Namikaze Minato had been a tricky bastard.
The man always had a trick up his sleeve, was always willing to pull off the impossible just to say he could.
He knows this, has seen it with his past jailer's eyes, so he really shouldn't be feeling as surprised as he currently is looking at the bars of his latest cage.
The seal spiraling across them isn't an Uzumaki work, but nor is it the rush job you'd expect given the circumstances.
Kurama knows enough of seals to know this one is a masterwork, but none of it makes sense.
The Uzumaki seals were elegant but utilitarian, every component obvious and every part accounted for.
This seal is not one of them. This seal has hidden edges and loops that curve at just the right angle to appear to be one thing but mean another.
He wonders why the human would chain him in a seal designed to look like an ordinary masterwork, a seal meant to conceal its own function.
Namikaze Minato had been a tricky bastard, though, so Kurama supposes he shouldn't be surprised.
The new seal lets his latest jailer hear him.
Not enough to make out words, not enough for him to actually manipulate it, but he can feel it react to his own anger at being trapped, to his boredom at being stuck in this cage.
This new jailer is only a kit though, and he finds himself doing his best to restrain his ever present anger without realizing it.
He's not a savage, he won't drive a kit to madness.
His jailer is four when the orphanage that shelters it tosses it onto the street.
Humans are filthy little creatures that hate anything they consider different, monsters that will punish a child for the sins of its father.
Kurama knows this, has known it for a while, so he can't explain the spark of rage he feels as the container stumbles out the door, clutching at a bloodied knee.
The kit is crying, fat globs of tears running down its face, and he can't explain the feeling in his chest.
It's anger, of course he's angry, he's furious, but it's something else.
It's something connected to the pattern on the walls of his cage, something that makes them flicker and fade when he focuses on it.
He can use that, can use whatever it is.
The kit is bleeding out.
There's a pair of human drunks at the edge of the alleyway and the kit is bleeding out against the bricks, eyes falling shut as they laugh with their hands all red.
No, he thinks, no, this is not how the kit will die.
He focuses on the feeling from earlier, the feeling that makes him want to rip the humans limb from limb, and pushes at the bars of the cage, watches as the flicker brighter and faster.
He starts in shock as the bars crumble, as the seal breaks, before leaping forward to take advantage of the opportunity.
There's a moment of dizziness, of disorientation, before the drunks are in front of him and he reacts without thinking.
It's over in moments, one human without its head and the other's chest torn open.
It's over in moments, and it takes him another to realize just what's going on.
Kurama reaches out a shaking hand, runs it across the body he seems to be inhabiting.
He has hair, he has skin.
He can feel a heart beating-he can feel his own heart beating, he has a heartbeat!
Breaths are coming faster, the body is starting to hyperventilate, when movement stirs behind him.
The kit's staring up at him and Kurama finds himself pressing a hand to its flesh without a second thought, concentrating as the chakra spills from his finger tips and sinks into the child's skin, slowly mending the jagged tears.
"Hey," he murmurs, pushing aside the rising panic, the rising need to know just what the fuck is going on.
"Hey, kit."
He watches the kit watch him, kneels down on shaking legs-on human legs-wondering what to do.
The seal is gone, his chains are gone, but he's trapped in a human body in return.
Konoha will no doubt want to dissect him, want to tear him apart, and he has a feeling they'll want to do the same to the kit watching him.
There's really only one solution.
"Come on," he says, lifting the kit up and moving to stand, "we're going."
"Where?" the kit asks, blinking back at him with nothing but curiosity in its eyes, and he pauses.
"We're going to a place where you won't get hurt anymore."
It bites at its lip before throwing its arms around him. He stiffens as the child tightens its grip before leaning back and smiling at him.
"My name's Naruto, mister."
Leave it to Kushina to pick a name like that.
"Kurama," he says, too exhausted to lie.
"My name is Kurama."