the entire village knew about Naruto's parents, since Tsunade had proclaimed and announced it, quite loudly and angrily if many villagers would add.

Tsunade decided to give Naruto a proper burial—with a few, okay, many meetings with the council and arguments from the shinobi close to the Uzumaki—and went inside the said person's room. The others—who had known Naruto and cared for him—followed her but was ushered out of the room by none other than Tsunade's assistant, Shizune, when they tried to sneak in.

After half an hour or so, everyone started to get impatient, with Sasuke the most out of all of them. Their senseis and Jiraiya had gone extremely worried, wondering what was taking the two medical ninjas so long to get Naruto.

Speak of the devil. Tsunade burst out of the room, crying tears of happiness. She snuggled within the Toad Sage's arms, muttering 'thank goodness, thank goodness' all over and all over again.

"What's wrong?" Tenten asked, seeing the two women's relieved and hopeful faces. "Did something bad happen?"

"He's alive," Shizune announced, burying her face in a towel which she got. . .out of nowhere. "Thank Kami, he's alive,"

"Wait," Kakashi and Gai—albeit how ironic it sounded—said together in unison. "Naruto is alive?" they asked again at the same time.

"Y-Yes," Now, Tsuande was the one who answered, although she was still crying. "I can't believe it. It's a miracle,"

Those mere statements caused the most baffling reactions out of everyone. Most of the rookies were freely sobbing, Neji and Sasuke tearing up, frozen in their own seats, Sakura gasping in shock, chanting 'he's alive, he's alive' numerous times, Hinata bawling her eyes out, extremely happy at the thought of Naruto—her crush—being alive, and their senseis either crying their eyes out (a great example is Maito Gai and Rock Lee) or gasping in shock and relief (two examples are Kurenai and Asuma, even though Asuma dropped his cigarette in shock).

Iruka, on the other hand, smiled sadly and faintly—but it was still a smile nonetheless. For the other people present in the corridor, they were happy to see—even though it was just a small glimpse—of the happy Ninja Academy teacher that had disappeared a month ago.

"But. . ." Ino began. "When is he going to wake up?"

"I-I don't know," Tsunade sniffled. "But it's probably after a year or shorter. . .so eleven months, I guess?"

"Troublesome," Shikamaru muttered, although two simultaneous shouts made his words inaudible. "What a drag,"

"That's quite a lot of youthful time!" Gai and his student, Rock Lee, yelled together, making most of them have a rather large drop of sweat on their foreheads.

"LEE!" ("Oh no," Kakashi said.)

"GAI-SENSEI!"

"LEE!"

"GAI-SENSEI!" ("I want to place a genjutsu on them," Kurenai remarked, trying not to growl at the two taijutsu masters.)