For as long as she could remember, Tsukiko had always lived in the small village of Intai with her mother, Mitsuki, and younger brother, Shotatsu. It was located just outside the walls of the Village Hidden in the Leaves, away from the hustle and bustle the shinobi village created on a daily basis. Intai, despite being so close to this, was a relatively peaceful place, and a great place to grow up.
The village was small enough that everyone knew each other, and the two Akihana siblings often described the village as one big family. Everyone certainly acted like a family, at least. Tsukiko and Shotatsu found themselves playing the part of everyone's grandchildren or niece and nephew. Or, in the case of the only other person who had been their age in the village, a close friend. Perhaps even a brother and a sister. That person had been the one the two were closest to, while he had been alive.
So, it was to be expected that the siblings would feel upset when their mother announced that they would be moving back into Konoha. Both Tsukiko and Shotatsu hadn't been born in Intai; no, they were born in Konoha. In Tsukiko's case, she had lived there until she was three. But that was so long ago, and neither could remember it. It was with heavy hearts that they packed up their belongings and said goodbye to everyone in the shinobi retirement village that they had come to regard as family.
“It'll be an opportunity to meet others your age,” their mother, who happened to be a retired shinobi herself, had said as she smiled at the two when she had told them the news. “and you know that Konoha isn't far. You'll be able to visit everyone as often as you'd like.”
And even though neither Shotatsu or Tsukiko had protested this decision (verbally, at least), she continued on when neither looked too consoled with her words. “This move is necessary if either of you want to become shinobi. You want to put all of the training everyone here has offered you to use, don't you?”
She had smiled at the two of them when they gave incoherent, mumbled responses which translated to something along the lines of, “Yeah, I guess you're right.”
“We'll be moving in three days. That should give you both plenty of time to pack and say goodbye to everyone, okay? Please give Konoha a chance, I'm sure you two will love it there.”
So now, three days later, the family of three found themselves waiting patiently outside the large doors of Konoha. It didn't take long for the nin looking over their passes and identification papers to allow them entrance. With a slight nod from said shinobi, the other ninja who stood guard in front of the door stepped aside to allow them to pass.
Shotatsu and Tsukiko had made a silent agreement to show just how much they hated this by means of being silent and moody and as difficult as possible. It was one of the first things they had agreed on in over a year. Despite this, they couldn't help but look at the village in awe.
They knew that Konoha would be very different from Intai, but they hadn't expected Konoha to be this different. Both felt more than a little overwhelmed with just how big Konoha seemed to be, how many people there were, and how many different things seemed to be going on all at the same time.
'So this is what a real shinobi village is like' Tsukiko thought to herself, her eyes darting around from place to place, finding it impossible to take it all in at once. She felt that this was partially to blame on her left eye, which she hadn't been able to see out of it for the past year or so. There were short, random periods of time in which her vision returned to her, but even then all she could see were the vague shadow of shapes.
Shotatsu's thoughts were nearly the same; he went as far as to verbalize them with a simple, “Woah!”
Their mother, who had been watching and anticipating their actions, chuckled. When this caught the attention of the brother and sister, they tried to return to their previous level of moody-ness, but neither could bring themselves to resent the idea of living here anymore. In fact, now that they were actually here, it really didn't seem so bad. Like their mom said, they could visit everyone in Intai anytime they'd like, right? And both of them did really want to become shinobi....
“So, what do you two think?”
“I guess it's okay,” Tsukiko replied, trying not to sound too interested, and Shotatsu nodded in agreement.
“Where are we gonna be living?” the nine-year-old asked quickly after, craning his neck around as if looking for some sort of sign that would point to the place. His newfound interest wasn't quite as skillfully hidden as Tsukiko's was, but he didn't seem to care if it was or not. Unlike Tsukiko, he didn't care as much about not letting his mom have the satisfaction of knowing she had been right all along.
“Not that far,” Mitsuki, their mom, answered vaguely, a smile on her face now that she had gotten the reaction she wanted. “Our things are already there, so once we get there I want you two to unpack, got it? And Tsukiko, honey, what are you looking at?”
The last of their mother's words were added when she realized that her daughter was barely paying attention. She looked in the direction Tsukiko was looking in curiously.
“What is it, honey?”
“Hm...that guy,” she replied distractedly, and though her mother wasn't sure of what guy she was specifically talking about, she knew where her daughter was getting at. She rolled her eyes before Tsukiko could even voice the rest of her thoughts. “He's so...hot!”
Her eyes followed the mass of mousy brown hair as it walked into the crowd, a grin playing at her lips.
Shotatsu scrunched up his face, “Ew. Why d'ya always have to be such a pervert?”
Tsukiko chose to be as mature as possible with her response, and gave him the finger.
“Tsukiko!”
“Sorry, mom.”
It didn't take long for the three to get moving again. Apparently, their new...place of living (as Tsukiko called it to herself, as she couldn't bring herself to call it her home just yet) was near the center of the city. Tsukiko found that the farther into the city they got, the more crowded it got as well, and she made sure to keep an eye on her mother.
Back in Intai, her mother never was around this many people, so she was unsure of whether or not the older woman was used to maneuvering around this many people in her wheelchair. That was the reason they had lived in the retirement village in the first place; the disability that had forced their mother to give up her life as a shinobi. It happened not long after Shotatsu was born, when Tsukiko was only a little over three years old.
She could remember how confused she had been, when someone had told her that her mother wasn't a ninja anymore. She could also recall how upset she had been when she had seen her mother sleeping in the hospital bed, and saw how pale she looked. Tsukiko also clearly remembered how much more upset she had gotten when she first realized that a good portion of her mother's left leg was missing.
It hadn't taken Tsukiko long to realize just how difficult things might be for her mom now, even if just for a little while. It was around the time she turned 5 that she began taking an active role in helping around the house.
Though she couldn't do much at the time, she had been determined to do all she could to help out. Mostly, she helped with taking care of her little brother, who was quite a handful when he was younger.
'He still is', she thought to herself, glancing over at him. Tsukiko could tell that it was taking all of his self control not to start running around from place to place, now that he was hyped up about living here.
She had also been very active in her role as a big sister, and it didn't take long for her and her brother to become practically inseparable. Tsukiko frowned to herself when she thought of how quickly their relationship had deteriorated a little over a year ago.
She glanced over to Shotatsu again and her frown marring her face deepened when she thought of how she was the one to blame for this. A part of her constantly felt awful about it, and hoped that the relationship between her and her brother would someday get better...
Shotatsu turned his head back at her and stuck out his tongue when he caught his older sister staring at him.
...and sometimes she didn't.
This managed to draw her from her line of thoughts (she was really grateful, she wasn't fond of thinking too much about those things). Tsukiko glared and looked away. Her eyes fell on one building in particular when she did, and she eyed it with interest.
'Ichiraku's ramen...' she smiled to herself, making a note to go there sometime. She hadn't had ramen in quite awhile; her mother never made it too often because of how unhealthy it was. Seeing the ramen stand reminded her of her closest friend while in Intai, Koshi. When he was still alive, he had loved ramen. Personally, it wasn't exactly her favorite food, but she liked it all the same. How could she not like it, even just a little, after years of hearing Koshi talk nonstop about it?
Another thing that caught her attention was the kid in orange she saw when she looked at the ramen shop. It was hard not to notice him, with how much he stuck out from everything else she had seen thus far.
“Bastard! I'll beat you to a pulp for that!”
Tsukiko winced at the volume of his voice when he spoke. Despite the decent 20 yard distance from the ramen stand, it still sounded as if he was right next to her, screaming into her ear.
“Holy crap, that kid's loud,” Shotatsu commented, wincing himself. Both were equally glad when their mother told them to hurry up, and they got out of hearing range.
The place they would be living at wasn't too far away from Ichiraku's. It was an apartment, which made Tsukiko worry a little until her mother explained that their apartment was on the first floor.
Conveniently, it was one of the first apartments you reached upon entering the building, aside from the landlord's office and apartment. And true to what their mother had previously told them, all of their belongings were already in the apartment.
“Not bad,” Tsukiko said after taking a quick walk around the apartment. It had a full bathroom, a bedroom for each of the three Akihanas, a kitchen area, and a dining room. For an apartment, it was pretty large, too; it was almost the size of the entire one-story house the family had previously owned in Intai.
She noted, however, that there was a hole in the wall of the dining room which needed fixed. That was probably why the apartment had been so cheap, but it was something that could easily be fixed.
All in all, she liked the place and could see herself actually calling this 'home' in the near future. The second bedroom on the right down the hall, especially...
“I'm glad you think so,” their mom said sincerely. “Now, can you two help me put the boxes in the rooms the belong in? We can start unpacking as soon as that's done.”
Tsukiko was quick to grab one of the boxes labeled, 'Tsukiko's' and race towards the bedroom she already had her eye on. Shotatsu did the same after letting out an indignant, “Hey!”
“Tsukiko! No fair!”
“Shut up, Sho! I'm the oldest, so I get first pick!”
“Well, you're the ugliest too, but you're not bragging about that, are you?!”
“What did you say?!”
“Stop fighting, you two!” Their mother sighed heavily, though a glint of amusement shined in her light moss-green eyes. “...how did I know that something like that was going to happen?”
Unpacking had taken up the entire afternoon and evening, leaving Tsukiko unable to explore the village that day. The only thing the three had left to do was move their furniture to the appropriate places, and they would be completely settled in. Mitsuki had already called someone about fixing the wall, and that would be done sometime by the end of the week.
Tsukiko went to bed that night extremely tired, leaving her to wonder how she could still remain energetic after a few hours of training, but couldn't after unpacking a few measly boxes. It was one of the mysteries of the world, she guessed, and didn't have any time to think any further on it before she fell asleep.
The next morning, after she had helped her mother out of bed and had moved the furniture with Shotatsu's help, Tsukiko was getting ready to go out and take a look around the village. Shotatsu had left nearly a half an hour before, but Tsukiko had stayed behind to make sure her mom would be alright getting to the Hokage's building.
“Are you sure you'll be okay? I can walk with you, if you want. And how do you know he'll let me enter the Academy? Maybe I'm too old...”
Okay, so maybe Tsukiko knew that her mother was fully capable of getting from place to place herself. Admittedly, she mostly wanted to speak with her mother about what she and the Hokage were going to be meeting about.
Mitsuki had already spoken with the Hokage before the three had come the previous day, and all arrangements concerning their move were already taken care of. Today, however, she had to speak with him about what they were to do about Tsukiko and Shotatsu entering the Academy.
“I'm fine and I'll work everything out, stop worrying,” her mother ushered her out of the apartment building's door as best she could. “Go take a look around the village, and be back before dinner. I'll tell you everything then.”
“But-”
Her mother looked at her sternly. “Tsukiko.”
She pouted but said nothing more than, “Fine. I'll see you tonight, mom.” and walked off in the opposite direction of the Hokage's tower. It wasn't until she was a out of her mom's view before she punched the air and let out a big cheer.
“This place is awesome!”
Now that she was away from her mom, she felt safe enough to freely admit to what she had been thinking since she had actually seen the village first hand.
Her mom had been right in saying that she would love it there, but there was no way she was going to admit it to her. Tsukiko wouldn't be able to stand the 'I-told-you-so' look on her mother's face. She could imagine what her mom would say.
“See, and you were making such a big deal of all of this! You were acting as if Konoha would be absolutely horrible, but it isn't, is it?!”
Her mom could be really weird and excitable about that sort of thing, almost as if she were a kid herself again.
But she could see why her mother had loved growing up in this place so much, and why she was happy to be here again. Though she loved it back in Intai, Konoha was a really nice change of scenery. And even if she had yet to see even a small fraction of the village yet, Tsukiko could tell that she was going to love it here. She was sure that Koshi would have loved it here, too.
A few random people gave her a friendly smile as she passed, which she gladly returned. A few little kids ran past her, laughing loudly, and Tsukiko could remember a time when she and Shotatsu did things like that together.
“Now,” Tsukiko grinned to herself and pulled out some of the money her mother had given her earlier that day, “it's time to get some ramen!”
Tsukiko took a deep breath and she observed everything around her. Yeah, this place was definitely much different than Intai. But as she walked the short distance to the ramen stand, with money clenched in her fist, Tsukiko already felt herself beginning to feel at home here.
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Chapter notes: Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto or anything involved with the Naruto fandom, in any way, shape, or form. It all belongs to Masashi Kishimoto and whoever else may hold some copyright to it all. No copyright infringement is intended by this. Don't sue me. ._. I do, however, own Tsukiko. Yay.