Chapter 17
Introducing Naruto to Konohamaru had been the best and worst choices Keigo had made in his life.
Naruto loved the boy who followed him around and looked at him like he hung the sun and stars but Keigo was afraid that the village wouldn't survive their pranks.
Keigo was their trusted supplier anyway.
One day after Naruto had run off to cause some troublewith his self-proclaimed sidekick, Keigo had some free time to spare.
He soon began to get bored until he literally tripped over Shikamaru.
His wanderings had brought him to the park where he had stumbled upon the sprawling body of his sensei's son.
"Keigo, you're such a drag" the boy whined.
"Are you hiding from your mom again, Shikamaru?" Keigo replied indifferently, "Let me guess, cloud watching?"
In response the Nara snorted and sulkily looked away guiltily.
Caught red-handed.
"It would be my duty to take you home but if during the trip we stopped at that dango stand that you like so much no one would know, after all what Yoshino doesn't know can't do any harm" Keigo proposed to the pouting child.
When Shikamaru turned around with his eyes sparkling with interest he knew he had hit the mark.
"Do you want a ride squirt?" Keigo motioned to climb onto his shoulders
Shikamaru who considered himself too old for such things always made an exception for Keigo.
So they walked, Shikamaru on his shoulders,Keigo holding his little legs tightly and the boy's fingers tangled in his red locks.
May arrived in a flash and with it Keigo's birthday.
He would be eighteen on the twenty-seventh.
There were now a few tens of minutes left until midnight and Keigo was sitting on the roof of the hokage tower. That evening sleep had never come and after hours of tossing and turning in the futon he decided to go get some fresh air.
"That's where you were, I wondered where you would be after seeing the empty bed" came his father's voice.
Keigo didn't move from his position with his legs pulled to his chest and his arms hugging them.
"What's the reason for that long face?"
"Dunno" Keigo shrugged.
He could feel his father's eyes boring into the side of his head but he didn't turn to look at him.
"Do you remember when you got lost in the woods?" Minato asked.
Sure enough, Keigo remembered it, he was about four years old and on one of Jiraya's visits to the village he had taken him to explore the woods. Too bad the old perv had gotten distracted watching the onsen and left him alone in the woods. Keigo had cried for hours, wandering randomly to find his way home. Only when evening fell did his father manage to find him and bring him home. He remembers how safe he felt in his father's arms.
"Yeah so?"
At that point a hand gently took his chin to make him meet their eyes.
"I promise I will always come for you whether it's tonight or fifty years from now when I'm a decrepit old man" his father promised.
Keigo's shoulders lost their tension and his arms left his legs to take place around his father's body as he lunged to hug him.
His father had fully understood what Keigo thought, he was afraid of growing up.
"You will always be my baby, my brave little bubba"
Keigo spent his birthday in the company of Tenzou and Itachi filling up on ramen at Ichiraku.
The day passed with them pleasing Keigo and his every whim. Also try riding one of the Nara deer.
They were his best friends and also his only ones. Few but good.
He had never complained about having few friends but when they had to go home and Keigo found himself alone he regretted what could have been if he had been a normal child and not a prodigy.
He had learned to enjoy those moments in solitude, and so he went to swing a bit on the swings in the park.
"Happy birthday,"
Kakashi's sudden appearance scared Keigo so much that he fell off the swing.
"You have to stop doing this or sooner or later you'll give someone a heart attack" he said sulkily from his position on the ground.
"Mah Keigo, don't be like that" Kakashi replied with his usual closed-eyed smile.
Keigo didn't blush at all when he saw that smile as Kakashi plopped down in the seat in front of him.
Their knees were touching from how close they were.
"So why do you come and bother me here?" Keigo tried to cover up with a question the way he was entranced by looking at Kakashi with a stupid smile on his face.
"I have to guess that then you don't want this gift I got for you"
A package wrapped with fuinjutsu seal test paper was waved in front of his face.
"No I want it, back off" Keigo said taking the gift from Kakashi's hands and starting to tear the paper off without restraint.
He took out of the box two thick bands of leather which, joined by a metal plate, formed an x shape.
The metal was engraved to have the symbol of the Uzumaki clan.
"I thought that after all these years you might need a new sheath for your katana that isn't the standard ANBU one"
Keigo couldn't believe his eyes but it seemed to him that while Kakashi was speaking a blush was peeking around the edge of his mask.
"This is perfect"
Keigo's smile was bright as he put on his new gear. It was the perfect size, it hugged his torso well, the metal plate rested perfectly at the end of his sternum and there was no discomfort on his shoulders.
In the excitement of experiencing how the new sheath felt while stretching, Keigo missed the way Kakashi's eye followed his every move and the tip of his ear turned a vague pinkish color.
Uchiha Shisui was dead.
Apparent suicide was the information that had been disseminated in the village.
For someone who hung out with Itachi as much as Keigo, it was impossible not to have crossed paths with Shisui at some point.
The guy seemed to pop up in Itachi's vicinity at any moment.
Keigo had never moved beyond acquaintances with Shisui but was sorry for the loss Itachi was suffering.
Speaking of Itachi, he had been acting elusive in the last few days after the news broke.
Keigo saw little of him as he even skipped training.
That day Team Ro was assigned to evening training in the dojo of the ANBU compound.
Keigo was warming up before finding a sparring partner since Itachi looked like he wouldn't show up that day either.
A sudden burning sensation at his tattoo made him stop in his tracks as did everyone else in the dojo before a siren and red light came on.
In all the years that Keigo had worked in ANBU there had never been a code red.
All the agents ran to their respective locker rooms in search of the gray armor that completed the uniform.
The entrance hall was already packed with rows of teams in formation when Keigo ran in and slipped into position behind Kakashi and in front of Tenzou. The rush to get there was so great that he still had to finish fastening his shoulder straps.
His father as the hokage came through the door in a flurry of cape and electricity.
"emergency and intruder alert, suspected conflicts in the Uchiha district. S-class enemy to eliminate"
The Fourth in one motion opened the main doors, the excessive force was what demonstrated the stress the man was feeling at the moment.
It was already dark outside, the evening was late and the moon was the only source of light.
"Move out"
As they walked into the darkness the place Itachi usually occupied in front of Keigo was still empty.