Of pineapples
The light suddenly shone in my eyes, I instinctively shut them and tried to back away.
“Sorry, Kaito-kun, I was just checking your pupils.” Nohara-san let out a small laugh.
I pouted. It is obvious that he did that on purpose just to mess with me.
“ I have good news for you. You are officially fully healed and healthy now. In body at least The only thing that is left to check is the rate at which your blood is replenishing itself. “ he snatched my medical documents from somewhere and started searching for something in them” we already know that it is faster than average but it is necessary to determine the exact ratio.”
“Aha” he shouted victoriously “ Found it. That sort of thing is usually left to do for civilian nurses. You see, medic-nins like me are quite in high be demand at the hospital “ he said with his nose turned up so high it could almost reach the ceiling.
I gave him a deadpan stare “ Then where do I need to go now?”
“Room number 105 , it is on the first floor, but you will have to wait for quite a bit, the queue there is no joke” he patted me on the shoulder. My muscles tensed and I tried to slowly relax. I was still uncomfortable when someone touched me without any warning.
Suddenly he dropped a bunch of candies in my lap” Here , you will need them” I hate the fact that the first thought that I had was whether he poisoned them or not .his pager rang “ Goodbye, Kaito-kun. Hope I won’t see in hospital for quite some time” he ran off towards the door patting my head in a passing.
He locked the room after we exited and stuffed some papers in my hands.
“ Now shoo, no time to waste , room 105” he shouted already halfway across the corridor.
As I was walking in the hallways I noticed just how truly overcrowded the hospital was. The war is still ongoing, it is to be expected.
But why was I alone in the room two times already? Was it because I was too dangerous? Or does my situation require that much secrecy?
In front of the room that I was searching for already gathered around 40 people. Most of them were elders in their fifty’s and teenagers.
As I tried to understand how this whole system worked I could hear whispers.” Kumo bastards… medical supplies… total annihilation” It seemed that Kumo successfully attacked our supply route. Hah, when the war will be over already.
Granny in civilian clothes said to the woman sitting next to her“ You know ,my son is on frontlines right now, all I can do is to donate blood like that and hope that might help at least a little”
The woman nodded her head”I wanted to become shinobi when I was young but I didn’t have enough talent. I worry so much every time my husband and friends go out on a mission. I have universal bl…”
I didn’t hear the rest. Oh, so all people here came to donate blood. Makes sense. We don’t have that many medic-nins, most people will require blood transfusions.
As I was walking further down the line of people, I didn’t noticed someone’s leg on the floor and tripped over it. Before I could faceplate, the owner of that leg caught me by scruff . Teenager in from of me or you can call him young man already had gauze on his face and funny looking pineapple like hair.
“ Oi , brat, you should be more careful” he said with lazy droll and put me down on the floor. Target for acquiring information is found.
I scratched the back of my head “ Sorry, shinobi-san, I will be careful next time”
That was how I met Nara Shikaku. I wanted to find out more information about the Academy, but I swear to god, absolutely nothing worked on this man. I tried I am super curious innocent child act, pitiful orphan with no knowledge, bribery and bets with candies and threats with crying.
All I was able to gain was that Academy is extremely boring, which wasn’t exactly informative. Well, at least I was able to amuse him somewhat.
He is one who found most of My information(even medical records, at which he raised an eyebrow) and the bastard did it so effortlessly, that I noticed only, when it was already too late. I suppose ,he in a veeeery runabout way taught me how to actually gather information from someone. Still it was rather unpleasant
At least I was able to get back at him with the most soul crashing thing, that brought even greater men to their knees.
I mustered my most fake smile“Thank you so much for your informative answers” I practically gritted through my teeth “Matron says , we are what we eat, so here, Oji-san(first strike), you must have really liked them, when you were a child” I handed him all pineapple flavour candies that I had(second strike).
The bastard just snorted and went on his way.
The children who start Academy are given their own little apartment and monthly stipend. Most of them never again visit Orphanage, they consider it shameful to be seen again with “ kiddies”.
We are allowed to roam Konoha as we wish, but it is not like any shinobi would want to chat with snotty brats, which is understandable.
So the only contact with “ real ninja” that we have are their yearly visits to the Orphanage, where they describe how cool it is to be a shinobi and what an honour it is. Which also tells pretty much nothing about realities of this lifestyle. At least I realise, that I am doing it to protect myself.
I don’t want to feel powerless and helpless ever again
Now that I was cleared for physical activity, I can finally train. Only two months left.
The time went by in a blink of an eye.
I have already read all information, that was stored at the Orphanage. So I went to the village library and tried to soak whatever knowledge I could every evening there. (Subjects, that we were already taught like mathematics, history, geography and so on, but in more detail)
It soon became apparent that there is absolutely nothing new that I could gain from classes at the Orphanage, so I started bailing out on them.Mornings now I spend on my physical training like running laps, doing push-ups and practicing my punches on the stump of the tree.
The most difficult part of my self made program was chakra training, because I had absolutely zero idea of what I was doing.
After my sessions at the hospital it was more or less confirmed that I am indeed from Chimie clan.They were slaughtered during the beginning of the first shinobi war, even those who had seen them are few.So I need to figure out everything by myself.
I found out about meditation from the books in the library. I sat in a lotus position and closed my eyes as was showcased in the picture and tried to move that itchy energy to various points of my body.
To be honest, it was quite difficult at first, but it became easier with the time. It is just, I don’t know why do I need to bring chakra to different parts of my body. I hope, i will be able to find the answer at the academy.If it is written in the book, it is probably helpful for something?
The blood manipulation on the other hand came way easier.It is just such an amazing feeling, almost like a different entity, with whom I share mental connection.I almost want to give it a pet name.
I started to cut myself on the hands and then let the blood out(I look like a mummy all wrapped in bandages now ), it makes me feel anemic and dizzy after an hour though.
But I just return every single drop back in my body and dizziness disappears after 10 minutes. Also, I tried to change them in different form, but that was unsuccessful. It almost felt unwilling to be anything else but chains, I myself was very satisfied. Not only can they attack but also capture and apprehend.
Right now I have only 2 liters of blood for me to use(I still have to keep a bit inside of me), but in the future I will have more. Unfortunately, I tried to store away some of the blood, but I was unable to manipulate it after some time.
I haven’t tried to do anything with blood of other people, because I don’t have any Guinea pigs to experiment on.
Significant change happened in my relationship with others since that accident.
Before that I could be considered to be quite a popular guy, I had good relationship with everyone, but still prefer to be left alone. Because others always paid a little bit too much attention to me, which was taxing to say the least.
The one I was closest to could be considered to be Daiki. Somehow we were always grouped together in our sleeping arrangements. We got used to each other’s company and just stuck together. He was more of dumb little cousin that I had to look after, than a friend. The only thing he talked about was becoming ninja and defeating all bad guys in the world.Funny punk
When I returned, everyone started practically interrogating me, then tried to group hug me, when they found out that I was in hospital. Any physical contact, even the one I could anticipate, made me somewhat uncomfortable, considering the fact that I was not all that close with them to begin with it made it even more so.
I could hear some grumbles about me not appreciating their concern and being overly secretive about the whole situation.
I was trying to behave normally like I used to do before, but staying at that place was suffocating. So, I didn’t.
Most of my time I spent outside of orphanage premises either training or exploring enormous village, which suited me just fine. But gradually some children started saying that I became too arrogant to hang out with them or just plain weird.
I already had enough on my plate to deal with and really couldn’t be bothered to do anything about rumours. So I didn’t.
So should i blame my passive behaviour for what will soon happen to me?