Trying this again, but MS shatmail is really getting on my nerves with it's
'upgrade.'
Between Deception and Truth
Chapter 3 - A New Life
By: Lord Archive
Naruto belongs to Kishimoto, all rights reserved. I'm only borrowing them.
---------------------
Sakura gazed over Konoha from the roof of the hospital. Leaving to get water to
drink was a blatant lie when
there was a pitcher of water in the conference room. She needed to think, to
come to terms. Naruto had been
something of a little brother to her. With Sasuke's rejection of her, she had
considered attempting a
relationship with Naruto if he had matured enough by the time he returned to
Konoha. But now that had been all
flipped upside down. Naruto had been turned into a girl and her teacher had
never bothered to tell her about
it.
"Thought I'd find you here," called out a familiar male voice.
Sakura turned around and saw the young man she had been waiting for. She gazed
at him hoping to see some sign
that 'Ami' had been some joke and that this really was Naruto returned. An itch
in her mind told her otherwise.
The face before her was an illusion. She blinked. "You're using an illusionary
henge?"
Naruto laughed. "My old body had no ability for genjutsu. Still no master, but
I can at least do a few things
with it."
Sakura smirked. "I see being a girl didn't do much for your way of speaking."
Naruto folded his arms. "I may have a different face, but I'm still me."
Sakura glared. "It's more than a different face. You're a girl!"
Naruto looked away. "Yeah. If you think you're having a hard time with this,
think about what I had to go
through. I didn't even know about periods and crap like that until I was
experiencing them."
Sakura paled sickly. "You've had periods?"
Naruto nodded slowly. "Oh, yeah. I've had them."
Sakura shifted nervously. "So... when will you be switching back?"
Naruto walked up next to her. "I'm not sure."
Sakura's eyes went wide. "Why?"
The false boy turned away. "Sakura-chan, the Akatsuki is still out there
hunting for a boy named 'Uzumaki
Naruto,' not a girl named 'Yamada Ai.'"
Sakura almost wanted to laugh at the overly common name. "I didn't think you'd
want to still be hiding."
"I don't want to hide, but there are issues that need to be dealt with.
Suddenly reappearing could cause
serious problems. It's part of the reason why my 'return' hasn't been
announced. We have yet to decide what to
do next." Naruto smiled sheepishly. "At least this time you'll be in on the
decision."
Sakura wished that she had been left in the dark until after the boy she knew
had been returned to normal.
---------------------
In the week after Naruto's transformation into a girl, Hinata had remained as
she was while Jiraiya worked with
Naruto in regaining chakra control while at the same time making sure the
Kyuubi was properly sealed. Not to
mention honing her own abilities that didn't rely on Byakugan.
The new girl had poured herself into the training and didn't let herself dwell
on the changes of her body.
Though Hinata was having issues reconciling the purple haired girl with a chest
larger than her own was in fact
her crush. Oddly, the transformation made it easier to talk to Naruto. She held
no feelings for girls, so her
infatuation and nervousness over the boy who never quit didn't carry over to
the girl who never quit. She still
wanted to protect Naruto, but her mind didn't go to odd places anymore.
Hinata had held onto the scroll that was now meant for her. With Jiraiya's
assertion that Naruto was in no
immediate danger of succumbing to the Kyuubi, she prepared herself to use it.
Because of the warnings from
Tsunade and her own idea of just how bad Jiraiya could be in the body of a
teenage boy, she retrieved the
scroll from where she had hidden it while the legendary ninja was training
Naruto.
Swallowing nervously, Hinata opened the scroll. She studied the writing
thoroughly, not wanting to make a
mistake. She then followed the motions that Naruto had made a week earlier.
Power ripped through her being as
her body was enshrouded in smoke.
Hinata tried to remain calm, and immediately tried to activate Byakugan several
times to no effect. Sighing in
defeat, Hinata approached a mirror and let out a strange scream before
collapsing into unconsciousness.
---------------------
Hinata awoke to a purple haired girl with a suspicious look upon her face.
"Naruto-kun?"
The girl's eyes squinted harder. "Is that really you?"
Hinata blinked while trying to sit up, with arms and legs restrained. "Why am I
tied up?"
"Finding an unknown boy lying in the middle of the floor of our apartment? You
do the math," Jiraiya groused
from the other side of the room.
"Unknown... boy?" Hinata shuddered. "Right... I used the jutsu. I wasn't
prepared to see my... face... like
this." He almost wanted to start crying. "I was Hyuuga Hinata, now I don't know
who I am. I have no Byakugan."
Naruto shifted uneasily while tears began to pool in the boy's eyes. She
released the binding ropes from the
boy, who proceeded to curl up into a ball. She wasn't sure what to say. "Ah,
come on. It's not that bad being a
guy."
"I've lost everything. My clan, my blood, my name, everything." Hinata sobbed
loudly. "What do I do now?"
Jiraiya glared at the hysterical boy. "You know what you have to do now. This
is what you came here for. Your
goal hasn't changed, just your body."
Hinata swallowed back his tears. His goal was to protect Naruto. That was why
he had left his clan and gave up
his true body. "I'm sorry. I wasn't as prepared for this as I thought."
"Just don't try to think about it," Naruto advised. "Work on making yourself
stronger and find how your new
body works."
"R-right," Hinata replied shakily, glancing at his new black haired, brown-eyed
face in the mirror caused him
to shudder. "I suppose we should also start using our cover names. So we can
get used to them before we're on
our own."
"What are your cover names?" Jiraiya asked.
"I'm to use Yamada Jiro," Hinata replied.
"How common can you get?" Naruto griped. "Aren't we supposed to pick names not
so blatantly normal?"
"As our cover is being runaway lovers, using amateurish names will be to our
benefit as we want it to be
obvious those aren't our real names. Anyone hunting for the Kyuubi wouldn't
think we'd use such a simplistic
name," Hinata explained.
"What name do I get?" Naruto wondered.
"Tsunade-sama left that for you to decide," Hinata replied.
Naruto scrunched her eyes in thought. She wasn't any good at naming anything.
Her first thoughts were names of
girls she knew, but that wouldn't be a good choice even if 'Sakura' was rather
common. She then thought of
Gaara and the tattoo above the sand-nin's eye. "Ai. I guess I'll be 'Yamada
Ai.'"
Jiraiya chuckled at the name, while Hinata's face turned deep red.
---------------------
Another week of training followed the transformation into Jiro, this time
focusing on getting the boy to
harness and control his chakra. He didn't quite have the finite control of his
chakra he had as a girl, causing
him to lose all the abilities and higher arts of the Byakugan, but his genjutsu
had become noticeably more
potent. Though the bigger surprise was that Ai had some genjutsu ability where
Naruto had none.
Still, Jiro could not believe how easily Ai took to the change of body and
gender. Even going the bathroom had
been an adventure. Hinata had never gotten a good look at a guy's privates
before, even though her eyes and
Kiba's lack of modesty had given her opportunities in the past. Now Jiro was
all too aware of what made boys...
well, boys.
As the days had ticked by, Jiraiya seemed to get increasingly nervous. Now he
called Jiro and Ai to him. "It's
time we part ways. I need to get back to tracking some leads, while you two
need to set up your cover."
Ai grumbled, but said nothing. Jiro merely nodded.
Jiraiya unrolled a map. "I want you two to travel first to the town of Tsuji as
covertly as you can. From there
you two are to act like normal people and walk to the tiny village of
Hitozatohanareta. There is an abandoned
home there where you can live. It's a simple trading post where local farmers
gather their goods before sending
it to Tsuji."
"Will they have any issues with us taking the house?" Jiro wondered.
"It's an extremely simple village. They'd be happy to have a pair of newlyweds
join their little community.
Especially when one of them has some knowledge of medicine," Jiraiya answered.
"Not that much knowledge, but I can make do with simple injuries." Jiro sighed.
"I guess we should also go over
the cover story as well. I'm from an affluent family that was trying to arrange
a marriage for me, but the
candidates were more living dolls than girls. Beautiful, but not much in the
way of a personality. Ai was a
local orphan who lived on the streets making do with what she could to survive.
While not as physically
beautiful, she had a personality that attracted me to her."
"That seems a bit close to your original bodies," Jiraiya observed.
Jiro nodded. "That may be true, however it'll be easier for her to follow her
role."
Ai folded her arms and huffed. "Sure, talk like I'm not here."
"Sorry." Jiro blushed. "I'm still not used to all this."
"It's like fighting. You don't think about it, you just do it," Ai asserted.
---------------------
Standing before the slightly run down structure, Jiro and Ai appraised the
house that would soon be their home.
"Definitely will need some work," Ai groused.
"Well, it has been abandoned since the last couple who lived here died of food
poisoning," Jiro reminded.
Ai let out a hollow laugh. "I hope that's not an omen for us. I'm hardly a good
cook. And these people don't
have ramen for me to buy."
"I'm not any better." Jiro looked around and noticed there were some people
watching them. He wanted to sigh,
but held it in. He opened the door. "Well, Dear, it's time for us to move in."
Ai blinked. "Huh?" She then 'eeped' as she was picked up and carried into the
house. "What are you doing?" she
hissed.
"Keeping up appearances." Jiro kicked the door shut before setting the girl
down. "We are newlyweds and the
locals were watching us."
"Oh." Ai huffed. "I hope they don't expect us to be making out like mad or crap
like that."
Jiro shook his head. "We do have a sense of modesty to maintain, but they
should see us holding hands and doing
little things for each other."
"Let's just see what the rest of this dump looks like." Ai scrunched her nose.
"I hope they took the bodies
out."
"I think they'll understand if we open up the windows." Jiro promptly let in
some fresh air and gave a sheepish
wave to the smiling townsfolk. "This town is perhaps too small."
---------------------
Jiro firmly believed the town was far too small for his liking. In a matter of
days he had learned more about
them than he knew about the Hyuuga clan.
Kuroari Daiku and his sixteen-years-old son, Mokkou, were the town carpenters.
Daiku's wife died in childbirth
delivering his second son, Shou, who was now eight-years-old. Kaji Tettsui
worked as the blacksmith, and he was
married with a four-year-old daughter and a newborn son. Ginkouka Terasen was
functionally the town mayor who
ran the local store and handled the business transactions for the local farmers
when they sold and traded goods
in Tsuji. Terasen was married to Teijo, and his only son lived in Tsuji with
his new wife while his daughter
died some years ago from illness. Hatago Honjin ran what passed for an inn.
While it was built to lodge
travelers, it functioned more to serve as a large home for Honjin's wife,
Saishi, and their four children, from
the oldest, an eight-year-old girl, to the youngest, a one-year-old boy.
Just as the townsfolk was ready to share any information about themselves, they
expected Jiro and Ai to be just
as open. A brief explanation of running away from disapproving parents had done
well to quite most of their
curiosity as it gave reason as to why they were being secretive. Still, any
information said to one person in
town was likely to be known by everyone before the end of the day.
Jiro mentally cursed as he watched Mokkou strut his way toward what was now the
Yamada household.
"Hi, Jiro. How's the repairs going?" Mokkou questioned.
"There's not much to repair. More cleaning that anything else," Jiro replied
evenly.
Ai walked out of the house holding a small throw rug. "Oh, hey, Mokkou. What's
up?"
Mokkou smiled brightly at the girl. "Was wondering if you needed any help?"
"Sure! You can beat the dust out of this." Ai promptly threw the rug at the
teenager.
Mokkou was struck in the chest by the rug and a cloud of dust erupted, causing
the teenage to start coughing.
Ai turned around. "Now to see if I find a broom."
Jiro smirked and followed his false wife. "I'll help you."
Mokkou pouted in disappointment.
---------------------
Ai awoke to the sight of a raven-haired young man sleeping next to her. Part of
her still wanted to freak at
the idea of a guy being in the same bed as her. At least they never did any
thing besides sleeping.
Pulling herself free of the bed, Ai shambled her way to the dresser in the
room. Opening it, she found clothes
that belonged to a dead woman, but were now hers to wear. She didn't
particularly like taking stuff from a
person she never met, even though the face she now wore was similarly stolen.
With a sigh, Ai stripped out of her nightgown. Before she could put any clothes
on her now naked form, she
jumped hearing her supposed husband wake up.
"Good morning," Jiro almost moaned out, paying little heed to the state of
undress of his faux wife.
"'Mornin'," Ai returned, rushing to put some clothes on. She knew Jiro was
rather familiar with the female
body, having been a girl originally, yet the idea of a guy seeing HER naked
brought up worries that the guy
might want to do THINGS. Things she certainly didn't want to do as a girl.
Jiro exited the bed and dropped the pants he had worn to bed as he prepared to
get dressed for the day.
Having been a guy originally, Ai knew the sight before her likely had more to
do with the need to go the
bathroom than her, but it still frightened her in ways she couldn't explain.
She dashed out of the room while
still working on the ties of her blouse.
---------------------
"Have you put any thought about what you'll be doing for money?" a middle-aged
man questioned, with gray hairs
noticeably accenting his black hair.
Jiro shifted uneasily. "Terasen-san, I'm not really sure. I went to school to
learn many different things,
but..."
"You never mastered any of them," Terasen finished. "It's good to know you at
least can do some first aid. The
town could certainly use your talents there, but such injuries don't happen
often enough to pay for all the
supplies you'll need. Especially if you make Ai a mother soon."
Jiro laughed nervously. There was certainly no chance of that happening, but he
would need money to make sure
both of them were fed. "Do you have any ideas, Terasen-san? I feel I'm already
living too much on the town's
generosity."
"I figured a 'jack-of-all-trades' could be useful in not doing any single job,
but in being on call to the town
for jobs where help is needed." Terasen pulled out some papers and looked them
over. "For example, the
Hyakushou family has been having a little trouble on their farm. Seems a wild
boar has seen fit to eat from
their crops."
"You want me to hunt the boar?" Jiro wondered a little nervously.
Terasen laughed. "You look strong, boy, but that boar is a monster. What I was
asking is if you'd help the
Hyakushou and Kuroari families to erect a fence around their crops."
"I can certainly help working on that." Jiro nodded. While hunting the boar
shouldn't be too much of a problem
for him, showing he knew how to fight could lead to questions he couldn't
answer.
---------------------
"Hi, Teijo," Ai greeted walking into the local store. "How's things?"
"My, what an interesting way of speaking," the middle-aged woman commented.
"Yeah, and your husband says the same thing," Ai retorted. "You try living on
the streets of a city and see
what it does for you."
"Terasen does speak his mind," Teijo mentioned fondly. "You may be rough, but
you're certainly a breath of
fresh air. I've never met a girl quite like you."
"That's for sure." Ai began to look at the store shelves to see what she could
do for food later. "Wish I paid
more attention to how ramen was made."
"You certainly seem to love it, but I've never tried it before. What's good
about it?" Teijo wondered.
Ai smirked. "I could go on about many things, from noodle texture to the broth,
but the real reason is that
it's cheap. I can get twice as much ramen as I could any other food in the
city."
Teijo nodded slowly. "I see. Price would've been an issue for you."
"Yeah. Ya gotta make do with what ya got." Ai began selecting supplies.
Teijo appraised the girl. "Have you given any thought to doing any crafts?"
Ai blinked. "Crafts?"
"While the men don't want to admit it, us women have to help them out. We make
little trinkets and such to sell
in Tsuji. Saishi is quite good at making paintings. If it wasn't for her,
Honjin and their children would've
starved to death." Teijo smiled at the girl. "So what are you good at?"
Ai didn't move for a while. "I... I beat people up. Bad people, of course, but
that's what I did to survive. I
couldn't have survived on the streets without learning how to fight."
Teijo looked aghast. "You beat people up?"
"Tsuji has had trouble with crime, haven't they?" Ai shot at her.
"Regrettably, yes." Teijo nodded.
"Now imagine a little girl, alone, on those streets with no one to protect her.
If I couldn't beat up a guy,
I'd end up with worse than a broken bone or somethin'," Ai groused. "I had to
fight in order to save myself."
Teijo covered her mouth with her hand. She had heard about some rapes in Tsuji
recently. "Has any guy...
defeated you?"
"Only to Jiro, but I let him," Ai lied with a devilish grin, while her stomach
wanted to lurch at the thought
of 'losing' to any guy.
Teijo laughed. "Well, I know who to call on if we have any trouble. My husband
could use such help when we send
goods to Tsuji."
Ai shrugged. "Don't expect too much from me. Most idiots that want to hurt a
girl are weak cowards. Show them a
bit of strength, and they run away."
"That's good, I guess." Teijo nodded cautiously. "But fighting won't put food
on the table. Nor will it help if
you've got a little one in you."
Ai shuddered in revulsion.
Teijo frowned. "Not ready for motherhood?"
"I... It's... That's just scary." Ai's body continued to shake. "I mean..."
"I won't lie to you. Having a baby is certainly scary. I understand you've
never had to rely on anyone but Jiro
before, nor had anyone rely on you." Teijo sighed grandmotherly. "A baby would
change that. You'll be relied on
for everything, and loved beyond anything you've ever known."
Ai looked away from the woman. "Can't I get used to the idea of being married
first? All of this is so new to
me as it is. That is more than I can handle."
Teijo walked around the counter and grabbed the girl's hands. "I promise I
won't bring this up again until you
ask me about it. However, if you think you might be pregnant, please talk to
me. I'll help you."
Ai looked at the woman with watering eyes. She tried to fight the tears, not
certain why they were forming in
the first place.
Teijo frowned, pulling the girl into a hug. "Have I hurt you?"
Ai shook her head. "I... I don't know why I'm crying."
---------------------
Jiro tried to fall asleep, but was finding it a difficult prospect with the way
Ai kept moving around in the
bed. "What's the problem?"
Ai hadn't looked at him the entire night. "You know we're never going to have
sex, right?"
Jiro flinched before he blushed and turned away from her. "I have no plans on
being a father."
"I never want to have kids. I don't think I could possibly handle them. Someone
relying on me completely and
totally?" Ai shuddered. "I've been by myself for so long. I've never had anyone
in my life who acted like a
mother to me. And the idea of being with you... It all just scares me. I don't
like either of us even being
naked together."
Jiro gritted his teeth and he pulled himself out of the bed. "I understand.
I'll be in the guest room."
Ai just curled up into a ball, wondering briefly if this was how her fake
husband felt just after becoming a
guy. She had avoided thinking about being a girl, focusing on other tasks, but
then Teijo kept talking about
babies. Guys don't get pregnant.
---------------------
Jiro tiredly arrived home after working most of the day erecting a fence for
the Hyakushou farm. He frowned,
smelling nothing cooking. He soon found the house empty. A myriad of
possibilities raced through his mind, from
Ai running to Konoha to get her real body back to Akatsuki somehow discovering
the girl held a tailed demon and
ambushing her.
As Jiro searched the house, the notion of Ai running away became increasingly
unlikely. No clothes were
missing, and what little money they had remained in it's hiding place. There
was no sign of struggle either,
but if the Akatsuki managed to completely catch Ai unaware, they might've
caught her without a fight.
Jiro checked one last thing and punched the wall in annoyance. He now knew
exactly where Ai was. A couple of
the scrolls Tsunade had given them were missing.
Muttering under his breath, Jiro walked to the kitchen. He immediately started
on dinner, and pointedly made
only enough for himself.
Ai dragged herself into the house just as Jiro finished eating what he had made.
"Have fun?" Jiro asked snidely.
"Training is training," Ai groused. "Granny included some great stuff though.
It'll take me a week just to get
through the first scroll." Her stomach then growled. "So, what's for dinner?"
"Make it yourself," Jiro shot at her, dropping his dirty plates in the sink
before stomping off.
Ai folded her arms. "What got up his crack?"
---------------------
Everyone was back in the conference room, listening to the tale that Naruto and
Hinata, or rather Ai and Jiro,
were telling.
Sakura massaged her forehead. "Talk about misunderstandings."
"You ain't kidding," Ai laughed.
"Did you two ever come to some understanding?" Sakura questioned.
"Don't get ahead of this," Tsunade intoned with Ai mockingly copying her.
Sakura scowled at the reprimand.
"We lived together for over a year-and-a-half," Ai reminded. "Misunderstandings
happened a lot, but we
certainly had time to work things out." She then giggled. "In fact it was our
next misunderstanding that got us
through our first one."
"Oh?" Sakura wondered.
Ai nodded. "But first... bathroom! Be right back."
Sakura's head crashed against the table.
"Now would be a good time for a break," Tsunade mentioned before walking out of
the room to stretch.
---------------------
Chapter 4: Abnormal Normalcy
Ai and Jiro try to set up daily routines, but life and situations don't seem to
allow for that.
Thank you all for your reviews. I haven't received this many on any of my works
since my Red Digivice Diaries.
I probably wouldn't have posted this chapter so soon without your comments and
critism.
Thanks to Jeremy Mullin for prereading this. I don't thank him enough for all
the help he has given me.
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