The Gambler, the Thief, and the Black-market Boss

Chapter Seven: In Which Everyone is Screwed

I'm gonna stop doing recaps. I'm sorry I just can't.

-/_\-

Chapter Seven:

In Which Everyone is Screwed

Naruto Uzumaki was not at all amused. It had been exactly three hours and forty-two minutes since he lost consciousness and started falling through the endless dark void, and he had yet to stop. Three hours and forty-eight minutes. Scowling, Naruto tried to figure out when his life went so wrong. Seriously, he was a gambler and best friends with a mafia boss and a thief/assassin. No, wait, he remembered. It was that one time way back when. Well, maybe he shouldn't have— HOLY CRAP THE GROUND!

It came so fast that Naruto didn't have any time to prepare. He hit the ground hard and expected to feel a piercing pain of some sort—or maybe lose consciousness again—but instead, it just felt like he fell. No pain, just a slight discomfort and some shortness of breath. Deciding not to look a gift horse in the mouth, Naruto stood up and examined his surroundings.

"That's weird," he muttered, "how'd I end up in a sewer?" He was up to his ankles in crystal-clear water that gave of an eerie orange glow. "Radioactive?"

"So you've finally arrived?"

"Wha— Oh Kami it's the Kyuubi!" Naruto scrambled backward in horror. "Where did you come from!?"

"I've been here the whole time." The fox leaned closer. "You, however, have not. Come closer, child, let me help you."

Naruto scowled. "I'm not stupid!"

"Are you sure about that?"

"Hey!"

The fox sighed. "What a shame. You would have tasted marvelous, too."

"You were gonna eat me!?"

"No, I was going to eat your astral projection."

Naruto frowned. "Oh, right, you're sealed in me, aren't you?" A pause. "Wait, are we in my gut!?"

"No, you chicken, we're in your mind."

"But my mind's up in my head and the seal is on my stomach!"

"Your mind and your brain are different things, little chicken. Besides, do you think that demonic father of yours somehow managed to seal me, the great Kyuubi, into your intestines?"

Scowling, Naruto screeched, "Demonic father? You're the demon here!"

The Kyuubi pulled its lips back in a snarl. "Wrong, you featherless chicken. I'm a mighty being made completely of chakra. Demons are very different, indeed."

Naruto opened his mouth to yell at the fox some more, before realizing something. Suddenly subdued, he said, "Hey, why aren't you like, you know," he waved his arms around a bit, "trying to murder me?"

The Kyuubi snarled a bit, before putting its head onto its paws. "Won't do me much good. There's a seal on the gate. I'm spending the rest of your puny little chicken life trapped by this seal."

"What gate?" Naruto asked blankly; as far as he could tell, the Kyuubi was out in the open, just sitting there—which is why he had panicked so much when he first saw it. The Kyuubi stared at him a bit, eyes squinting. Finally, it got up and stood on all fours, making Naruto flinch a bit. "E-Eh?"

"You truly are an idiot, aren't you? You can't control your own mindscape—even your fire hazard of a mother could do that. What a pathetic little creature I have been sealed into." The Kyuubi turned around to walk off into the darkness, but Naruto stopped it.