Chapter Text
Naruto stared despondently at the small sheet of paper, forehead creased and hair matted with sweat. He had been trying to use what Iruka-sensei had said was “chakra,” which was the thing that all ninjas used. It seemed like everybody else in class had gotten the small “explosion tag” to erupt in harmless glitter fairly quickly, even the girls who seemed more preoccupied with congratulating Sasuke than actually trying it themselves.
Yet all he had gotten for his efforts was a sheet of paper that seemed to not change no matter what he did to it. He tried closing his eyes and concentrating, the way Iruka-sensei demonstrated it. When he had grown sufficiently bored of that, he moved on to glaring at the sheet of paper, willing the elusive chakra to move into it. And finally, he had started to silently beg in his head for the sheet to just do something, anything. He would even take a single piece of glitter.
It didn’t help that after a while, everybody seemed to notice that he was the only one who hadn’t been able to activate the seal. While most were content to leave after making one or two snide remarks about the “dead-last,” some of the other students stayed behind just to see him struggle. And even though Naruto was used to the negative attention, for some reason he felt even more hung up over this failure than the others.
Maybe it was the fact that, unlike in history, this was an actual skill he could see being used in the field. Iruka-sensei had said that chakra was the foundation of being a ninja; without it, you were as good as a civilian.
Eventually, even Iruka-sensei seemed to grow tired of his lack of success. “Why don’t I take you out for some ramen, Naruto-kun. I just finished up my grading for the day.” The mention of grading made Naruto grit his teeth in frustration. He was sure that today, like yesterday and the day before and the day before that, he would be getting a “needs improvement.”
“I swear I’ve almost got this, Iruka-sensei!” he says. “Just gimme five more minutes.” He closes his eyes again, concentrating on the feeling of energy moving from his core to the tag. He hears whispering around him, can almost feel Iruka-sensei’s pity.
Please, please, please work…
Just this once…
I wanna be able to do something right.
Bang!
Startled, Naruto opens his eyes to the silver glitter falling around him, mouth opening in happiness. “Finally! I told you I could get it. Believe it!” He jumps up in his excitement, waving his arms around. He grins so brightly that he can barely see his surroundings.
After a minute, he notices the classroom’s silence, and turns to where Iruka-sensei is biting his lip. Naruto looks around, confused, before he notices the paper seal still clutched in his hand, when it should’ve dissolved after the glitter explosion. He turns, and notices a small group of girls growing red from trying to hold in their snickers. Once they realize that he’s looking at them, their laughter bursts forth, causing the other remaining students to start laughing as well.
Naruto feels his face beginning to burn, and he begins to run out of the classroom, ignoring Iruka-sensei’s calls. He winds his way through the streets, bumping into civilians who look at him in thinly-veiled disgust, trying to take enough breaths to keep his tears down until he can lay down in his crappy bed underneath his worn-down blankets.
He barely makes it inside his apartment, shutting his door with a resounding bang! He tries to remember the things Jiji and Iruka-sensei used to tell him to do when his emotions got too strong, but he can still feel the glitter exploding on his face, his excitement, and then the realization that it was just a cruel prank played on him.
He bursts into tears, large, unattractive ones. He knows his crying face is ugly, and he’d been told off for crying enough times at the orphanage to know that it never fixed any problems. But even though he knows it won’t change the fact that he embarrassed himself in front of his classmates and Iruka-sensei (probably the rest of the village as well, since gossip always traveled fast in Konoha, especially when it concerned Naruto), he can’t helped but crawl under his covers and clutch his worn dog plushie, the only stuffed animal he owns, and heaving sob after sob after sob.
He must fall asleep like that, clutching at the only stuffed animal that seemed to survive the villagers’ raids during October 10th, his sobbing slowly zapping away at the last of his strength.
He wakes up sputtering out water. He coughs roughly, forcing the last of the liquid out of his lungs. He stands up, and notices that the water reaches up to his shoulders. It’s murky, so dirty that he can’t even see the rest of his body below him. His movement causes ripples around him, and as he follows them out, the small ripples disrupt much, much bigger ones.
Naruto’s eyes move up
and up
and two red eyes glare at him from behind a prison door.
“Leave me, wretched child.”
Naruto opens his eyes to a shadowy figure leaning over his blanket. He begins to panic, tossing out limbs in an attempt to hit the person, before the blanket is lifted over his eyes and he sees Iruka-sensei.
“It’s me, Naruto-kun! I stopped by because, well… I was worried about you. I brought take-out from Ichiraku’s.” The teacher gestures to six steaming bowls of ramen on the table.
Despite all the crying from before, Naruto feels tears well up in his eyes again, and Iruka wastes no time in enveloping him in a crushing hug.
In between bites of ramen, Naruto tries to not think about the water or the prison door or the two eyes that stared at him, filled with the same kind of hatred he saw every time he left his apartment.
Iruka-sensei stays at his place for a long time, far longer than normal, even after they’ve finished off the ramen bowls, cleaned up the (rather impressive) stack of dishes, and put a small load of laundry in the washer. He doesn’t even mention what happened earlier, or the fact that Naruto and he have class the next day and really shouldn’t be staying up this late.
Eventually, once he was sufficiently convinced that Naruto was feeling at least a little bit better, he left for his own apartment, promising to take Naruto out for ramen the next night as well. Even though Naruto knew it was pity for earlier, or guilt for not stopping the prank before it happened, he still watched Iruka-sensei leave with a smile.
Once he left, though, and Naruto was in his bed again, clutching at his dog plushie, his mind drifted towards those eyes. Was it just a dream? A nightmare?
Except Naruto knew what his nightmares were like. They were filled with faces of people he knew. They almost always took place in Konoha. And they were rarely that short. Or confusing.
Wretched child, the thing had called him. That was another thing that didn’t add up. People only ever called him a monster in his nightmares.
Leave me, it had said. Not Get out of here! or What’s a monster doing with humans? or even Who let him in? Just leave me.
And lastly, perhaps most damningly, Naruto remembers seeing lines of ink around the prison door, more complex and intricate than his mind could ever make up.
“Everyone has chakra,” Iruka-sensei had explained, “The difference between shinobi and civilians is the ability to utilize that chakra. Every person is born with an innate amount, and while that amount can increase over time through rigorous training, a child’s base chakra amount can generally indicate how their chakra reserves will look in the future.”
“Seals are just another way of utilizing chakra. This,” he picked up one of the papers in front of him, “is an explosion tag. One of the benefits of sealing is that, so long as the original seal was properly made, anyone can use it without having to know how to create or replicate the seal. Explosion tags are one of the simplest seals out there, and are especially helpful when you don’t have enough chakra for a large explosion.” Iruka-sensei closed his eyes, holding the explosion tag an arm’s length away, and with a small bang! the tag went off, spraying the first row of students with glitter.
“The reason why it’s great for smaller chakra reserves is the fact that it can store chakra in the seal itself. Different explosion tags will either have more or less chakra stored in them, depending on their usage. For example, this one only takes a small amount of chakra to activate, as it’s meant to help you all practice actually using your chakra. More complex explosion tags might have less chakra stored in them, which allows for more choice on the user’s part to determine what size explosion they want.”
“What’s most important to know about seals as a whole, though, is the fact that they’re used for containment. Sealing scrolls are used for rations or supplies, explosion tags are used to seal, well, explosions, and even things like chakra stones have seals in them to contain back-up chakra.”
Naruto imagines the swirling lines on the prison door, forming a symmetrical, circular design.
He imagines the water, pooling around his shoulders, the ripples around him almost threatening to pull him under once again.
He imagines the red eyes, staring at him in disgust.
He opens his eyes, and on his stomach is a tangled mess of a seal he cannot comprehend.
Seals are made for containment.
Then what does this one contain?