#3

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A SAGE ADRIFT

#3

Nestled among the rolling hills of Westchester County, the Davis farmhouse stood as a beacon of sustainable and cozy living. The farmhouse was a place where the now-retired Richard and Dorothy Davis spent their days, working on their very own farm with their own ideas with nobody to tell them what to do and when to do it. 

That was the thing they enjoyed about their farm the most, the autonomy that came with owning your own farmhouse. Richard had always wanted a farm with a barn where he would keep all his farming supplies and use them as a real farmer, not in pursuit of profit but in pursuit of fulfilling labour. 

In his opinion, that was something that was going missing from the societal fabric at large. The ability to be fulfilled, mentally and physically, by the products of your own labour.

Dorothy, of course, was more concerned about the animals on the farm than her own husband sometimes but it was all in jest. The loving couple gave each other the space both of them needed to work on their tasks but at the end of the day, both of them came to the same house to talk about their days as entertainment.

Having never had kids, the average person might assume that Richard and Dorothy led dull lives but that could not have been farthest from the truth.

Richar, a former high-ranking investment banker, made enough bank in his life to sustain multiple generations of high-profile living and yet he continued doing it because he liked crunching the numbers. Even now, the excess produce they had, it was all accounted for and sold above the market rate by Richard. After getting an opportunity to retire with a fat bonus check, he pounced on the opportunity to buy up a large piece of land in Westchester County, the place where his father used to work, on the Apple Orchards.

It was his dream to one day own an apple orchard for himself and he did it, with his own two hands. It was difficult, sure, but with seven years of nonstop toiling, he was now the proud owner of an apple orchard, something he was sure that his dad must have been very proud of.

Dorothy, on the other hand, had an equally stellar if much less financially rewarding career of her own. Since their marriage was an arranged marriage since at the time, Richard was not interested in anything but his career, the balance of their marriage, at least in the beginning, was very lopsided.

Richard would spend long hours at work and she would spend the day maintaining the household along with spending time with the neighborhood wives. That was until her mother-in-law suggested she take up helping others as a career. Sure, it paid almost nothing and was a very thankless job in general. According to her, it was still much better than sitting at home or fake laughing at the same jokes that the neighborhood wives' group made.

And so began her career as a social worker. Over the years, she had made quite the group of contacts with people high up in their professions. People whom she had, over the course of her long career, helped out in one way or another. This ensured that if a case came to her, she would be more or less very easily able to solve it. 

Over the course of years though, as was customary with her line of career, she had come across multiple specimens of people she would hesitate to call as human beings. Scum of the worst order, they were above no crime. Human Trafficking, Drug Trafficking, Organ Trade, Organised crime, she had seen them all and had a hand in jailing them all.

The highlight of her career would be being at the forefront of a case that ended up in multiple government officers being convicted along with a sitting Senator being indicted as well.

That, along with a string of other reasons, was why she was gently pushed away from the career of social worker and "advised" to work only on animal welfare. It was a different era back then and the "advise" had come from pretty high up so she had not hesitated much and jumped in the line of animal care.

Of course, she prided herself in her ability to become a pain in the ass for the higher-ups of any field to deal with. So, eventually, when age began catching up to her and after Richard's insistence, she eventually decided to retire from the active scene and honestly, life has been much better since.

Of course, nobody could separate her from her animals and so, Richard had cordoned off a significant portion of their farm for her animals and she couldn't be more thrilled about that. The ability to just wake up and have all her favourite rescues and cattle just chilling on her farm was a dream come true for her.

Nowadays, all she did was help around the farm and make sure that the caretakers are taking good care of her animals.

Such was the life of the retired Davis couple in Westchester county. They were pretty good friends with their neighbours and had a couple of friends back from their industry days but due to the very nature of their work, they could at best be called as work acquaintances and nothing more.

That was more or less the daily routine of both Richard and Dorothy, one that had been uninterrupted for years by now. The same schedule that was about to be slightly disturbed by the existence of one Naruto Uzumaki, a lost otherworlder.

…

..

Naruto, the complete anomaly of a ninja that he was, had decided to just confront the problem head-on and just ring the front door of the retired couple.

Although the Davis couple lived modestly and had generally zero security guards apart from the employees that lived on the farm, they had invested significantly into making sure that their house was as safe as it could be from intruders and had various alarms that would be triggered at the slightest indication of an intrusion into their sanctuary.

Such were the perks that could be afforded with the power of money and a little bit of industry connections.

But the matter of fact was that the protections that were installed by the Davis couple all had a certain image of an intruder in their mind.

A sneaky, suspicious individual trying to gain entry by either brute-forcing the most obvious entry point, the doors or the windows or trying to gain access to the farms by bypassing the boundaries. The security engineers had never expected somebody to just walk up to the front door and ask the people living in the premises because that is exactly what happened when Naruto rang the doorbell. All security systems registered him as a normal passerby instead of the freeloader he was about to become.

As Naruto stood there in his orange getup with his orange suitcase smiling straight at the door, the Davis couple inside was looking at their intercom screen, confused about the identity of the person.

Then, the intercom crackled to life, "Um, Hello?" The sound of one confused Richard could be heard.

Naruto was, at first, taken aback by the source of the sound but then saw the intercom speaker and realised his mistake. He took a step back and bowed slightly towards the intercom and said, "Hello! My name is Uzumaki Naruto and I would like to work here, please,"

"So, let me get this straight, you have somehow lost all your identification papers and are stuck in the United States for the foreseeable future? Somehow and I will need some proper explanation as to how, you heard about our farm and wanted to work for us here? Does this not seem a little odd to you, Mr.Uzumaki or is that even your real name?" Davis said as all of them sat in their living room after Dorothy had made the decision, based on her gut feeling, to ask Naruto to come in and at least offer him a cup of tea before sending him on his way.

Naruto gave a strained smile at that series of questions, "Uh, to be honest, that is all I know. I don't have any identification on me that will work in this country and whatever I own is in the suitcase. Please, I have heard of the horror stories that happen to the homeless in this country and I don't wish for that to happen to me or anyone. I can assure you that I can and will work hard and you don't even need to pay for my work, just food and stay will more than suffice." 

He bowed his head and put his hands together in prayer for them to accept his request.

Richar was about to refuse, but was stopped by Dorothy who put a hand on his leg and said, "Naruto, was it? Why don't you give us both a moment of privacy and we'll let you know our answer then?"

Naruto nodded, a bit relieved at seeing the kind smile that Dorothy gave him. He then went outside the living room and closed the door behind him. Standing in front of the front door, he could hear them talking about his appearance as well as him being "too good looking" to be homeless, something of the sort.

Sometimes his enhanced senses gave him more trouble than it was worth. In this case, he could not understand half of what was being said inside the room and they were talking about him!

"Come in, Naruto" He smiled upon hearing Dorothy call for him.

He opened the door and peeked his head through it, "Yes?"

Dorothy looked startled by his appearance but smiled through it, "Yes, you can start working for us but we do have some terms and conditions."

"I will follow everything you say, believe it!" He winced internally as in his excitement, his verbal tick returned to his normal manner of speaking.

As he sat down on the sofa, his luggage sitting innocently to the side, even though he had no idea what was inside that suitcase, just that it was unusually light.

"So, first things first, No drinking No drugs, you get me? Young people like you should focus on their work first."

"Agreed." Those things didn't work on him anyway. His enhanced metabolism burning through any drug or alcohol within seconds, leaving him completely sober at the end of the experience. Unfortunately, he had been the victim of many drugging attempts in his time as Hokage, even from within the village but each and every time, they failed as his body completely adapted to them after each attempt and after all the things he had been through and all the poisons he had developed an immunity to, in the Land of Fire itself. 

He doubted this world had anything to offer that could help put him to sleep. If it did, it would be very much helpful to reduce the nightmares he received on the daily.

"Secondly, you will live in the worker's quarters. The building is not far behind, you can see it from the backyard. Remember, the work will be heavy but we do not condone unpaid labour here and hence, after the first two weeks, we will evaluate your performance and you will receive your salary."

He nodded, very much grateful. His surprise must have shown on his face because Richard said, "What? You thought we were a bunch of old white people who would exploit unfortunate immigrants? Well, I, for one, believe in the quality of work you do, not a piece of paper or the colour of your skin."

He smiled at Richard, "Understood."

Richard looked thoroughly uncomfortable due to his smile and Dorothy's eyes twinkled as she looked at them.

"And last of all, no stealing. If you need something, be frank and tell us but don't try to pull wool over our eyes, we have not become old simply by sitting around."

"Wouldn't dream of it," he said while nodding his head repeatedly, like a chicken.

"Alright, I am sure you must be tired because of your journey. Let me fix you up a meal while Richard shows you the way to your new home. I hope you like it because we have put a lot of thought into that building." Dorothy said as she went towards the kitchen.

He followed behind Richard as they went through their backyard towards the building he could see in the far distance.With the help of his enhanced vision, he could see children playing in the jungle gym that was installed in front of the building.

Hefting his suitcase over his back, he followed behind the silent and brooding Richard, excited about the new chapter in his life and determined to make sure that nothing happened to them.

They seem like good people and the least he could do was protect them.

In addition to that, he could feel the potent nature energy in the surroundings and that would help him immensely once his chakra pathways were healed up, he could use his Sage Mode to help them even more.

As an added benefit, with his Sage Mode, he would not have to worry about somebody hurting the old couple even if the enemy was on the same level as a Kage. 

After all, he was not called the Super Kage back home for nothing, even if he didnt like bragging about it, that was the truth. Even without Kurama, he was more than capable of defeating all the other Kages all by himself.

That was what set him and Sasuke apart from all the other Kages. They had the Sage's chakra and were literally built differently.

Word Count - 2344

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Toodles!