The Tale Of Flowering Fortunes

A/N: Oh ho ho! I return! Yeah, I kind of forgot about updating here...he he...please don't shoot me...



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“Otoutou…” She moaned.

Altogether, the sound came back, as if someone had turned the mute button off. They could hear the distant sound of crying in the field as the warriors found their voices again. Murasaki went to go see, but Kakashi stopped her, grabbing the waistband of her red hakama and pulling her next to him.

“Let Jiraiya-sama take care of it.” He said, pointing at the field. In the midst of the field, she could see Minato’s blood-covered body as her father knelt down beside it. Kakashi was still clinging to her, trembling slightly, though not as bad as herself.

“M-mina-to?” She stammered, staring at the body with tears running down her face. Her hands fisted in Kakashi’s shirt, pulling it up and revealing the extent of his injuries procured from the Kyuubi.

Kakashi sat down on the branch, his normally passive, arrogant face pale with fear and grief. He was blinking rapidly, a lone tear streaking down from his one grey eye, disappearing into his mask. He just sat there, staring at the singed grass, at his sensei’s unrecognizable corps.

“What am I going to tell Kushina-sama…?” He said, lifting his hands and staring at them. Murasaki blinked slowly. She didn’t want to tell him…not now…

She looked back at the field, watching as her father rummaged through the ash. She let go of Kakashi, leaping out of the tree and walking over to her father’s side.

“Murasaki! Stay where you are, don’t look!”

Murasaki took a step forward, her eyes fixed on the remains. “Father…don’t touch him…you’ll be impure…” She said, trembling.

“I said stay back.” He warned, turning to look at her. Murasaki stared at him. Tears were flowing freely down his face. She looked down at her feet, buried up to the ankle in ash and cinders that were still hot. She hear the crying suddenly become clear as Naruto’s tiny form was lifted from the debris. He stood up, cradling the baby as gently as he could, before passing him off to Murasaki.

“Come with me.”

Murasaki obeyed, wondering how such a small, frail child could have survived such an explosion. She felt someone standing beside her and looked over. Kakashi was standing two paces behind her, his silver head bowed, following them back into Konoha. People stared and whispered as they passed, many backing away into the shadows. Murasaki looked back down at the baby, laying naked and screaming in her arms. A spiral seal stood black on his skin, like a tattoo. There were marks, much like whiskers, on his face, which was contorted in a scream that rang like a bell in the silent streets.

Murasaki wrapped him in her wide sleeves, letting him listen to her heartbeat. This seemed to calm Naruto slightly, but he still fought fiercely against her, as if her touch burned him and he was trying to get away.

Se could sense they Kyuubi’s chakra still raging inside the child, though it was growing dimmer with each step she took.

They went inside the Hokage building, where a shrine-like structure had been set up. There was a basket in the middle, surrounded by candles.

The room fell silent as they entered. It felt like a funeral procession…

Jiraiya put his hand on her shoulder, motioning for her to lay Naruto in the basket. Jiraiya’s eyes were sad, but warm as he gave her shoulder an affectionate squeeze, urging her forward.

Feeling the eyes on her once again, Murasaki stepped slowly forward, summoning all her courage and doing the breathing exercises that Gai had taught her.

She disentangled Naruto from her sleeve, her skin making a brief contact with hers as the kyuubi’s chakra flared again, the seal glowing slightly.

Pain, as if from a burn, shot up her arm and she struggled not to drop the baby. She made a soft grunting noise, quickly putting fabric between them as she laid him down, backing away and clutching her arm. Naruto wailed louder, if possible.

Jiraiya rested his hands on her shoulders, as if trying to bring her comfort. The stood there in silence, the room lit by only the flickering candles, for what felt like an eternity. Murasaki’s arm throbbed from the contact with the boy, though she could feel the Kyuubi’ chakra fading slowly, the room becoming more peaceful as it did so. Murasaki removed her hand from the patch of skin, revealing a harsh burn mark left by the contact.

Jiraiya looked down. “Where did you get that mark?”

“When I set him down, I made contact with his skin and the Kyuubi’s chakra flared.”

The room was silent yet again, all eyes on her again.

“Go put that under cool water.” The blonde woman named Tsunade barked, pointing towards the door. “And don’t come back until it stops hurting.”

Murasaki nodded, leaving and shutting the door behind her. She leaned against the door, her body shaking yet again. She stumbled down into the bathroom, closing the door and falling to her knees, sobbing quietly into her hands. She heaved a shuddering sigh, hauling herself weakly up to the sink and turned the faucet on, running the burn under the cool stream.

She remembered part of a Shinto cleansing ceremony where the wound was to be washed in fresh, running water and closed her eyes, relief spreading slowly to the seared skin.

She shut the faucet off, toweling the skin around it and went back to the room. She paused outside the door, eavesdropping again.

“It could be that her years at the shrine had some sort of effect on her chakra, being around something so spiritually pure…” The older man was saying slowly.

“You’re not saying you buy into that, are you, Sarutobi-sensei?” Tsunade scoffed.

“The kyuubi sure doesn’t like her, though…maybe not as an opponent, but she definitely makes it uncomfortable for it…and the feeling seems to be mutual…” Sarutobi said evenly.

“What are you saying? My little girl is, what, allergic to the kyuubi? Or is she allergic to the kid?” Jiraiya asked, sounding angry.

“Not exactly. Pure and impure forces can never touch, only co-exist. The yin and yang is black and white, but never grey… without one, the other cannot exist…”

“So, she’s resistant to the kyuubi’s chakra?” Kakashi’s voice chimed in.

Murasaki took a deep breath, assessing the information. She leaned on the door, her forehead colliding with the wood. It felt cool against her skin, soothing her pounding headache slightly. She could feel the faint vibrations of the kyuubi’s chakra seeping through the walls. She knocked gently before opening the door. No one spoke, as if nothing had happened.

She took her place in front of her father. Everyone was watching Naruto as if waiting for something. She looked down at the baby, who was crying loudly.

“Shouldn’t we cover him with a blanket, he’s getting cold!” Murasaki said, stepping forward. Jiraiya stopped her.

“No, Murasaki. We’re waiting for the seal to take…”

“But…He’s cold…he could die!”

Jiraiya’s hand gripped her shoulder a little tighter and he knelt down in front of her. She could see that this was just as hard on him, if not harder. “Murasaki…I know…but it has to be done. We both know something terrible just happened to the village, and this is necessary to make sure something else doesn’t happen…” He said, touching her cheek just below here eye, where red streaks like his own had begun to form.

“But he’s Minato’s son! We should prot-” Jiraiya held up his hand to silence her.

“I know, but from here on out, you have to keep that a secret…Otherwise, something bad could happen to Naruto, understand?”

Murasaki nodded, looking over at Naruto, who was still screaming shrilly.

A few hours later, they sent Kakashi to take Murasaki home.

They trudged along the streets in silence, even though the village was still very much awake, though it was nearly three in the morning. Sirens were blaring and people were struggling to put out fires that remained from the attack, children screamed and wailed and they could hear distant shouts. Glass crunched beneath their feet as they trudged along towards Jiraiya’s apartment. Cinders fell from the sky along with other debris as they walked past the epicenter of one of the attacks. The smell of smoke and charred flesh filled their noses and Kakashi turned away. His headband had been pulled back down over his sharingan eye. It was one of those nights where you felt cold all over, not only on the outside, but on the inside.

Murasaki opened the door to her fathers apartment and went inside, half expecting Kakashi to follow her in, but he stopped at the doorjamb, looking at his feet.

“Um…can I…come in?”

Murasaki blinked in surprise. This was the first time he had ever really looked, or acted, like a kid. He tapped his toe gently against the doorjamb, his arms hanging limply by his side.

Murasaki nodded, letting him in and trying the light switch.

“The powers out…” She said with a sigh. “Go ahead and have a seat…”

Kakashi sat down while Murasaki found some emergency candles under the sink. She set them on the coffee table and sat down opposite to Kakashi on the couch. Kakashi was sitting with his shoulders slumped foreword, his hands folded on his lap and his head bowed slightly.

He was shaking slightly.

“I don’t know what to do…” He whispered quietly. His voice was breaking slightly. Murasaki blinked at him, tilting her head slightly. He looked about how she felt.

“I…I think you’re in shock…Hatake-san…” She said, standing up and getting him a blanket from the hall closet. She though back to a conversation Minato’s had with her about a week after she’d come to the village.

Kakashi hade made a rude comment about her as she’d come in to the Hokage’s office as he was leaving.

Minato sighed in frustration, rubbing his forehead.

“Why does he do that?” Murasaki had said, setting his lunch on the table.

“Well…” Minato said, leaning back and stretching. “You were a friend of Obito’s, so every time he sees you, he’s reminded of his friend…and I guess there’s some issue with the Hatake clan and Shinto, more so than the normal issues shinobi have…” He said, sighing and taking his lunch from where Murasaki had set it.

“Don’t judge him so harshly…he’s been alone for so long, and he finally starts making friends, and…” Minato sighed, sitting up. Murasaki nodded, looking at the door through which Kakashi had disappeared. “Now that Rin’s gone, too…he’s alone again. I think in many ways, he’s like you…and in many ways he’s not.”

Murasaki blinked at him slowly, cocking her head.

“I don’t understand…”

“Kakashi’s father, Sakumo Hatake, committed Seppuku when Kakashi was six, right in front of him…Kakashi’s been alone for almost the entire time. It wasn’t until I took him on as a student that he really started to change from acting like an adult, to acting like a kid again…when he finally started to make friends…”

“They passed away…”Murasaki finished softly, looking back at the door that the teen had exited. Minato nodded, picking the nori off the rice balls Kushina had sent with Murasaki. Minato had always been so careful that Murasaki hadn’t thought so ill of Kakashi.

Now he was shivering and sobbing on her fathers couch, looking like the young boy he was. She brought the jounnin the blanket, wrapping it around his shoulders. She went to the refrigerator, grabbing a jug of water and put it in a teapot, using a minor katon jutsu to heat it to boiling as she made tea.

She handed him a steaming cup of o-cha, sitting down on the other end and staring at her own cup.

“I’m sorry, Hatake-san…” She said quietly, sipping her tea. He shifted slightly so the blanket blocked her view as he pulled his mask down and sipped his tea, tears still flowing down his face slowly. Murasaki frowned, trying to find words to comfort him. It scared her to see him cry, he was one of the strongest shinobi she knew, he was a tough kid…

They sat in silence for a long time, the sounds of the chaos outside slowly soaking in to the apartment as they drank their tea. It seemed almost to surreal. Kakashi set the cup down on the table, drying his eyes as he pulled his mask up.

“Thank you, Fujiwara-san…” He said quietly.

Murasaki looked up in surprise. “You’re…welcome…” She said. He looked at her, his grey eye red and puffy, his silver hair hanging limply in his face.

“Thanks for letting me come here for a little bit…” He said quietly, standing up. Murasaki stood up, too.

“You’re always welcome here…” She said quietly as he handed her the blanket. “If you need to talk…or just need to sit with someone…” She said, folding the blanket and following him to the door. He paused on the doorjamb, as if he wanted to say something, but simply shook his head.

“See you around…” He called over the sound of a screaming siren.

“Be careful, Kakashi-san!” She called out the door, closing it only after he disappeared from view.

Murasaki sighed and curled up on the couch where Kakashi had been. The spot was still warm, and the arm of the couch smelled remotely like him. She pulled the blanket over the top over her and fell asleep.