A Change in Age (Part 2)

A continuation of this.

I decided to change the disconnected scenes into an actual story with plot. I'm actually surprised how well that worked out.

Warnings: Not part of the AtO storyline at all. Mostly an excuse to browse through the Naruto wikia and come up with random plots. Not edited thoroughly.

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Harry grimaced as he landed in the Hokage's office. “Is there a reason that I'm being shunshin-ed to and from my apartment?”
“It's best to be cautious with Naruto being so vulnerable.” Tsunade said, “We don't want people to know that he's been de-aged.”
“That's be difficult, since he looks so...” He paused when Tsunade grinned.  “What?”
“Since you've noticed the obvious problem with keeping his current form a secret. I'm sure you'll agree when I say that we need to disguise him.” Tsunade grabbed the bag that was on her desk and pulled out a few bottles.
“Disguise him?” Harry asked.
Tsunade nodded and moved towards Naruto. “Hide everything that could make people connect him to Naruto by disguising him to look like you.”
“Like me? You think making him look like me will make it safer for him?”
Tsunade gave Harry a look that he assumed said 'obviously, you fool, now shut up and let me work'.
Naruto shuffled away from Tsunade, looking at her distrustfully.
Tsunade turned back to Harry.
Harry rolled his eyes. “Naruto. We're going to play a game.”
Naruto looked up at him. “A game?”
“We're going to pretend to be undercover ninjas.”
“Ninjas,” Naruto said with wide eyes.
Harry nodded. “But to be an undercover ninja, you need to get a disguise. And Hokage-sama will help us with your disguise.”
“Really?” Naruto turned to Tsunade, who immediately nodded with a gentle smile. He thought for a moment, moved forward towards her cautiously but kept a tight hold of Harry's sleeve.
“I have a bad feeling about this,” Harry said simply, even as he watched as the Hokage carefully applied a white paste over Naruto's cheeks. In seconds the white paste turned into Naruto's skin colour and covered the black lines there perfectly. He watched silently as she changed Naruto's blonde hair into a pitch black.
Naruto blinked up at him with his trusting blue eyes. “Nii-san? Am I like a ninja now?”
Harry ruffled the soft black hair gently. “Yeah. With your new disguise, you're...” He paused, acutely feeling like he'd just given up and lost the fifteen year old Naruto that he knew. “You're a completely different person.”
Naruto giggled in pleasure and pretended to fight an invisible opponent.
Harry looked up to push aside his turbulent emotions, but his eyes met Tsunade's understanding gaze. “If that's all Hokage-sama,” Harry said. “I'd like to get some grocery shopping done.”
Three hours after leaving the Hokage's office, Harry hadn't bought any groceries. Instead he just walked around with Naruto, who had gotten tired of walking and had to be carried, buying pastries and other snacks from various vendors they passed.
“Your Highness!” A voice yelled out desperately.
Bored out of his mind and curious about what royalty looked like, Harry looked around. Not finding anyone dressed in extravagant clothes and jewellery, Harry turned back to the stand and tightened his hold of a fidgeting Naruto.
Harry tensed and stepped back as a burst of wind brushed across his face and something landed at his feet. He looked down and took another step back as a tall but old man knelt on one knee and stared directly at him.
“Your Highness!” The man sobbed, his multi-layered green clothes shimmering in the sunlight. “Finally, I've found you two after all these years. It's good to see you two safe and alive.”
Harry blinked at the man, looked around warily and shuffled backwards again as silently as he could. Apparently picking up on Harry's tenseness, Naruto stopped fidgeting and leaned in closer, hiding his face in the crook of Harry's neck.
“Your Highness?”
Trying to remember where everyone would be at this time of the day, Harry stared at the man's deceptively sane-looking eyes for a moment before he remembered Cat-san was supposed to be watching him. Thankfully, Cat-san had been attentive and appeared in front of Harry and Naruto shielding them from the man.
Cat-san spoke to the man in short and clipped sentences.
After a few minutes, the man exclaimed. “Very well! Then, I will talk to the Hokage myself.”
When Cat-san shunshin-ed him to an empty room in the administrative building, Harry asked, “Why didn't you tell him that he was mistaken?”
Cat-san stayed silent for a moment. “It's best to let Hokage-sama deal with such matters.”
“But...”
“When I intervened, I made quite a scene.” Cat-san said, “I didn't want to create a bigger scene in such a public space by starting an argument with the man.”
“Well, even if you did make a big scene, thanks for helping, Cat-san,” Harry said.
Naruto, who had been quiet and content to keep still in Harry's protective hold, turned and stared at the masked-man curiously.
Harry knelt down, allowing Naruto to stand on the ground. “Aren't you going to thank the man who protected us, Naruto?”
Naruto hesitated slightly. “Thank you... Cat-san.”
“You're welcome.” Cat-san sighed. “And it's Raccoon.”
Fully expecting the matter to be settled soon, Harry couldn't help but feel disheartened as he entered the Hokage's office and found Kakashi, Sakura and Sai there. “Naruto, why don't you go play with Sai while I talk to Hokage-sama?”
“Sai?” Naruto frowned.
Remembering Naruto's unusual amnesia, Harry walked over to Sai and pushed Naruto forward. “Sai is our friend, so you can play with him.”
“Friend?” Naruto questioned again.
Sai stayed silent, looking slightly uneasy as having to deal with a younger Naruto.
Thankfully Sakura leaned closer to Sai and whispered something in his ear.
Sai nodded, knelt down in front of Naruto and unrolled a scroll. With a quick flick of his hand, he pulled out a brush and drew some animals. “Can... do you think you can catch my ink creatures?”
Naruto gasped as the ink animals jumped out of the page with another flick of Sai's hand. And then without any prompting he chased after the ink animals.
Harry gladly went back and stood in front of the Hokage. “What happened?”
“The man claimed that you were a prince...”
“Of course, I'm not a prince!” Harry said in annoyance. “From which angle do I look like royalty?”
Everyone in the room blinked and shuffled uneasily, but didn't say anything.
“I don't get why you're listening to this man,” Harry said in irritation, ignoring their silence.
Tsunade sighed. “Because he has very authentic papers that show that he is a Minister from the Land of Light.”
“Land of Light?” Harry repeated as he watched Naruto chase Sai's ink creations around the office with loud laughter.
“A very small Country in the South that's filled with bioluminescent plants. At night, everything glows. The grass beneath your feet, the trees, even the algae in their ponds.”
“They named their country after glowing plants?”
“Glowing plants that can't grow anywhere else. All attempts to make them grow outside of the Land of Light has been a complete failure,” Tsunade said.
“I'm guessing the plants do more than just glow at night?”
Tsunade nodded curtly. “There are certain drugs that can only be made from the plants that grow in the Land of Light.”
Harry slumped, knowing that he wasn't going to like the rest of what she had to say.
“About three years ago, when the prince and his younger brother went missing, the Land of Light closed it's borders to all outsiders. Since the king had died soon after the youngest prince was born, the eldest pince was set to be king when he turned eighteen. We lost a crucial source of medicinal ingredients.”
Harry didn't need to hear any more. “And now with this man thinking I'm the prince... It's your chance to get inside and restart the trade.”
Tsunade nodded. “We might even find out what happened to the real princes.”
“I can't just...” Harry glanced at Naruto.
“You obviously won't be going alone. Team Seven will be joining you two.” Tsunade also glanced at Naruto. “And getting him out of the village for a while can work in our favour. No chance for the nosy people to find out his current form.”
Even though he was wary about the whole thing, Harry said, “If it can keep Naruto safe, then I don't mind leaving Konoha.”
“Good. At least you won't have much trouble with the physical aspects of looking like a prince,” Tsunade said  as she stared at his clothes. “The minister already confirmed your identical facial features. And your clothing habits work in our favour.”
Harry glanced down at his clothes. “What do you mean?”
“I haven't seen clothes that are as clean or well maintained as yours.”
Harry shrugged since he used magic to keep his clothes in good condition.
“But maybe we'll need to get traditional clothes that looks a little bit more expensive,” Tsunade said thoughtfully. “Something for both of you to wear.”
Cat-san tilted his masked face for an instant.
Tsunade grinned and nodded.
The masked-man bowed and disappeared from the room.
“Well that's another detail solved,” Tsunade said. She stared at Harry. “Now we just need to give you a crash course on Land of Light's history. Shizune, Kakashi, I'll leave that and his princely etiquette lessons to you two. You need to finish most of the things before you leave tomorrow.”
“Tomorrow?” Harry yelped but then smiled reassuringly at Naruto who had stopped playing with Sai's ink creatures.
“You're lucky I convinced him that you couldn't have a celebratory reunion dinner with him tonight,” Tsunade said. “But he was insistent that you leave as soon as possible.”
“But...”
“We can't risk delaying your travel to your homeland,” she said. “It'll just create political problems that are best avoided.”
“I can't just leave. My owl just left for one of her long hunts the day before yesterday...” Harry paused, wincing at having to use Hedwig as a reason not to go through with their plan.
“Your owl seems able to find you anywhere.”
“She can.”
“Then there shouldn't be a problem. She'll come to you eventually,” Tsunade said in a no nonsense tone.
“She hasn't even seen Naruto like this...” Harry said, absently wondering how Hedwig would react to Naruto's new form. He also wondered if Naruto actually remembered her.
“I'm sure you'll handle things,” Tsunade said and pointed to a door at the side of the office. “That room is secure and big enough to have Naruto in there with you.”
“You promise that Naruto will be safe if we actually...”
It was Kakashi who answered. “We're his team, Harii. We'll definitely keep him safe.”
Sakura nodded.
“Fine,” Harry said.

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So, have you seen the design for Sakura's parents when they were introduced in the anime? Only found out about them through the wikia.

Yay, for random browsing doing research on there.

Polar