Lunar Sunrise

When Naruto leaves Konoha for the sake of his friends, where will he find refuge in his time of need? Yes, homosexual pairings. D Naruto/Gaara or Naruto/Sasuke, undecided. Vote! (:

As the yellow-haired demon stared at the warm pastels of the rising sun, he slipped away from the cruel realities of the world. He was able to forget, for a time, the names that he was called when they though he couldn't hear them, and the horrible things they said about his comrades. His expression saddened and turned bitter.

'I finally get friends only to have to push them away again…'

He had to; the boy was too kind to let his precious friend's reputations be sullied by people's prejudices against him. Sighing, the blonde blocked all memories of laughter and happy times with his team to concentrate on his mission.

If one peered out from the top of the Hokage tower (as one certain female Hokage was doing at that very moment) you could just barely make out a snatch of vibrant golden hair bobbing through the trees on the outskirts of Konohagakure.

.-.-.

"Mou! Not only is Kakashi late, as always," the pink-headed kunoichi grumbled, "but now the Idiot is oversleeping as well?"

Pacing back and forth, Sakura was effectively pissing off her quiet companion. He wasn't sure which was irritating him more, the pacing, or the insults towards his friend.

"Sakura. Be quiet."

The girl sweat dropped and giggled, offering a meek "Gomen, Sasuke-kun…" as an apology. Kakashi poofed in then, making them choke on a cloud of grey smoke.

"I've got bad news, you two." the copy-nin said gravely, none of the usual humor visible in his eye, "Naruto has run away from home."

Sakura just raised an eyebrow and had a classic, "So where's the punch line?" look on her face. The raven-haired sharingan wielder, however, listened to the news with a bit more solemnity.

"He's…run away?"

"Apparently. I think this note makes it pretty clear as to his intentions."

A piece of parchment fluttered out of the older ninja's grip, and Sasuke had it in his hands in seconds.

DearGaara, Sasuke, Sakura, Kakashi-sensei, Iruka-sensei, Tsunade-baba, Shizune-neechan, Ero-sennin, Konohamaru, Kiba, Akamaru, Shino, Hinata, Skikamaru, Neji, Bushy Brows, and everyone else in Konoha-

'Jesus' Sasuke thought, 'if Naruto didn't write this, I don't know who could've.'

I'm sorry that it's come to this, but I can't think of any other way around it. I'm leaving Konoha. I won't have all of my precious people looked down on and ridiculed because of me. I'll always be here if you need me, (I won't be far away) but I won't be close enough to cause you trouble.

To all of my Rookie friends- I'm sorry I didn't tell you this before, but I am the Kyuubi container. The nine-tailed fox sleeps (for the most part) in my stomach. That's why all of the older villagers despise me; I represent something horrible in their pasts that they'd rather all forget. I'm sorry I had to keep it from you, but I was scared you'd all hate me too

To my sensei-s- I hope you can all understand why I'm doing this, and respect my wishes enough not to chase after me. (None of you will ever catch me, anyway! Ha-ha! I'm the Great Uzumaki Naruto, dattebayo!) Iruka-sensei, I thought of you as my real father, I hope that one day I can see you again and tell you this in person. Oh, and Tsunade-baba? The next time Gaara comes on a mission from Suna, could you inform him? I'm sure he'll be angry with me, don't stand too close to him. I don't want you to get hurt.

If any of you even need me, carve a message into one of the tree trunks in the edge of the Konoha forest. (Put something so that I know who wrote it, okay?) Please burn this letter after everyone has seen it, and spread a rumor through the village that I was killed on a mission. It will make it better for everyone.

Thank you.

Uzumaki Naruto

The dark-haired avenger stared at the words long after he had finished reading the note. His fingers were locked in a death grip around the papers, his mind trying to comprehend the fact that Naruto was no longer in Konoha. Well, he'd fix that. Screw what the boy said, and screw what the villagers thought, he was going and bringing the dobe back! As soon as he had reached that conclusion, however, he felt the familiar bite of steel wire slicing lightly into his skin. He was yet again strapped to a stupid tree.

"Fuck, Kakashi!"

The jonin smirked, albeit sadly. "My, my. Such language, Sasuke-kun."

On the outside, the bubblegum-haired girl trained herself to look properly mournful, but on the inside Inner Sakura was doing a victory dance.

"Alright! I get to spend more lovey-dovey time with Sasuke-kun now! Cha!"

"—find him." Sakura only caught the end of her crush's statement. "Huh?"

"I said, I'm going to find him! And bring him back!"

The ash-headed man shook his head slowly. "You're still on probation, You won't be going on any missions for quite a while, especially not an S-rank one."

"S-rank?!" the genins shouted in unison.

"Yes, Godaimehokage-sama has categorized Naruto as a Non-hostile missing nin. A task force of mainly Anbu will be sent, but possibly some of his genin friends will go too."

"Anbu? For Naruto?" Sakura asked, completely ignorant of the blonde boy's awesome strength.

"Even most Anbu can't match him when he gets really hyped up…" the brunette muttered, "We need another jinchuuriki to match him…"

The older ninja then bit his finger, called out "Kuchiyose no jutsu!" and slammed his thumb on the ground to call out his faithful hound Pakkun in a matter of seconds. He then ordered him to relay a message relating to the summoning of the Sand Demon.

.-.-.

Sitting in her office, trying to dodge work as usual, Tsunade rubbed her temples in a futile attempt to relieve the migraine that had been building there since her own personal sun fled from the village. Hearing an insistent scratching at one of her windows, she turned towards the noise, slightly surprised to see the copy-nin's summoned beast waiting for her to let him in. Opening the window, she greeted him with light puzzlement.

"Pakkun?"

He inclined his head towards the Alpha female of the village. "I come bearing a message from Kakashi. He says it's something you'll want to know urgently." She then furrowed her eyebrows, and gestured for him to speak.

"Kakashi says: 'I just thought of something, we know that if Naruto doesn't want to be found, then even Anbu won't find him, but what about another in the same situation as him? Send an urgent summons to Sabaku no Gaara and we may just get our kitsune back after all.'"

The female counterpart of the Three Sannins gasped, and proceeded to run back to her desk, throwing everything else off of it, save a scroll, ink, and a brush. She ran the brush over the paper as fast as she possible could, splattering the black mixture everywhere in her haste. When she was finished, the letter was barely legible, but it would serve its purpose well enough.

"Pakkun, could you please…?"

The inu winked and jumped up, taking the scroll firmly in his mouth.

"It'd hee mah pehsa."

Taking that to mean: "It'd be my pleasure.", Tsunade could sit idle no longer and swiftly jumped out of her window, making a break for the nearest Pachinko parlor.

.-.-.

The shukaku carrier was just returning from a mission when a ninja canine nearly barreled into him, had he not sidestepped he would be covered in sand. And not in a way he wanted.

pantpantpant

He raised a non-existent eyebrow at the dog who was laboring for breath.

pantpantpant

Had the foolish beast not noticed him? He cleared his throat.

pantpantpant

Rolling his eyes, the boy decided to just confront the animal about whatever it needed from him.

"Yes?"

"Gomen, -wheeze- I just ran here all the way from Konoha…-deep breath-…alright, I'm okay now. The Hokage requests your presence immediately in Konoha for an S-rank mission." He presented the scroll that he had dropped upon running into the whole point of his mission.

Gaara looked at the horrendous handwriting on the scroll. "The only words I can make out are 'Konoha', 'Naruto', 'Jinchuuriki', and 'NOW'."

Pakkun shrugged. "Well, that's the gist of the letter, anyway."

The sand ninja debated for a moment and then tossed the scroll back at the dog. "Take this to the Kazekage. I'm going to Konoha."

.-.-.

Okay, this is my first attempt at a gay/shounen-ai ish story, so please let me know what you thought.

The timeline is after Sasuke gets retrieved by Naruto and before Shukaku is removed from Gaara, so I'm not exactly sure when that'd be, but somewhere around there.

Spelling may be off on some of the Naruto terms, lemme know.

Please, feedback is love. :D

ooinuirloo