A/N: Read the first paragraph of my profile for info about story updates (and then read the rest if you want to)
Also, disclaimer: I don't own Naruto.
Edit Note: For some reason, pasting text with bold and italics into an existing document totally wipes out the bold and italics. Had to update to fix it, 'cuz it made parts of this chapter difficult to read.
A young Naruto ran as hard as he could from the angry mob that was chasing him. He didn't know why everyone wanted his blood, but he didn't want to stick around to find out.
He rounded the corner into an alleyway in the hopes of losing his pursuers, but was unfortunate enough to end up facing a dead end instead of a way to escape. He turned back towards the mouth of the alleyway fearfully, watching as it filled with the angry faces of civilians and shinobi alike. That day was the fourth anniversary of both the fourth Hokage's death and the Kyūbi's defeat, so it seemed a fitting day for the villagers to take their revenge on the demon in the name of the Yondaime.
The boy spoke up, fear plain on his face. "Please! I didn't do anything! Please don't hurt me again!"
One of the villagers near the front of the crowd sneered. "You call the murder of hundreds of people 'nothing'? You vile demon! You're going to get what's coming to you today. Get him!"
Prompted by the shouted command, the group converged on the young child, knocking him to the ground. They began beating him, using fists, feet, knives, improvised clubs and any number of other weapons to cut and bruise the crying jinchūriki.
His inhuman resilience was both a blessing and a curse. He was blessed to be able to survive the damage to his vital organs and arteries, the various broken bones, the concussions and brain damage, the massive bleeding and everything else he was subjected to. He was cursed to remain conscious through all of it, experiencing the excruciating pain of every cut, impact, break, burn and bruise, until his incredible healing was finally overcome and he passed out from blood loss.
When the boy went limp and ceased struggling, the villagers decided that no more pain could come to him unless they left him alive, which they were unwilling to consider. An older shinobi wielding a kunai knelt beside the child's head, raising the weapon over his head in preparation to deliver the killing blow. As he brought his hands down, however, red chakra erupted from the jinchūriki, vaporizing the closest of the villagers. The sudden death of their comrades startled the mob, and the dilute but familiar chakra emanating from the boy terrified them into fleeing. They failed to notice the many wounds they inflicted on the innocent child healing as he lay in a pool of his own blood in a grimy alleyway, unconscious.
…
Naruto was awoken by water dripping onto his head. His eyes slowly opened, and he took in his surroundings. It appeared that he was in a sewer of some kind; perhaps the villagers had dumped him there after they were done with him. The floor was covered by several inches of water, and pipes ran along the wall. The ceiling was worn and cracked, and water dripped through the gaps.
He sat up slowly, surprised by his lack of pain after having endured such a severe beating. Despite his accelerated healing, he was usually sore for a while after major injuries. He might have been unconscious long enough to fully recover, but he didn't feel particularly hungry, so that probably wasn't it. He mentally shrugged and returned his attention to his surroundings.
The sewer continued on in two directions, and neither seemed exceptionally promising as a way out. However, the pipes on the walls sounded like they were all flowing the same way, so Naruto decided to follow the water and see if it led somewhere. He rose to his feet and began walking. Water sloshed at his feet, but didn't seem to impede his movement, which he found odd. It felt like he was walking on dry ground rather than wading through a pool. Something strange was going on, but Naruto couldn't figure out what. All he could really do was keep walking and see if he could get somewhere.
After an indeterminate distance, including a few turns and forks, the wide hallway opened up into a large chamber that seemed to have no place in a sewer. The ceiling was incredibly high, the walls far apart, and the far end of the room obscured in darkness behind floor-to-ceiling metal bars that were as thick as adult trees. Naruto's eyes followed the bars up to a large circular plate embedded in the middle of the obstruction, with the kanji for 'seal' written on it. His eyes were drawn to the darkness behind the bars as something large stirred, and his gaze was met by two glowing red eyes that were as big as Naruto was tall. The eyes blinked once, and a calm but powerful voice filled the air.
"I didn't expect to meet you so soon, kit."
The intensity of the voice startled Naruto into taking a step back, but he stood his ground and continued looking directly at the massive creature's eyes. "Who are you?" His voice was timid but did not waver.
"Hmmm… you don't seem terribly afraid of me. Perhaps you will grow into a human worthy of being my Jinchūriki. I am the Kyūbi no Yōko, the demon that attacked Konohagakure four years ago today."
"But you aren't mean to me like the villagers are. How can you be a demon if you aren't mean? And what's a Jinchruki?"
"To answer your first question, humans are some of the most cruel, hateful creatures that walk this earth. Demons aren't nice, but we aren't as… 'mean' as humans can be. And as for the second question, do you know where we are?"
"Uh… Konoha's sewers?"
"No, we're inside your mind. That is to say, I am inside you. A Jinchūriki is a human who has a demon, specifically one of the nine Bijū, sealed inside them. I am sealed in your mind, so you are a Jinchūriki."
"Is that why the villagers all call me 'demon'?"
"Yes, those foolish, hateful creatures fail to understand the nature of sealing. They either believe that you are actually me in disguise, or that I can control you. They take their anger at me for what I did out on you, all because of something you couldn't control."
"But why did you attack Konoha?"
"I didn't attack your home intentionally. I don't feel like saying more about it, and you probably wouldn't understand anyway. Now, if you're done with your interrogation, I have a question for you. Why do you stay in Konoha?"
"Konoha is my home. Where else would I go?"
"If you left, you would escape the beatings and the anger that people direct towards you. You could find somewhere else to call home."
"But I don't want to go anywhere else. I want to stay in Konoha and become Hokage, and then everyone would have to be nice to me."
"Kit, the way the villagers treat you is going to get worse before it gets better, if it ever does, and it's already pretty damn bad. I'm not sure I can keep you alive through much more of this."
"But there are already people here who are nice to me."
"Whom? The Sandaime and the Ichiraku father and daughter? The Ichirakus are nice to you because you spend thousands of ryō in their business, and they don't want to lose their biggest customer. They probably hate you just as much as the rest of those ignorant villagers. As for the Sandaime, he is the ruler of Konoha, the dictator that controls what happens in his village. Why didn't he use that power to protect you from the villagers' hatred?"
"Uh… the civilians didn't listen to him?"
"He could very easily declare it a crime to treat you unfairly, and after a few people are punished you would be bothered very little. He chose not to though, and as a result I had to bring you back from the brink of death with my power. I don't think you understand how serious what just happened to you was. You were going to die. You were as close to death as anyone really can be without actually being dead. I can't promise that I can keep bringing you back from that point, and the only way for you to avoid being beaten that badly in the future by the villagers is to leave. I can train you to protect yourself, but it will take years and you might not survive long enough to be able to fend off more attacks. If we leave and I train you, you may be able to return one day and become Hokage. If you stay, you will probably die, and dead men don't become Hokage."
Naruto sat in front of the demon's prison, considering the large fox's words. He had spent his first few years in the village hidden in the leaves, and he didn't know what life outside the village walls was like. Going out into the world on his own was a scary prospect, and he considered Konoha his home. He was reluctant to leave.
However, what the Kyūbi said was true, it was dangerous to stay. He was constantly hungry, thirsty, cold, uncomfortable, and often battered and bruised from various assaults. This hadn't been the first severe beating he had sustained, though it was by far the worst, and it seemed that everyone in the village hated him. The only people that had ever even appeared to be nice to him had been Ayame, Teuchi, and the Old Man, but the fox brought up valid points about all of them. He spent at least half of his stipend on ramen every month, and had been spending that much at the ramen shop for about a year now. He had essentially spent enough on ramen to buy the Ichirakus a house. The Old Man had also explained what it meant to be Hokage to Naruto (which had given rise to his dream), and part of that had been that the Hokage rules the village, able to order things done and make laws. Why hadn't the most powerful man in the village done something to help him? Perhaps there were laws, but nobody enforced them because they hated Naruto? Maybe he was too busy being the Hokage to do something like that to protect one boy. Naruto couldn't imagine the Hokage being evil, so he couldn't have failed to protect Naruto on purpose, but it was very possible he simply didn't think of it or didn't have the power to.
As much as it scared Naruto, he couldn't deny that it seemed like running away was the best course of action. Staying would mean that Naruto was risking life and limb, leaving would possibly put him at risk but possibly lead to a much better life. He would get training from the fox, so he would be able to defend himself soon enough. Even if he had a hard time outside the village walls, he probably wouldn't have it any harder than if he stayed home.
Several minutes of thought brought Naruto to the conclusion that he would be better off leaving Konoha than staying and being at the mercy of the people that had just almost beaten him to death. Having made his first truly life-changing decision, he stood and faced his prisoner, who was watching him impassively.
"I decided not to stay."
"Good. Go home; pack up whatever food you have at home and anything else you really don't want to leave behind, then I'll guide you over the walls and out of the village. When you leave, take a moment and focus on feeling my presence inside you. That will allow me to open up a link between us so I can speak to you without you having to come in here. We can make more in-depth plans after you're outside the walls."
"Ok." Naruto looked around for a moment. "Uh… how do I leave?"
The large demon chuckled in amusement. "Just close your eyes and focus on leaving. It's almost like forcing yourself to wake up from a dream. You can do the same thing out there if you ever need to come back here for some reason."
Naruto nodded and closed his eyes. After focusing for a moment, he opened them and looked up at a pitch black sky. Immediately, pain washed over him like a wave, causing his vision to blur and his muscles to contract, forcing him to let out a pained groan. He curled up and waited for the aches to pass. After a few moments, the soreness of recently acquired bruises receded, and he could focus again.
Remembering what the fox said about forming the link with it, Naruto closed his eyes and tried to feel for the fox's presence. For a moment, nothing happened. Soon though, comfortable warmth built in his stomach. He focused on the warmth and it strengthened, and after a few more moments he could hear the fox's voice.
There, now we can speak without forcing you to enter the seal. Just think whatever you want to say to me and I'll be able to hear it in here, same way as you can hear what I'm saying. Now, go get your stuff, I want us to be out of here by dawn.
Naruto clambered to his feet, triggering another twinge of pain that made him wince, and set out towards home. He stuck to the shadows to minimize his chance of being found, listening for footsteps or voices. After a few minutes and a couple detours, he reached his front door and entered his decrepit apartment. He paid the grime, bugs and strewn garbage no mind, heading straight for the kitchen to gather what little food he had stored. Everything edible went into a backpack he had found in the dumpster a few months ago. After his pantry was cleaned out, he went to his dresser and grabbed a few changes of clothes. Soon, he was standing outside the building that he used to call home, all of the things he owned of any real value on his back.
Where to now?
You know how to get on top of the Hokage monument, right? Go up there and walk along the edge of the cliff. It's taller than the walls around the rest of Konoha, so there are places where you can climb down and end up outside them.
Naruto did as instructed, sneaking up to the top of the monument then walking along its edge. He soon came to a section that was sufficiently rocky that he could climb down, ending up on the ground a good distance outside the walls. He looked back in the direction of his home wistfully for a moment, before turning and walking away.
…
Sarutobi Hiruzen was not in a good mood. The shinobi he tasked with guarding Naruto during the festival were insisting that they watched him until they were relieved from duty, and the shinobi that relieved them from duty claimed that there was nobody at Naruto's apartment when it came time for them to take their shift. Hiruzen knew which of the two shifts were lying; Naruto was nowhere to be found. Last night's guard detail was currently in the T and I department, but was refusing to cooperate. Hiruzen had tasked nearly half of the ANBU with searching the village, scouring every building, alleyway, nook and cranny for the boy, but none had reported finding him. The best they had done was find some witnesses that said they saw him last night, but nobody could or would say exactly when or where they saw him. The Sandaime didn't think a four-year-old could leave the village on his own, and he would hope that nobody would kidnap him, but he decided that safe was better than sorry and tried to order tracking teams to find the boy. However, he found himself up against some unexpected opposition.
"Uzumaki is a civilian, so his responsibility falls to the civilian council. Ninja should not meddle in civilian affairs! We don't need a ninja tracking team searching for the boy."
Homura and Koharu were refusing to allow Hiruzen to send tracking teams out to look for the young Jinchūriki. They were correct, unfortunately; he had been foolish enough to give the Konoha council enough power to subvert him in certain civilian affairs, including those that involved civilians that were outside Konoha's walls.
Homura and Koharu were unaware of the mob that had attacked Naruto the night before, believing instead that the boy had either run off or been kidnapped. They hated him with enough vitriol to be glad of his disappearance, hoping for him never to return.
Danzō, however, knew of the mob. His Root members had successfully interrogated some of the civilians that had claimed to have seen Naruto the night before, learning of the beating that Naruto sustained. Their description of the injuries they saw before they were chased off sounded fatal, and the description of how the chakra that burst from Naruto's body obliterated the victims it touched provided an explanation for why Naruto's body was absent from the alley they said they left him in. Believing their Jinchūriki to be dead and wanting to minimize the damage, Danzō had Root agents assassinate the shinobi being interrogated and helped Homura and Koharu prevent Hiruzen from sending out tracking teams, intending to claim that he ran away once scent trails became unreliable. He wanted to keep the shinobi that contributed to Naruto's supposed murder out of jail, lest their military force be weakened.
The Sandaime sighed, unable to do anything more than what he was already. Naruto seemed to be absent from the village, and the council was preventing him from doing anything about it. He simply hoped that wherever he was, Naruto was ok.
A/N: Follow and favorite and review if you enjoyed, it will motivate me. Flaming is encouraged, constructive criticism will be considered, and compliments will motivate me even more than other reviews.
