Naruto: Dreaming of Sunshine

The world is a looking glass and gives back to every man the reflection of his own face. ~ William Makepeace Thackeray

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When we arrived at the palace, it was late at night, and there were a whole bunch of guards running around. They weren't aimless; they definitely had a purpose and a destination.

"That doesn't look good," I noted. There was nothing immediately wrong at first glance – no fires or fighting – and there were no alarm bells or warning shouts. But the tension in the air suggested this was no drill.

"Hey!" Naruto shouted, flagging a guard down. "What's going on here?"

"Who are you and what are you doing on the palace grounds?" the guardsman demanded in return, tightening his grip on his polearm. He caught sight of Chishima and seemed to recognise him. "No, never mind. Just stay out of the way! The Cursed Warrior has been sighted."

That was exactly what we wanted to hear. Or no, I would have preferred a little time to scout around and question people first, but it was a pretty lucky break, all things considered.

"Awesome," Naruto said, following pretty much the same train of thought. "Let's go check it out!"

We followed the stampeding of the guards towards whichever location they were heading, dragging Chishima with us. It was a little risky to be dragging him to a place where there was known trouble, but I was confident we'd be able to protect him, in a way we couldn't if we just left him behind.

It was likely we'd need him to explain our presence, as well, since we hadn't had time to introduce ourselves to anyone else.

"Send a patrol out the east gate and check the forest. Make sure a team has been dispatched to guard the Daimyo!" The orders were directed at the force of guards from and older man with impressive sideburns who was standing barefoot on the wooden veranda. He was wearing sleeping clothes with a robe hastily thrown over top, though that didn't seem to diminish his professionalism any.

I rather approved.

"That's Komei-sama," Chishima said, bracing himself against the wall and breathing heavily. The brief sprint might have been a little too much for him.

"Stay here," I said, because it was safe enough, and we leapt up the wall and started running along the rooftops, overtaking the guardsmen as they ran towards the gates. We fanned out, maximising the area we could search without losing contact with each other, and swept the area.

The security response might have been good in terms of defence but the sheer number of people provided cover and erased any signs that might have let us track it. The ground had been stamped down by heavy military boots and it was impossible to tell if any tracks had been left behind.

Then –

"There, up above!" I said.

It hovered against the night sky. A figure, clad all in white with a helmet and a halberd in hand, with the mask of a demon, just as Chishima had described it to us.

And while there were ninja techniques to achieve flight, or the semblance of it, I could see why this ruse had been so convincing to people.

It was almost drifting eerily away on the breeze.

In the dark it was almost impossible to pick up on the tell-tale strings holding it aloft. I couldn't even see what the strings were attached to, since there wasn't anything above us. In its own way, that kind of fakery was a type of ninjutsu – it was the only type that would have existed in my old world.

We converged together, aiming to follow it wherever it landed. There was no doubt that the Cursed Warrior saw us in return, for it abruptly dropped low, angling towards the ground and vanishing from our sight.

I burst forward, pouring on the speed. The vibrations of the roof underfoot told me that the others were doing the same. We had it now – we weren't going to let it get away.

We were well out of the palace grounds, and the housing was giving way to forest. It made sense that the Cursed Warrior would head towards a deserted area to hide, but trying to escape Konoha ninja in a forest was a mistake.

"Just give up!" Naruto hollered. "We found you! We know you're not a real ghost!"

The forest gave way to a small clearing where there was an abandoned and disused shrine. It was fairly big, with a courtyard surrounded by high walls. The doors were wide open and I caught the briefest of glimpses as the figure in white ducked inside. I locked onto the chakra signature, which was faint and untrained, but definitely real.

Gotcha.

Sai and I circled around the shrine, just to make sure there was nothing else there, even as Naruto made a bee-line for the door. It didn't feel like a trap but, then, that was the best kind, wasn't it?

"It's empty?" Naruto said, puzzled, screeching to a stop in the middle of the shrine. He spun around and around, eyes getting wider and wider.

I slid in through the open door and let my eyes adjust to the even dimmer interior. We could probably have used torches or seals to create light and track the Cursed Warrior based on footprints in the dust, but I still had a lock on their chakra.

"Trap door," I said. "They're below us."

Below us and moving, which indicated tunnels. Clever. They could come and go without being seen, and it would appear as if the Cursed Warrior simply vanished.

It took us a few minutes to find the location of the trap door and to pry it up. I pulled out three LED seals for us, and we dropped down into the pitch blackness of the tunnel. Well, there was actually a ladder, but it wasn't so deep that we needed to use it.

"If the tunnel continues in this direction," Sai pointed out as we cautiously started moving. "We will return to the palace grounds."

"Interesting," I said, because he was absolutely right. Then again, all our main suspects for starting the rumours all lived in the palace anyway, so perhaps it wasn't so far-fetched.

Even if we were warily looking out for traps – of which we found none – we still caught up with the Cursed Warrior long before the tunnel reached its end. And in a tunnel, with a little bit of light, was close to a perfect set up for my shadow jutsu.

"We caught you!" Naruto crowed.

The Warrior tried to struggle, but they had no resistance to my jutsu. I reached up, awkwardly managing to undo the catches of the helmet and pulled it free.

Long black hair tumbled free, framing the angry face of a young woman. She was in her late teens, maybe not quite twenty.

"Uh," Naruto asked, hand coming up to cup his chin. "Who are you?"

She clearly wasn't anyone we'd met here. But since we'd been in the palace for all of five minutes before giving chase, that wasn't surprising. We could have just dragged her up and found her identity that way – but given that the situation looked a lot deeper than 'someone is dressing up as a ghost' I didn't particularly want to do that.

At least, we could talk to her first.

"Let me free!" she spat. "You have absolutely no idea what you are meddling with!"

"Hey!" Naruto protested immediately. "What's the big idea? You're the one running around pretending to be a ghost and scaring everyone! Lots of people are really worried about this."

"It's regrettable," she said, and however regrettable she found it, it wasn't enough to sway her. "But necessary. You wouldn't understand."

"So tell us what's going on," I suggested quietly, trying to sound as reasonable and approachable as possible. It was a little difficult when I was actually the one holding her hostage. "We're ninja from Konoha who were hired to discover the truth behind the situation. We can help you."

She gave a short, bitter laugh. "You were hired by Mousou to do his bidding. He just wants me silenced. What does the truth matter to you?"

Interesting. So she was informed enough to know who had sent for us. Probably not working for him, though, with that amount of scorn.

"Problems that aren't resolved correctly have a habit of resurfacing," I said, trying to pick the angle that would most appeal to her. Since I had no idea what her motive was, it was a little tricky. "We hardly want it said that we failed in our mission."

Self-interest was a believable motive, right? Presented that way, it made it seem that we were open to being swayed by the truth. It was a fine line, but our mission briefing had been about finding the truth, and not about aiding in a cover up.

"This situation is greater than merely that of ghosts and rumours," she said. "You have no right to interfere with it."

"Well tough," Naruto said, crossing his arms. "We're here now, so you've just gotta deal with that."

Immovable object, meet unstoppable force.

But this kind of argument could get very messy.

"Is this," I said slowly. This would be a leading question. If I was right, it would probably help us. If I was wrong, I was giving her an option to deceive us. "About the assassinations?"

"You know," she said, and her voice cracked and broke. A shiver wracked her body, and though I couldn't see it in the darkness, I could feel it through my jutsu, a ghost of a feeling.

"What assassinations?" Naruto asked, alarmed. His eyes went wide. "Did someone really kill the old Daimyo?"

"He was murdered," she said. "Killed in cold blood. I know it to be true! I will find out who is responsible. I will have vengeance!"

Carefully, I let the shadow around her feet fade out. I could catch her again, if she made to flee. Or attack. But we had her now, in a much realer sense, and we would learn much more from conversation than from fighting.

"That's awful," Naruto said. "What happened? And who are you, anyway?"

She sighed, a deep rattling thing. Her eyes closed, briefly, in contemplation. I could tell the minute she gave in and decided to work with us. Or to try and use us. "This is not the place for that discussion. Come with me."

She turned and continued walking down the tunnel. I fell into step easily. There was only one pathway, so only one exit. Unless there was a trap waiting for us at the end – and I had my sensing on full alert just to make sure there wasn't – there was no harm in relocating.

She carefully shed the armour of the Cursed Warrior, leaving it in the tunnel, before ascending up the ladder. "It belongs in the abandoned temple," she said, by way of explanation. "There is no time to return it, but it is too much risk to have it in my rooms."

Almost surprisingly, the ladder came out in an opulent room. I didn't know where I had expected it to lead, but this wasn't it. The trap door was hidden beneath a low table, and we rolled awkwardly out from beneath it. When it was closed it was indistinguishable from the tatami flooring.

Very neat.

But the room itself…

This was a tunnel built right into the heart of the palace – a way for the royal family to escape, should it ever be brought under siege. Likely one of the most guarded secrets of the land.

"Wow," Naruto said. "This is almost as nice as Yukie's palace."

It was a living room, wide open spaces and plentiful seating. From beyond the shogi doors I could hear the gentle clinking of a zen garden water-piece. There was a fireplace and mantle, and above it a giant painted portrait of a family. The Daimyo's family, clearly, if the robes the man was wearing was any indication. There were two young, identical ten year olds in the picture. The picture was several years old.

And several pieces of information clicked into place.

"Chishima said that Toki died," I murmured, staring at the painting.

The young woman – Toki herself – sat in seiza across the table. There was a pocket watch on it, one she picked up and flicked open.

"Toki is dead," she said. "All that remains is a ghost seeking vengeance for those that are gone."

"What?" Naruto repeated. "You're the princess? But how come you're alive? What happened to Sagi?"

"I know not whether they meant to kill me," she said. "Or whether Sagi was the true target of the attack. But he- he died all the same."

Tears glistened in her eyes, but the rest of her expression was iron hard. Her fingers curled over the watch.

"Toki is not a person that holds any power in this court," she continued, eyes low. "Toki alone could never have discovered the truth, nor brought the guilty to justice. But Sagi is the Daimyo. Sagi has the freedom. I believed that."

I took a second to wrap my head around that. That was a mind-trip. Her brother, her twin had been murdered, and every second since she had lived in his place, pretended to be him. Every second had to be a reminder that he was dead.

I couldn't even imagine…

What if Shikamaru died? I'd been twinless Before. But that was different. I'd been a different person then. This life, this lifetime, was so woven around him. He was everywhere, in every memory I had, part of every skill and talent. They all linked back to him, inextricable.

If he died… there would be so many empty holes in my world. Empty places, the shape of a brother. His absence would be as noticeable as his presence.

I tried, for a second to imagine that. Then I tried to imagine myself filling those holes with myself, to convince everyone else that he was not dead.

My skin crawled.

"It didn't work," I said. She wouldn't have needed to go to these lengths, to dress up and run around at night, if she'd been able to go through legal methods.

"No," Toki said, admitting defeat. "Sagi has less power than I thought. Mousou controls the court now and Komei the militia. I played the part of the cursed warrior, instead, in hopes of discovering who was behind the assassinations. It is an old legend in this palace, that only a ghost can gain true vengeance."

"We'll help you," Naruto declared boldly.

"That is not our mission objective," Sai said mildly, almost sounding like he was saying it just for forms sake. It was the first time he had spoken since we had found Toki, and that was being quiet, even for him.

"Sure it is," Naruto replied. "Our mission was to stop the ghost, so if we find out who is behind the assassinations, then all the ghost sightings will stop."

I considered that to be a fairly sound argument, really. More so than some of the things we'd done.

"Have there been more assassination attempts since?" I asked. "Against you?"

Toki shrugged, carelessly. "Some. But none have led back to the culprit. I have fought them, and I have chased them, and nothing has been accomplished."

I reassessed how well I thought she was dealing. That was a very deep well of apathy, right there. An astonishing disregard for her own life. Even if she did gain vengeance and discover the truth, what did she have then?

"Maybe one of us should stay with you," Naruto suggested, giving me a slightly wide eyed look. "So that you don't get hurt."

"The only reason I continue this shameful existence," Toki said. "Is so that I can get my revenge. Once that is done, I can perish for all it matters."

"Hey! Don't say things like that," Naruto cut her off. "There are heaps of reasons that you shouldn't die. What about your friends? This country? You're supposed to be the Daimyo, right? Living only for revenge is no life at all."

"You have no idea what it feels like to lose everything you hold dear," Toki spat at him, suddenly. "You have no idea-"

I do, I thought, and didn't say. Every person, every place, every story and song and-

But that wasn't something I could share with her, to ease her pain, to show sympathy. It just left me feeling old and tired.

"You're right!" Naruto shouted back, interrupting the gathering pity party. "I don't know! But I do know that you shouldn't just give up because of it."

I shushed him, and swept my senses out to make sure that no one had heard and was coming. Alone, we might have been, but I didn't think people were truly that far away. And if there had been assassination attempts, then the guards would be on alert for noises coming from the Daimyo's rooms.

Naruto shook his head, as if shaking the argument itself off. "Shikako, you stay here with her tonight, okay? Me and Sai will go back and find Chishima."

I nodded. I wasn't exactly thrilled to be on body guard duty and not be investigating things, but better me than Sai. Whatever his secret mission from Danzo was, leaving him alone with a Daimyo was asking for trouble. "Stick together, okay? And be careful what you say to Mousou –"

"You cannot tell him," Toki interrupted, eyes fierce. "If the identity of the Cursed Warrior is revealed, then I will never be able to discover the truth." Her hand went to her side, where the sword of the Warrior would have hung, as if she were prepared to offer an ultimatum at swordpoint.

"I get it," Naruto said impatiently. "They'll try even harder to kill you if they know you know. And that's not going to happen. We're going to protect you and find out the truth!"

Whether she wanted it or not.

I covered an amused smile.

"Do as you will," Toki said. "As long as you do not interfere with my search."