Chapter 123: The Second Schoolhouse

A few weeks after Sasuke’s birthday, the second Academy building was ready to open.

It still smelled of fresh timber, plaster, and ink.

Ren stood inside one of the rear classrooms while workers carried the last chalkboards and supply crates past the open door. Several windows along the corridor had been left open, letting in the noise from the older courtyard where the morning crowd was beginning to gather.

The classroom itself was finished. New desks filled the room, their wood still clean enough that Ren doubted it would survive the first week. He ran a hand over the back of one and felt a small, uneven edge where the carpenter had missed a spot with the sander.

“If you start inspecting every desk personally, we’ll be here until winter,” a voice said behind him.

Kurenai came through the doorway carrying a stack of attendance sheets and a supply list and dropped them on the nearest desk. She had been at the Academy since before sunrise, helping coordinate the staff for the opening.

Ren looked at her. “I paid for the furniture.”

“Then you can move that too.” She pointed toward a heavy crate sitting near the wall.

Ren took one end, Kurenai caught the other, and together they carried the crate into the adjoining storage room while teachers continued passing through the corridor outside.

Once they set the crate down, Kurenai reached out and brushed a layer of sawdust from his shoulder. Ren caught her hand and pulled her into a kiss.

She kissed him back easily, tasting faintly of morning tea. Ren pulled her closer until footsteps sounded in the corridor.

Kurenai stepped away and smoothed her clothes. By the time an instructor appeared in the doorway to ask about a room assignment, she was already answering him.

Ren was left holding the empty crate. He barely made it back out into the hall before a passing worker asked him to help with a stuck window.

By midmorning, the new corridors were full.

The seal workshop already had dark ink stains across one of its workbenches. In the larger classroom beside it, wide tables had been arranged for the evening accounting and vocational courses. More instructors moved between rooms, and civilian families filled the halls behind them.

Near the stairs, one harried teacher stopped Ren to ask where the new practice materials had been moved.

Ren pointed her toward the administrator at the end of the corridor and kept walking.

By the time he returned to the courtyard, the crowd had thickened enough that he heard Naruto before he found him.

Naruto came through the gate holding Kushina’s hand. The training posts caught his attention almost immediately, and he veered sideways until Kushina caught the back of his shirt.

Sasuke walked beside Mikoto. The wooden practice kunai Itachi had given him on his birthday was still clutched in one hand.

Then he spotted Ren.

“Big Brother.”

Naruto’s head turned.

“Big Brother!”

Both boys started toward him. Ren crouched just in time to catch Naruto before he crashed into his knees. Sasuke arrived more carefully and immediately held up the wooden kunai for Ren to see again.

The Academy was full of things the boys normally weren’t allowed to touch. There were training posts, practice weapons, massive chalkboards, older children, seal paper, and actual shinobi instructors.

While Kushina and Mikoto were talking with one of the teachers, Ren noticed Sasuke quietly forming a hand seal. The shape was still rough, though his fingers no longer ended up tangled together like they had on his birthday.

“Who showed you that?” Ren asked.

Sasuke pointed vaguely toward the gate. “Itachi.”

Mikoto heard the exchange. “He’s been showing him one or two shapes whenever he gets home early enough,” she said. “Nothing serious. Just a few minutes before dinner.”

“And Naruto has started copying them,” Kushina added with a sigh. “Yesterday he spent breakfast doing this with jam between his fingers.”

Naruto heard his name and immediately demonstrated a hand sign.

It was completely wrong.

Sasuke reached over and corrected his fingers.

Naruto shook his head. “No.”

Across the courtyard, an older student was making his way along a low wooden balance beam while an instructor corrected his posture. Naruto stopped arguing and stared.

Sasuke followed his gaze.

Naruto looked at him.

Sasuke was already moving toward the beam.

One of the nearby instructors noticed before either boy could climb onto the actual beam. She pointed instead to a painted straight line running across the flagstones. “You two can use that.”

Sasuke stepped onto it first and began moving carefully, placing one foot directly in front of the other. Naruto started beside him with considerably more confidence than balance, made it two steps, and wandered off the line.

He climbed back onto it.

The second attempt lasted even less.

Sasuke kept watching his feet and reached the far end while Naruto was starting over for the third time.

Naruto frowned, marched back to the beginning, and started over.

While the boys were occupied, Kushina reached over and took the cup Mikoto was drinking from without asking. She drank from it herself. Mikoto didn’t even look at her.

Later, when the courtyard grew loud again, Kushina leaned close to say something near her ear. Mikoto rested a hand at her waist while listening and left it there until Kushina finished and pulled back.

Shortly before noon, the instructors began calling everyone back toward the front of the new building. Families gathered behind the students, and the courtyard slowly quieted.

Ren was halfway toward one of the side doors when an administrator caught up with him and steered him back toward the entrance.

Ren looked over the families packed into the courtyard.

“The old building got crowded,” Ren said. He gestured toward the new one. “You kept signing up, so we built another.”

A few laughs came from the parents near the front.

Ren pointed toward the instructors gathered behind him. “They’re the ones doing the real work. Thank them.”

He stepped aside.

“Go inside.”

The instructors opened the doors, and the courtyard immediately broke apart as students pulled their parents toward the new classrooms.

An administrator was still holding a colorful ribbon across the main entrance when Naruto noticed the bright strip of cloth. Kushina saw where his eyes went a moment too late.

Naruto took off.

She caught him around the middle before he reached it and carried him back under one arm while he complained and reached toward the ribbon. Sasuke watched from beside Mikoto, looked at the ribbon for another moment, and stayed where he was. A few minutes later he got distracted by a rack of practice equipment instead.

Later that morning, a supply cart reached the gate well after the scheduled deliveries had finished. The cart was loaded with materials for the evening classes.

The guard at the gate stopped it and asked for the paperwork.

“He can confirm it,” the driver said, pointing toward Ren nearby. “His office ordered the delivery.”

The guard looked toward Ren.

Ren said nothing.

The guard checked the paperwork against the delivery list, inspected the cart, and waved it through.

Ren continued walking.

Pakura was near the side entrance speaking with two guards when he crossed paths with her later. She finished giving them instructions before looking his way.

“Anything?” Ren asked.

“Nothing.”

She kept walking, and Ren went back into the crowd.

Lunch barely deserved the name. Every bench had been claimed by families, so Ren ate standing near one side of the courtyard while answering questions from parents and teachers.

Naruto appeared long enough to steal fruit from his plate.

Sasuke replaced him a minute later and immediately held up another hand sign for inspection.

Somewhere in the middle of all that, Kushina ended up carrying Sasuke while Mikoto chased Naruto away from a stack of supply boxes.

Kurenai had even less time to stand still. Every time Ren spotted her, somebody else had stopped her—a teacher asking about a room, a parent looking for an instructor, an older civilian trying to find where enrollment for the evening accounting course was being handled.

By the afternoon, Naruto and Sasuke had wandered as far as the edge of the practice yard while Mikoto was distracted by an instructor.

Several older children were lined up in front of a painted wooden target, throwing padded cloth balls while their instructor corrected their posture. Sasuke stopped to watch. Naruto simply reached for the nearest ball.

The instructor lifted it out of his reach. “Too big.”

Naruto pointed toward the target. “Ninja.”

The woman looked at him, then at Sasuke. She crouched beside a basket, found two smaller cloth balls, and handed one to each boy.

Sasuke watched how the older students stood before throwing his.

The ball missed.

Naruto threw his without waiting.

His went considerably farther from the target.

Naruto grabbed another while Sasuke collected a second ball.

By the time Ren found them, both boys had collected a small pile of failed throws around the target. He leaned against the fence instead of interrupting.

Sasuke’s next throw clipped the very bottom edge of the board with a soft thump.

Sasuke stared at the board, then spun around.

“Big Brother!”

“I saw.”

Sasuke grinned.

Naruto looked at Sasuke, then at Ren, and grabbed another ball.

His next throw missed.

He tried again.

That one went wide too.

Kushina eventually found them there. “Time to go.”

Naruto pointed toward the board. “Sasuke hit.”

“I know.”

He pointed at himself. “Naruto hit.”

Kushina looked at the completely untouched target, then back at him. “Not yet.”

Naruto grabbed another ball.

Kushina sighed and lowered herself onto the edge of the practice yard. “Fine. One more.”

Naruto threw. He missed.

He looked at her, his hand already going toward the basket again.

Kushina handed him another ball.

This time the ball bounced off the ground first and clipped the lower corner of the board.

Naruto threw both arms above his head.

Sasuke pointed toward the patch of ground where it had bounced. “Missed.”

Naruto shook his head hard. “Hit!”

Kushina picked him up. “Fine. It counts. We’re going home.”

By the time families began heading for the gates, Sasuke had gone quiet. Mikoto picked him up, and he laid his head against her shoulder without letting go of the wooden kunai.

Naruto reached for Ren before Kushina carried him away.

“Big Brother.”

Ren touched his hair. “Go home.”

Naruto didn’t object much because his eyes were already closing.

The courtyard emptied as parents took their children home, leaving the new schoolhouse quiet for a while.

By early evening, adults had begun coming through the gates: shop workers finishing their shifts, clerks still in work clothes, laborers carrying construction dust on their sleeves, and a few older civilians heading toward the literacy rooms.

They followed the signs toward the accounting and vocational classes.

Ren stood outside the accounting room, watching the adults settle into their seats.

One of the instructors stopped beside him on her way inside.

“Joining us?”

Ren glanced into the classroom. “Kakuzu would take that personally.”

She smiled and shut the classroom door as the lesson began.

Ren walked outside.

The old Academy building was already going dark. Beside it, every window in the new schoolhouse was still lit, the voices carrying through the open glass as another class started. Ren stood there for a moment, then headed home..