"Quiet down, you runts!" yelled the slightly annoyed beast, her nine tails twitching slightly in response to her annoyance, "I swear I wonder why I ever had kits..." she grumpily thought to himself, "you're nice and quiet, all settled in? Good, I'll tell you a story if you promise to go to sleep, deal, kits?"

A small fox with dull yellow fur and cerulean blue eyes looked excitedly at his father, his three tails swishing excitedly now, "Story! What story! Please! Please tell us a cool ninja story!"

"Oi, keep it down will ya, I'm trying to watch the stars," lazily said a small dark fox his tail drooped lazily behind him, his muzzle on his paws, with his one eye slightly open, its vivid green eyes fixated on the skyline.

The nine tailed fox chuckled at her youngest and most energetic kit, "Tell you what, I'll tell you a very special story, one about your father and myself, back when I wash fresh out the den, and wondering the human world, sound good?"

At the mention of their father, all eight of the kits turn their attention to their mother, "I thought you told us all about Father?" asked the oldest kit, he was the first born by many years, almost into adulthood in comparison to his twelve year old yellow brother.

The mother fox chuckled again,"Almost everything, c'mon, you're never too old for a story," she said while gently stroking her eldest with her tails,"Now! From the beginning is the best place to start, well lest start..."

With that her kits listened intently to the story of their father, they haven't seen in so long, even the eldest could barely contain his excitement at hearing about his father after so long.


"Let go of me, I haven't done anything wrong!" whimpered the small little child, his unruly blonde hair blowing in the air as his small legs pumped to carry his small frame further away from the mob chasing him, "Damn, all I did was buy some bread from the store" he thought, a voice from the mob distracted him.

"I got the demon, let's kill it, spill its guts, cut its throat and let it bleed, I bet it doesn't bleed red like we do." An angry voice slurred out from the crowd.

"Yea! Look, it's squirming to get away." Called another.

"Every year, I haven't even done anything to them, why me? Why am I the villager's pariah?" The small boy thought, his moment of self-pity interrupted by the cold and familiar cold feeling of a kunai being placed against his arm, he felt where it nicked his arm, drawing blood, he let out a small whimper, knowing that this is only the beginning of a full night of torture and beatings, somehow no matter how much they beat him and stabbed him he'd recover for the next year, another cut, this one above the last, he felt a sharp pain against his stomach, doubling over, to feel his blood seeping through his clothes, he coughed up a small amount of blood, he felt the crowd dispersing, this was the smallest beating he'd ever received, only a small group of people were left, the self appointed 'Demon Hunters'. One spat on him, another sharpened the small tanto blade in his hand whilst the third was slowly making seals with his hand, finishing them he called out, "Earth Element: Crucifying Spikes" a sickening squelch was heard as the small broken blonde was impaled by the spears in a crucifying position, the one with the tanto approached, "Time to end this, Demon." He muttered, he thrust the sword downwards into the poor boy's chest, piercing his heart, they left the boy lying on the outskirts of the village to be food to the crows, little did they know, a real demon was watching.


He woke up feeling something wet wiping across his chest, instinctively he called out," I'm sorry, I didn't mean to do anything," expecting to be hit or shouted at, he scrunched up his eyes and tries to raise his arms to protect his face, only to find his arms pinned down by a small, and furry weight, slowly opening his eyes he saw a little red fox on his chest, its muzzle over his heart, and it's eyes locked onto his, seeing the fox he smiled weakly," hey little fella, you shouldn't be near me, the villagers will try to kill you for being with their 'demon', I don't want you to get hurt," he said sweetly.

"Well they're welcome to try, I'm sure they'll find that a bit harder to do than they expect"

"Who said that?" the blonde boy called out in shock, he couldn't feel anything nearby, only the fox, but foxes can't talk," I know you're somewhere there, you said something to me."

A soft chuckling sound reached his ears, "Kit, Kit, kit, I can't keep calling you that, you'll need a name, what's your name, kit?"

He looked dumbfounded, his mouth opening and closing in confusion, was this a joke? A cruel trick to hurt him? "Oi, kit? Are you a fish? Or am I going to name you myself?"

"Name? Oh yeah right, uhm, my name..." he trailed off, he hasn't used his name or been called by his name since his fourth birthdays, since the beatings began," My name, I guess you could call me Fish if you want, I can't really remember my name that well," he laughed a little sheepishly.

"So I guess I'll be naming you then, I'll call you Keisuke."

"Naruto, Naruto Uzumaki..."

"What? Is that your name, Naruto Uzumaki, it's got a nice ring to it, Fishcakes!" She gave him a foxish grin

Hearing his name his eyes widened, it dawned upon him that someone cared enough to name him, to give him something to call his own, he grinned showing of his long canine teeth, the calling card of fanged animals," Uhm, why did you name me?" his eyes drooping, and his voice becoming sad.

"Well, kit, if you're going to be staying with me, you'll need a name, won't you, kit?"

"I guess. Wait? Staying with you? I can't even see your face?"

Unbeknownst to him the little fox pouted,"Haven't you noticed the fox on your chest?" the fox's tail swishing excitedly.

A blank look crossed the boy's face, his brain refusing to process the new information given,"what does the fox have anything to do with this?" he thought, this was becoming too confusing for him.

"I guess, kit, take a look at your chest, whattaya see? A fox? Yes, fox's can't talk, but, Kitsune can."

The boy barely managed to make a sound before promptly passing out, one thought going through his mind "so, I am a demon..."

"Oh my, a fainter, hope that doesn't affect you too much," she chuckled a bit,"also, I hope that this village doesn't miss you too much, I mean, there has to be people who love you there?" she spoke silently to the unconscious boy.

She unfurled her tails, allowing all nine of them to show, getting off the boys chests she raised her paw in a high arcing motion, bring it down in a slash, red yokai tore apart the air of the slash, four distinct claw marks in the air, growing larger to encompass the two, the Kitsune and the boy, Naruto.


He woke up with a feeling that was vaguely familiar, blinking he pushed it off his mind, he sat up only to hear any angry growl emanating from the fox sleeping happily on his chest, he lay back down, to receive a gentle purring sound, and a lick on his hand. He looked around, trying to ascertain where he was, the fox said she was taking him with her, and she did take him somewhere, this certainly wasn't near his village, maybe not even his world. This place had black sky, with a pale blue sun, or moon, he didn't know what time it was, the grass was soft and silky to the touch, and let off a heady earthy smell, "So fox, where are we?" He asked cautiously.

The fox on his chest opened one eye lazily, "Kit, my name isn't fox, it's Akemi, Akemi of the Kitsune Clan, as for where we are, this is the Kitsune Clan's own special shadow realm. It's pretty much our own world, I guess you could call it a parallel universe." She chuckled at the last part, knowing he wouldn't completely understand either of the concepts, he'd probably faint again after finding out he's not even in his home world anymore.

He opened his eyes, "well, now that you've brought me here, what do you plan to do with me?"

She hadn't thought that far, she just acted on impulse, "I guess, kit, you have a dream, what is it?"

He grinned like a maniac, "I want to be the world's greatest warrior, and become the Hokage!" He shouted to the shadow world."

"Your village? I thought they hated you and ostracized you? Why would you want to protect them?" she asked.

"Maybe they did, but I want to prove to them that I'm not a demon, and I can actually achieve something, I want them to respect me!" he puffed his chest up, feeling proud of his dream.

"Then I'll help you achieve that dream, on one condition," her voice becoming cold, and her eyes latching onto his," If you go back, and they don't accept you, you start a new village, one without hate and greed and mortal pains, if you agree to this, I'll take you back to your village, and we can train there, using any equipment at the village, okay?"

"But if we go back now, they'll hurt us, and I'm too young to start a new village just yet, I'm barely twelve!"

"Good point, kit, good point, says? We go back, and we'll train, and we'll ask your village's leader if you can be let out on training trip, and we won't keep anything from him, we'll go around the countries, training and collecting knowledge. Now get up, I want to get a good look at you." She jumped off his chest, allowing him stand up. She was quite surprised by what she saw, other than the blonde hair, he had deep cerulean blue orbs for eyes, three distinct whisker marks on his cheeks, he had two canine teeth poking through his lips, giving him a more feral appearance than most boys his age, he wore a bright orange jumpsuit with a single line of blue running down the zipper, with black stripes on the seams, his pants were short knee length blue pants, with deep pockets.

Naruto blushed after a while, the fox's eyes staring at his fangs protruding from his lips, he grinned, thinking of a way to get back at the fox, "Akemi-chan! Like the fangs? Bet you don't have any like these!" he said smugly, forgetting he was talking with a Kitsune.

"You realize what you just said, right? You asked a fox demon, if she likes the fangs, then said she doesn't have, I'm impressed..." she trailed off finding the boy was grinning like a maniac and laughing, "Am I missing something?" she was now confused, or was this boy just silly?

"I know, that's why I'm laughing, say? Do you know what might have caused the fangs to appear?"

"I could probably take a few guesses, it might have been caused by you being directly exposed to my yokai when I teleported you here, but then again, you already had them when I found you, maybe it's something to do with your blood? Do you have a clan in your village?"

Naruto looked sad at the mention of his clan, "No, I'm the last of my clan, and no-one will tell me about them, they just say demons don't have clans, and that my clan died out when I was born."

A flash of anger passed through Akemi's eyes, it was wrong to abuse a child, no matter what they've done or where they came from. "In three days where heading back, for today, we can just spend time together, after making the rift, I'm more than happy to just sleep the day away, then tomorrow we can start training, now, lie back down so I can use your chest as a cushion!" She demanded with a friendly grin.


Akemi was woken up by being thrown unceremoniously from her cushion's chest, she looked over to Naruto, he was thrashing wildly, and whimpering quietly. "Poor boy, he's having a nightmare, I can't believe what that village did to him, it's inhumane, yet they call him the demon."

She picked the trashing boy up in her tails, murmuring quietly in his ears, gently licking him on his forehead, it calmed him, his thrashing had stopped, but small tears had started flowing down his face, "Naruto-kun, wake up Naruto, come away from the painful memories, Naruto-kun."

His eyes fluttered open, he was face to face with Akemi, her tails wrapping around him, "Akemi-chan, what happened, I thought you were using me as a cushion?"

"You had a nightmare, Naruto. Are you okay, you were thrashing around quite a bit."

"I'm fine... just a little nervous about going back to Konoha, there's very few people who looked after me there..."