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An Interlude of Bears and Insects	By : GrizzlyTeddyBear Category: Naruto > Het - Male/Female Views: 937 -:- Recommendations : 0 -:- Currently Reading : 0
Disclaimer: I don’t own Naruto, and this makes me sad. It also means I make no money from this venture. Naruto belongs to Misashi Kishimoto.

Chapter List
- 1
- 2
- 3
Authoress Pre-ramble:
I have returned! And as reward
for your waiting here is the 2^nd chapter. To answer the question of where’s the
plot? The Answer is written in the
title. As an interlude, it is going to
be a bridge between two stories…so admittedly not much plot, but lots of
character development. This interlude is
where I try to mash two different universes together to make them work…and
that’s all I’m saying on that for now.

A big “Thank you!” to
all of my readers and reviewers! And an
even bigger “Thank you!” to CasaHouse for the quickie betaing of the chapter.

Title: An
Interlude of Bears and Insects
By: GrizzlyTeddyBear
Disclaimer: I
don’t own Naruto, and this makes me sad.
It also means I make no money from this venture. Naruto belongs to Misashi Kishimoto. I do own Paige Stone, my OC! All information regarding animal totems was
collected from Dancing The Wheel by
Sun Bear and Animal Speak by Ted
Andrews.
Main Pairings: ShinoxOC
Rating: M for
mentioned adult themes
Warning: AU,
Post-series start time. Rookie 9 is
23-24 years old. Fic mentions pagan
religions, if you can’t handle it, don’t read! Also is OC-centric. Hold your pants, all will be revealed as the
story progresses.

***Chapter 2***

Chuckling to herself, Paige came back from her trip down
memory lane. She had gotten two nicely
sized shoulder bags and a few smaller pouches out of that deer, not to mention
a bit of venison to share around the clan.

Paige sighed as she looked back and forth between
her new bags hanging on the closet door handle and the clock the stubbornly
refused to show the advancement in time.
For a moment, she contemplated going out to her clearing to meditate and
maybe achieve sleep that way. It had
worked in the past. It had also freaked
out the rest of the clan slightly when they didn't know where she had gone.

One minute she had been enjoying the ability to
clear her mind from the thoughts of Shino being away on mission and snuggled up
to Matohota for warmth in the chill night air, and the next thing she was aware
of was being bodily carried back to her home.

***

Awake was not something she wanted to be, but
something had changed. She was
moving…someone was carrying her…and they were making her arm fall asleep. Beetle. At least it was a clan member carrying
her. Paige shifted the limb which was
tingling with lack of circulation and gave a sigh after finding a better spot
for it.

"You shouldn't be out alone at night in your
condition," reprimanded the person carrying her.

Recognition.
"…'m pregnant…," she yawned, "…not
dying…Tousan." The feeling of sleep
was receding, and that made for a cranky Paige Stone. "You act like I'm not capable of
defending myself," she glared.

"No," was the reply to her
accusation. "But you do have a
habit of putting yourself into situations from which you need rescuing."

She pouted in response as her home came into
view. "I was trying to sleep. It's something I haven't really been able to
do since Shino left."

Shibi deposited her on her own two feet before
opening the door for her.

Paige flopped down on the couch in the living
room. “I think I actually got an hour of
sleep too…” She watched as Shibi made
his way to the kitchen and then heard him rummaging around in her cabinets for
something.

“Tea will be done in a few minutes,” he announced
when he returned and sat opposite her in one of the chairs in the room.

The two looked at each other for a few moments
before she broke away first. “I know
he’s safe,” she mumbled. Truth be told
she had been asking Kagi Taka to keep an unobtrusive eye on anything suggesting
he was on his way to the next world. “But
I still miss him.” She looked into her
lap and started playing with the ends of Shino’s jacket that she had put on to
go outside. “I’m not quite sure when I
went from self-sufficient to needing someone to be near me so much that it
hurts when they’re gone.”

A cup of tea materialized in front of her
face. “You are not alone.”

Blinking a few times and then realizing she should
take hold of the cup of hot tea being offered, Paige offered a sheepish
smile. “I know, but no one else is
Shino.” After taking a small sip of the
still hot liquid she said, “I needed something to take my mind off of things
for a little while…” She trailed off
into silence, her mind still on how much she missed Shino.

“Have you discussed names?” her adoptive father
suddenly asked.

Giving a small start from having her train of
thought derailed, she took a moment to process what had just been asked. “Baby names?”
Biting her lip, she considered her answer, “Not yet, but I have noticed
everyone born into the plan starts their names with ‘Shi’. And the name Shizu was one I wanted to bring
up to Shino as a possibility.”

“He will like it,” Shibi responded almost
immediately.

“You seem sure about that,” Paige raised an
eyebrow.

He nodded once.
“It was his grandmother’s name.”

Paige smiled.
“Knew I liked it for a reason.
But with my luck, a child named ‘quiet’ will end up being a holy
terror.” She could almost guess the next
line of questioning. Shibi still had a
duty to look out for his clan.

“And the kikaichu?”

She gave a deflating sigh, “That was a tougher
decision. I know it’s risky at any age,
but done at younger ages it’s less risky.
And in order for her to be in the line of succession she has to receive
them, and both parents have to be agreeable to it. But you know my penchant for personal
decisions.”

“And?”

“And I ended up dragging Shino out to our clearing
and ‘walking the wheel’ about it,” the totem reader smiled. “We drew up the agreement before he left on
his mission. It’s on the desk in the
office to be reviewed by the elders when he returns.”

Shibi got up and headed towards the home
office.

Paige guessed he went to review the document
himself. When he returned to the room
she noticed she was starting to feel drowsy.
“What did you put...,” she yawned, “in the tea?”

“Valerian.
Although you can’t take it too regularly because of…”

“…my pregnancy,” she interrupted. “Figures,” she stifled another yawn. “You might want to show yourself out. I’m going to enjoy a few hours of sleep.” She walked back to the bedroom and promptly
passed out.

***

That was the one night she had gotten some sleep. Paige had tried to talk Shibi into allowing
her to use the Valerian more often, but he refused, replying the health of his
future granddaughter was too important to risk.

She rested her hands on her stomach. There was no outward sign of her pregnancy,
but she knew that was only for so long.
Shino and the clan had agreed to her idea of hiding the pregnancy from
those who didn’t need to know about it.
Oh sure, Tsunade knew of it. She
was the Hokage after all. But the rest
of the council, Paige had a healthy distrust of them after what they tried to
pull on her to just be allowed to stay in the village. If they knew she and Shino actually
accomplished conceiving the child they wanted to use for political power… Shaking her head to derail her current train
of thoughts she attempted to calm herself.
There was still no guarantee Shizu would inherit her abilities. Paige Stone would cross that bridge when she
came to it…if she came to it. And she
was secure in the knowledge that Shino, the clan, and her friends would stand
beside her in the defense of her child.

Her sleepless musings turned to her immediate
problem: how she was getting the Konoha
Psychiatric ward to run a bit more smoothly. She hadn’t made too many friends on her first
day…although she did win over the important people.

***

Following Sakura’s form through the myriad of
hallways that was the Konoha
Hospital, Paige attempted
to memorize the route. In theory she
should be able to find her own way to and from her work area.

“It’s not too much farther,” Sakura smiled over
her shoulder. “We have the ward in a
different section of the Hospital to cut down on the disruption when the ward
is especially…busy.”

“Uh huh,” remarked Page. “Who was running this place before me?”

“Technically it was jointly run by Ibiki and me,
but Nurse Dai runs the day to day functions of the place.” The head of Konoha surgery lead them around
another corner.

She thought it made a little sense. Ibiki had to know of the human psyche in
order to best get information out of it.
The further she was lead down the hall, the more she could hear shouting,
but couldn’t quite make out what was being said.

The pink-haired medic sighed. “That would be Dai. She has a love for the work. Unfortunately we’re hard pressed to find others
who are equally dedicated.”

Bear. Paige gave a small smile. A
fellow bear…this could be interesting, she thought.

The yelling finally could be understood. “I don’t know how you got hired at this
hospital, but I’ll make sure you’ll never work under this roof again! Get out of my sight!”

An orderly brushed past Sakura and Paige as they
approached.

Smiling as she approached Nurse Dai, she gave her
a visual assessment. She was older than
Paige and definitely carried an air of authority about her despite being a
little shorter than the Aburame heiress.
“Dai-san,” she smiled with a polite bow.
“It’s a pleasure to meet you.
From what I hear you’ve been running things.”

Returning the bow, Dai straightened and attempted
to fix her slightly mussed hair. “I
apologize if you overheard any of that Aburame-sama. Some people wouldn’t know compassion if it
bit them in the ass.”

“Please just call me Paige,” she dismissed the
formality. “And it’s good that I
overheard you actually.” Turning to
Sakura she asked, “Just how much latitude are you prepared to give me here?”

“You are more of the expert here,” the med-nin
shrugged. “It’s sad to say this place
has been run as more of a place of containment than treatment.”

“Then ensure whoever Nurse Dai was talking to does
not work under this roof again. If they
can’t be compassionate to the most vulnerable of patients, then they need to
think of a new career path. I’ll also
need personnel files on those currently working the ward and any
applicants.” She turned back to a
smiling Dai, “I’ll need your help sorting through this mess. I want a functioning place of rehabilitation
and we’re going to have to restructure from top to bottom to do it.”

“I’m going to like this one,” Dai said to
Sakura. “I’ll take over the tour from
here.”

“I’ll have those files ready for you by tomorrow,”
announced Sakura before she left Paige to Dai.

The nurse led Paige through a brief tour of the
ward. It was roughly split into two
sections: shinobi and non-shinobi. Shinobi were required to surrender all
weapons and have a sealing jutsu performed to restrict their chakra. “For safety reasons,” Dai clarified the
reasoning behind the segregation and the stripping of shinobi abilities.

Paige nodded in understanding.

“Medic-nins oversee the functioning of the shinobi
unit and civilian nurses oversee the civilians,” the nurse continued.

The totem reader’s eyes took in everything they
could on the tour. Some of the employees
enjoyed their work and tried their best to help. But others were not so dedicated. Paige made the effort to learn faces and
names for the upcoming review of staff files as Dai introduced her to the
current shift.

After being led out of the ward, Nurse Dai showed
Paige to her office. After taking a seat,
she asked, “How bad is it?”

Letting out a big puff of air, she leaned back in
her chair. “It’s not as bad as I feared,
but we definitely have our work cut out for us.
I could see a third of the staff will need to be replaced on this shift
alone and almost everyone needs retraining.
Almost all of them are complacent.
That means someone is going to get hurt in the near future.” Paige turned to look out the window.

“The ward has unfortunately been used as
punishment for staff. If they don’t
perform well in other areas of the hospital, they end up here. I do what I can with them, and some of them
do find they enjoy it, but others…” Dai trailed off.

“Remind me to talk to Sakura about that as well. That’s nothing but a disservice to the
patients.” She turned back once more to
a smiling Dai.

“This place won’t know what hit it, Paige-san,”
stated the nurse with a bit of a mischievous twinkle in her eye. “I’ve been waiting years for this. Sakura and Ibiki just didn’t have the time to
give the ward the shaking down its needed.”

An answering smile tugged at the corners of her
own mouth. “I think I’ll like working
with you as well Dai. Just promise me
you’ll keep that brutal honesty of yours around me as well. I have a feeling I’ll be needing your
insights.”

The next days were filled with hirings and firings
as Paige and Dai shifted through the mountains of files that mysteriously
appeared in her office the next day. For
as many files she read through and made a decision on, it seemed like there were
even more she was creating on how to train the new and existing personnel. Paperwork…was evil incarnate.

***

A loud authoritative knock jarred Paige back to
the reality of her sleepless night.
Another look at the clock as she got up and pulled on a yukata over her
pajamas to help keep out the night air.

The knock sounded again, but louder this time.

Lizard. Dog. Paige
couldn’t distinguish exactly how was on the other side of the door. “Coming!” she yelled at the door as she
rushed through the living room. When she
arrived, she opened the door to be faced with two ANBU operatives—their
emotions as impassive as their masks.
For a moment, she felt her heart constrict in fear. Had something happened to Shino?

“Paige Stone Aburame, your presence is requested
by Morino Ibiki to assist in an investigation.”

***

Authoress Post-ramble: I’m so evil!
I like making my readers suffer with cliff-hangers! Please leave a comment, question, or
criticism in a review or email at ekuepper@gmail.com! Until next chapter!
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An Interlude of Bears and Insects