Aerial Root

Review replies (just skip if you don't care!):
NightstarAngel: Thank you for both reviews! I'm fairly terrible at updating regularly (even in the 'holidays' I more or less work full time) but I'll keep trying! :D
tortilla lady: I don't intend to abandon it! And he'll be out in the village next chapter, so dun dun dun! As for the questions - yah, he knows about Kyuubi (as does everyone in Root) but not about his father. And yep, the Uchihas are wiped out. Barring our lovely brothers, of course. :D
silver: How did you know?! He'll be wearing a Kakashi-type mask outside in the beginning (though not forever). He's a little different, but I am aiming for a 'the more things change, the more they stay the same' thing when it comes to him. He hasn't had to kill yet, but his skills - well, you'll see. ;)

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Naruto barreled down the corridor at full speed, skidding around corners and bouncing off walls more than once in his haste. Corridors and corridors and more corridors and honestly, was it really necessary to have this many? Unwilling to admit even to himself that he was lost again, the energetic young boy continued to turn corner after corner, occasionally flinging himself up or down a flight of stairs.

Hearing the familiar grating of a trap being triggered he threw himself to the left, rolled and was running again by the time he heard the metallic sound of shuriken hitting the wall behind him. Traps were common place throughout the Root complex, more as a method of training than as a defensive gesture. Designed to incapacitate, no one had ever died from them – it was just really, really embarrassing to be caught in one. That particular fact was something Naruto had learnt first hand, more often than he’d care to remember.

Glimpsing something out of the corner of his eye he halted, twisting and drawing a kunai. Shifting his weight he brought the kunai down on the stone floor, dragging it and using the resistance to slow him down quickly. After sliding to a stop he looked up, breathing heavily. The gleaming plate on the door next to him proudly proclaimed that it was the entrance to the fourth dormitory.

Naruto grinned widely. That meant he was in the North wing and only two floors below where he wanted to be! He wasn’t lost after all! Obviously, his brain was just so far ahead of the rest of him he hadn’t noticed yet. Or something. He took off running again, turned at the next corner and threw himself up the stairs. Eventually he skidded to a stop in front of an identical door, the plate this time informing him that he was in front of the second dormitory. Flinging it open he ran down yet another corridor, counting doors as they flashed past until he reached his goal. Without pausing to grin at the two names on the door and without bothering to knock, he threw it open.

“SAI!”

The other boy stared at Naruto from his position sprawled sideways across one of the room’s two beds. His face, which was hanging over the edge and was thus upside down to Naruto, looked mildly alarmed. There was an inked brush in his mouth.

Sai blinked. Naruto knew he wasn’t surprised by his presence - the exuberant boy’s approach was always impossible to miss. But then, he knew his appearance was a little unusual – flushed and panting, with bright eyes and a grin so ridiculously huge that he was nearly unhinging his jaw in the process. His grinned widened even further as he watched Sai visibly brace himself for whatever was going to burst out, at frightening volume, of his roommate’s mouth.

“Guess what happened!” The voice wasn’t as loud as usual, but the barely contained excitement vibrating through it was clear.

Moving slowly Sai sat up. Carefully removing the brush from his mouth he set it aside and then pushed the rest of his art paraphernalia off his lap. Then, just as Naruto was about to rupture something critical in his impatience, he turned and carefully asked, “What?”

No fun. “You have to guess!”

The corners of Sai’s mouth twitched. He was obviously trying for exasperation, and it rather obviously wasn’t quite working. It was impossible, against such enthusiasm. “Let’s see. They’re serving ramen for dinner? You finally beat Touya at throwing shuriken? They’re not making you clean the paint off those statues you desecrated yesterday?”

“No, no, that was art and I finished that this morning!” Naruto flung himself down on the other bed.

“Art? You call that art?”

“Better than yours!” The blonde cackled, and then narrowly escaped rolling off the bed. He bounced instead, making the bedsprings creak. “Come on, come on! Guess again!”

Naruto knew that Sai wouldn’t take the swipe at his abilities seriously. When the pair had first become roommates two years ago, they were on shaky ground – Naruto had never had a roommate before and Sai’s had been killed while away on a mission. As such both were extremely wary, but they eventually reached a sort of friendship. This was partly due to the fact that Naruto’s fondness for companionship and people as a whole was infectious, but mainly because he had realised that a roommate meant someone to talk at who couldn’t run away halfway through.

And while people didn’t often run from Naruto, they did tend to sneer and turn away.

“You’re ridiculous. And I give up.”

Naruto gave an enormous bounce. This was awesome. “They’re sending me outside!”

That, he knew, had Sai’s undivided attention. While missions often drew the older shinobi away, it was rare for a Root member of their age to leave the compound. So far, the two boys only had a few experiences – small village missions that required them to leave and return in the same night, under cover of darkness. “Outside? Is it for a mission? Where are you going?”

Naruto grinned at Sai’s interest. “Just to the village.”

Sai smiled in return, awkward and lopsided. It looked a little painful, as if he was unused to it and rather self-conscious – which was precisely the truth. He had become rather closed after the death of his roommate – a genius shinobi three years older than Sai and Naruto - but Naruto’s presence made it impossible to remain that way. Especially after Naruto had sat on his stomach for four hours, refusing to get up until he saw ‘some real warmth, dammit’.

“Bring something back for me.”

The comment was intended lightly, but the sudden crash in Naruto’s mood was almost audible.

“Oh,” he murmured, visibly slumping. “Oh no.”

Sai tilted his head, searching out Naruto’s eyes. “Naruto?”

“Outside…Sai,” the blonde felt dread clench his stomach and ran a shaking hand through his hair. “I didn’t realise that I – that you…I didn’t think…”

“You never do, dickless. What is it?”

Naruto barely noticed the usual bait. “It’s permanent. They’re moving me out,” he mumbled. Then he stood up and without ceremony flung himself at the other boy. “I’m not going to see you again!”

Sai’s eyes widened as he was tackled to the bed, landing on his back with a squirming blonde twelve year old on top of him. “They’re kicking you out? What did you do? And please get off - of course you’ll see me again,” he added.

Naruto scrambled to the other end of the bed and grinned, eyes lit up again. “Promise?”

“Promise,” the other boy sighed. “I’ll drop in when I’m on missions, okay?”

“And I could break in to see you sometimes!”

Sai was smiling again, although Naruto recognised the expression as his default façade rather than something natural. “That probably wouldn’t be a good idea, considering your abilities in stealth.”

“Hey!”

“Although…” Sai leaned over the edge of his bed and began to dig through his trunk. Naruto looked on curiously, but before he could ask Sai had straightened up.

“Catch,” Sai said, tossing something towards the blonde that glinted in the light of the lamps. Naruto studied it.

“A mirror?” Naruto asked, looking to Sai with a questioning expression. It was small and round, fit to be held in one hand. Unlike ordinary ninja mirrors – which were almost solely used for checking around corners and thus undecorated – it had a curling golden frame. There was no handle.

Sai gave his unnerving pseudo-smile, and then held up a matching mirror. Angling it carefully he tilted it a number of times in quick succession, lamplight bouncing off the silvery surface in short flashes. Naruto watched the mirror carefully, and realisation dawned.

Honestly. Is. Your. Brain. As. Undersized. As. Your -

“Hey!” Naruto exclaimed, but he was grinning widely. The flashes were a part of a code exclusive to Root – it was taught to all members. Over the last year, however, the two roommates had embellished the ‘language’, widening its vocabulary with the intention of using it in class. Not that they ever had the guts to. The teachers were always far too sneaky, appearing directly behind you the minute you reached for something that wasn’t a pen. It was all you could do to refrain from pissing your pants, and even that was never a given.

Jerk.

Naruto had never been good with comebacks.

Sai snorted, and put the mirror down. “We’ll use the fourth window in the recreation room – the one I always read by.” The recreation room was the only room in the Root complex that resided above ground. It was on the second floor, in order to deter villagers from peering through windows, while the first floor was empty. The rest of the compound stretched deep below ground in a labyrinth of corridors, far from suspicious eyes. “I’ll get there as often as I can and you should do the same…but only after nightfall. We don’t exist, after all.”

Naruto threw a mock-salute in Sai’s direction before standing and stretching. Bounding to his trunk, he retrieved items as he went and lobbed them into the open chest.

Sai blinked, taken aback. “Wait – you’re going now?” Despite his earlier confidences, there was a touch of fear in his voice – something that went completely over Naruto’s head.

He didn’t look up from his attempt to stuff his trunk with what appeared to be the wardrobe of three people. “Tomorrow, after lunch.”

“I see,” Sai said, a soft mumble. As Naruto carefully wrapped a black jacket round a nondescript book he caught sight of Sai’s expression, eyes watching as the book was placed into the trunk. He was smiling softly – real and warm.

“I see.”

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Unbeta'd, as per usual.DX Also, I had a few POV problems (it kept wanting to write itself from Sai's perspective!) so apologies if any of that is still in there.

ALSO PLEASE ASSUME I'M USING SAI'S REAL NAME. If we ever find out that it's actually something different, I'll just go back and quietly edit it in. I tried to emphasis the fact that everyone still uses their original names by the plates on the door, but, well. :P