Red Is A Pretty Colour

7

Hiko's pov

After we left the bridge for the day we went through the town with Tazuna.

"Where are we going?" Sakura asked.

"You wanna eat tonight, don't ya? I gotta pick up some groceries." Tazuna said.

"You know, this is just like at home." I said.

"What do you mean?" Sakura asked.

"I normally go grocery shopping today." I said.

"Don't your parents do that?" Tazuna asked.

"Naruto and I are orphans so I had to step up and take the roll of parent. If it was up to Naruto our apartment would be a junk yard and we'd only eat instant ramen." I replied.

"Yeah that sounds like Naruto." Sakura said.

"Here we are." Tazuna said as we entered an almost barren store.

"Welcome." The shop keeper said.

I was going around the store helping Tazuna find the things he needed until I heard sakura shouting.

"YOU PERVERT!!" Sakura yelled.

I quickly spun around to see what was going on. Sakura had kicked a man to the ground.

"If that's what you're here to do you can leave." I growled.

The man wasn't long on rushing out of there. Tazuna bought his things and then we left the store to head back to his house.

"You surprised me back there, girls around here don't fight like that." Tazuna said.

"They should! Something's seriously wrong here!" Sakura said.

"She's right, if you don't defend yourself then you'll always be the target. No one will try anything if they know you can fight back." I said. "I figured that out pretty quickly with bullies at the academy."

"Hey buster-" Sakura began as she turned around.

I spun around two only to see a little scruffy kid. He held out his hands to us and smiled.

"Please?" He said.

"Uhhhh, here." Sakura said as she grabbed a hand full of sweets and handed him them.

"I know they're not the best thing in the world but, here." I said as I gave him a packet of salted crackers that I had in my pocket.

"Thank you." The kid said before running over to a little girl who was also really skinny and scruffy looking. He handed her the sweets and crackers and I couldn't help but feel sorry for them. It gave me more motivation to protect Tazuna and help these people.

"This is how its been since Gato came here, the children suffer and the adults are to afraid to stand up to him." Tazuna said. "We've lost all hope, that's why we have to finish the bridge, it'll bring trade but most of all it'll be symbol of courage, we must restore the spirit of our people. When the bridge is finished people will start to believe again, they'll believe that they can live with dignity. We can't let Gato stop us."