Six Years Too Long

Chapter 21

Third person pov 

Their trip to Suna went on without a hitch. Naruto remained energetic throughout all of it, and he systematically charmed every single member of their platoon. Minato thought it was adorable, and Kakashi found the whole thing hilarious. It was hard to resist a child as cute and radiant as Naruto was. He had a natural charisma to him that most his age couldn't pull off. And hell if Naruto didn't know how to use his.

Ayumu learned a lot about Naruto through observing him. It only convinced him even further of how unusual a case Naruto's was. The boy hadn't retreated defensively into himself despite how many times he'd been hurt as most youth in his position likely would. He was open, and bright, and seemed to roll over his hardships instead of letting them hit him head on.

Children tended to be more resilient than adults, but Naruto was unlike anything Ayumu had ever seen before. He was honest to a nearly brutal extent, but kinder and more analytical than any kid Ayumu had ever worked with before. He was more in-tune with his own emotions than you'd expect someone his age to be as well, which was the last thing Ayumu had expected to see in Naruto's case, especially considering how isolated he'd been up until his father showed up.

The blonde's ability to connect and empathize with others was something to truly awe at. Naruto had a genuine interest in others, and a genuine talent for putting himself in their shoes. He could meet someone and immediately begin to resonate with them. It was a rare skill.

Ayumu thought maybe that was the real problem here, however. Naruto had been abused both verbally and physically his whole life, and in trying to see from other people's perspectives to better understand them, he'd unintentionally adopted their views of him. He was struggling not to look at himself through the eyes of those who hated him after having done so for so many years. Detaching oneself like that didn't happen over night.

It was tragic, but Ayumu was fairly certain that was the case. The good thing was that Naruto could bounce back from this. In surrounding himself with people who didn't look at him with vitriol, eventually he was bound to start discovering their positive emotions and comprehending their ways of thinking, and hopefully he'd begin to see himself as they did once it all clicked as a result.

"I have sand in places I didn't even know existed!" Naruto cheerfully announced as they marched into Suna. Minato laughed a little, and Kakashi ruffled the blonde boy's hair. As if to prove a point, a cloud of sand puffed up when he did. "The houses here look like big pots!"

Suna's rounded architecture was to prevent sand build up. There were no hard corners or angles if it could be helped. Even if the village was fairly protected from sand storms thanks to the massive walls surrounding it, that didn't stop breezes from naturally blowing the loose sediment through the streets. The last thing they needed were houses being buried for being too angular. 

"Pretty cool, right?" Minato grinned, his hand curled around his son's. The boy had insisted on walking himself despite the sand. If Ayumu didn't know any better, he'd say the boy was using chakra to keep himself from sinking, but surely that wasn't the case. Naruto was still pretty small. He was probably just too light. "All the buildings here look somewhat like this. You'll see very few square structures."

"I guess that makes sense. They kind of remind me of beehives!" Naruto chirped out, observing the odd windows as they headed for the Kage building. There were all sorts of people gathered up along the sides of the streets, watching them curiously. Whispers ran rampant, eyes following Minato's figure. Naruto waved happily at them as they passed. "Do you think they're staring because we're dressed weird?"

It wasn't that they were dressed particularly oddly, but the clothing here was specially tailored to protect from the sun and keep sand off the wearer. Headwraps and flowy, long clothing, airy but with optimal coverage. The people here sported healthy tans and lighter hair than you might expect to see most commonly in the Leaf.