75Title: Strays
Summary: Naruto finds a dog door installed in a quiet, clean apartment, for the village's stray dogs. The flap is pretty big, and as it turns out, children can also fit inside. Naruto further tests this by shoving Shikamaru through as Sasuke watches on in mild confusion.
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Shikamaru looks up when a shadow falls over him.
Naruto peers down at the sprawled boy, blue eyes wide. "Are you...is there no one to pick you up?"
The Academy grounds are quiet, most of the children having run screaming as soon as possible. Shikamaru can see teachers hunched over stacks of paper through the staff room window. The small grassy hill he's lying on is a rather good vantage point.
Naruto has been quietly creeping closer to Shikamaru for the past fifteen minutes and now flops down beside him. "I'll stay with you," Naruto proclaims. "So you don't get lonely and stuff."
Shikamaru sighs and lazily follows a cloud passing above them with his eyes. "My family is setting up a surprise birthday party. I'm staying here to give them enough time."
Naruto folds his hands over his chest and stays quiet for six minutes, which is two more than Shikamaru expected.
"How do you know it's a surprise?" Naruto blurts out. "A surprise is a surprise; you can't know about it!"
"They're bad at keeping secrets."
"I bet they make awful ninja," Naruto says seriously.
Shikamaru thinks of his dad, the Jonin Commander. "Yeah. Horrendous."
Naruto rolls over, elbow jabbing Shikamaru in the side with a flail. "How long do you have? Do you want to play ninja?"
Shikamaru hums and makes a guess based off previous experiences. "Hour. Hour and a half." If he's being optimistic.
"Let's make it an assassination!" Naruto cheers, bouncing up to his feet. "My code name is Hokage!"
Shikamaru closes his eyes and plays dead. Unfortunately, Naruto has come to the conclusion that the best way to move a Nara is to do it physically. Shikamaru is hauled over thin and bony shoulders but he commits to it and stays limp.
Naruto has a very one-sided conversation with his mission partner as they take off for the market, but the blond talks enough for two people anyway so it doesn't really matter.
Naruto isn't very stable on the rooftops while carrying another boy, so they end up sneaking through the market on the ground. It's less sneaking and more Naruto tiptoes his way along the side of buildings, theatrically looking around like he's expecting someone to chase him.
People give them weird looks for the dead Nara.
Shikamaru raises his head when he catches sight of blue and white, eyes landing on Sasuke. The Uchiha is clutching a bag of tomatoes to his chest and is very pointedly not looking at them.
"Help," Shikamaru says flatly.
Sasuke pouts. Or maybe glares. It's hard to tell with such cute chubby cheeks. Sometimes Shikamaru thinks the girls are understandable when they coo at the Uchiha, but then they start the unholy screeching and he thinks Ino needs to be exorcised.
Naruto's head whips around and locks onto Sasuke too. He first looks angry, then conflicted, but still jogs over. "Teme! We're on an assassination."
"You're never going to graduate," Sasuke deadpans.
Which is pretty realistic considering how the current situation looks. Naruto, however, takes this as a challenge.
"You can be the target!" Naruto cries. "I'll kill you, then we'll see who graduates!"
Sasuke scoffs. "I don't have time to play games with you, I'm going to do real training with my Aniki later."
"Actually," Shikamaru cuts in with a drawl. "Running fake missions is a good way to prepare tactics for a real one, and sparring with a new opponent is better than falling into a routine with a usual partner."
Please, Shikamaru says with his eyes. He's too excitable, don't leave me alone with Naruto.
Sasuke pouts again. "...okay. Just until my Aniki gets home. Let me put my tomatoes back though."
"I know where you can leave it," Naruto says, bouncing on his feet in excitement. "This way!"
Sasuke follows, occasionally glancing at Shikamaru like he wants to ask why the Nara is being carried but doesn't want to know the answer. They leave the market district and wind deeper into the housing sector.
The village preaches intermingling of shinobi and civilian but there's clear segregation and Naruto is leading them through shinobi apartments. Stronger frames, larger windows, landlords who won't complain about tenants banging around at two in the morning or bloody tracks through the hallways.
Naruto pauses outside one apartment building, looks both ways and then ducks around the small back alley.
"Teme," Sasuke snaps quietly, wavering at the entrance. "Where are we going?"
"Putting your stupid tomatoes away!" Naruto calls back as he slides around some bins, but he stays relatively quiet as well.
Sasuke looks around, huffs and (gently) storms after the two. Naruto stops outside an apartment door, just before the alley feeds back into a main road, the door having a large dog flap in it. He drops Shikamaru off his shoulders and stuffs the Nara through the flap.
"What," Sasuke deadpans.
Naruto drops down and wriggles through as well. Shikamaru is splayed awkwardly where he was shoved in, refusing to get up because he's gotten used to being carried around and now feels lazier than ever. He remains on the floor while taking stock of the apartment.
It's empty, bare walls and no decorations or personal items left around. The door opens up to a living room and kitchen fusion, with a hallway further down probably leading to the bedroom and bathroom. It's clean enough but the furniture is very worn down.
Probably because of the dogs, a large scruffy one that might be a Labrador curled up on one couch cushion. A little matted one, some mixed breed of black and grey, is frozen with its head in a large food bowl attached to the wall. There's also a water bowl, both with containers hanging above to automatically refill when the level drops in the bowls.
Both dogs are strays, obvious by their dirty coats and small but numerous injuries that most strays acquire on the streets. The Inuzuka generally take in strays but Konoha is a large place and some dogs are liable to bite when humans get too close, regardless of intentions.
"What," Sasuke says again from outside the door.
"Come in," Naruto urges.
"That's not your apartment," Sasuke snaps and sounds a bit like he hates himself for that knowledge.
To be fair, Naruto talks a lot, and there's only so much babble about being Hokage the boy can spew out without at least mentioning his home once.
"It's like mine," Naruto says, looking away. "The orphanage owns it but no one lives here." Naruto huffs and shoves an arm out of the flap. "Give me the stupid tomatoes, I'll put them away."
Sasuke eventually crawls inside because some things are more important than pride. How unfortunate that such a thing is a bunch of tomatoes.
The little dog has gone back to eating, the big one panting quietly with a tongue lolling out.
"Leave it on the counter and let's go," Naruto says, sliding over to pet the dog on the couch.
Sasuke frowns. "I'm putting it in the fridge."
"It'll zap you," Naruto argues, fingers buried in fur clumped together by dirt. "With the glowing squiggles."
Shikamaru sits up. "Seals?"
"Whatever," Naruto whines. "Let's goooo."
Sasuke still tries the fridge door and yelps when a small seal on the left door activates, snatching his hand back. "It zapped me!"
"I told you so!"
"Shut it, Dobe!"
They end up dropping the tomatoes off on top of the fridge because Sasuke is paranoid the dogs will eat it. Shikamaru is stuffed back through the flap and they head off to play ninja. They don't assassinate anyone but a passing chunin almost gets stabbed by a wild throw from Sasuke so Naruto counts it as a success.
Shikamaru is still too early for the birthday party.