Fic Outline of 'Kiba of the Mokuton' (Naruto)
I looked at the concept and went "but like what if I played that as straight as possible and then turned into a weird mix of an adventure and horror novel.
Some scenes I had planned out ;;
Kiba looks down at shock - because..that's not flowers. Kiba doesn't own flowers, and the secondary option of a jutsu gone wrong doesn't sound right either because - well, Kiba wasn't doing any jutsu to go wrong.
Before he can consider it too long Hana bursts into his room, a frantic look on his face he's only seen once before - the night of the Uchiha Massacre. He knows that they never really talked about it to Kiba - but it was obvious that everyone was on edge after that, and with mental health being suddenly a much more pressing issue in shinobi clans - it'd take only an idiot not to piece the unrest in clans together.
Kiba - well, he's not sure what he's done wrong, but he feels like he's been caught red handed anyways. Hana looks - well, more resigned then afraid, but there's definite fear still lingering there.
He's not sure what to say. "It's not what it looks like?" He's- well, he's not really sure what it even looks like in the first place.
- hana is like all weird and cagey and paranoid and burns all of the weird not-jutsu-but-not-not-jutsu flowers and grabs kiba by the arm and drags him out of the house and is like 'kiba be quiet this is like. a really big deal'
-turns out, kiba has this weird super secret bloodline unseen since the shodai. except it's not really rare, since it seems like. at least thirteen other people have it. including his sister.
A/N here, I had these big plans about presenting the entire thing in a non-naruto fan friendly manner. like under the assumption no one knew anything but not in a way that forcefed the audience - mostly for the challenge of it. hard to explain in text but like, imagine a normal novel explaining it's world to you - I wanted to do that for readers more unfamiliar with naruto. kiba seemed like a good 'sort of knows things mainly doesn't and is easy to write' and I found myself really attracted to the idea of putting these concepts together using this plot as glue
Small excerpt from the planned Naruto introduction to audience ;;
Kiba knew of Naruto - but he never really talked to the blonde before. It's hard to ignore someone who's constantly yelling - from the way he dressed, to his pranks, to his personality - he was a loud guy.
Naruto's ultimate goal in life was pretty obvious to anyone who had ears - to become Hokage and be known as infinitely better than all those previous. Kiba secretly thought that he actually had pretty good chances at the thing - even if he only wins the nomination by default. After all, you hardly hear anyone in their year yelling to the blonde that, 'actually no that's my goal.'
Kiba asked his mom why Naruto wanted the position so badly, and why no one else seemed to. She said something with big words like 'city-wide incidents' and 'disillusionment' and 'rising political tension.' He didn't get it and said as much. She just sighed and said that no one else was crazy enough to want to deal with the paperwork.
He's pretty sure that's not what the other words she said meant - but Kiba got the second point too, Naruto did project an image that seemed insane enough to willingly want to do paperwork all day.
I didn't get far enough in the planning to have chapter ideas, but I did have a sort of ending planned where after the big journey (which, realistically, probably ended after the chuunin exams and started when Kiba was like eight.) the epilogue was going to be a mirror of the first chapter - except instead of hana guiding kiba and introducing him to the rest of the mokuton kids it'd be kiba guiding moegi (who canonically has the wood release?? apparently?? because that's just a thing now.)
this hypothetical story probably would've focused on kiba's journey to self-discovery and acceptance (hence adventure) and also have a side of major subtextual horror because this is a story focused on kids with powerful abilities in a society that occasionally kidnaps and brainwashes kids into being super-soldiers. yeah that's gotta be fucking scary. I'd imagine kiba's life before discovering the mokuton was mostly bland and small, and didn't make him challenge opinions and narratives of the village very much ;;
naruto is a demon? I mean, sure if you squint he does look kind of malicious sometimes. the hokage is all-knowing? duh, why not say the sky is blue while you're at it. abandoning konoha is the worst crime you can commit, right after actively harming it? I mean..that doesn't sound right, but it's.. not wrong? probably?
I'd imagine unless he has a reason to look at his village with mistrust, he likely wouldn't think twice about what is being said to him. sure, sometimes people say shit to him like "inuzuka are mindless idiots" and he'll tear them a new one, but that's not konoha's fault - that's just civilians that don't understand clan structures being idiots. and also other clan members who don't know anything about the inuzuka being idiots. and desk filers being idiots. and occasionally figureheads being idiots - it's rumoured that the second hokage didn't have much care for anything outside of the senju. but that's just - obviously a people thing, not a village thing. even if he seems to meet more people who believe that then people who don't.
so yeah, he..needs to question some stuff more actively, have less innate trust for the village, and I think this is perfect chance to start on being a more autonomous person.
if I had to give this fic a name it'd probably be "Growing Pains" or "Green Thumb" or something like that. short (probably 2 words) and maybe starting with a G. no reason why, I just thought it fit the energy.