Chapter 1

The alarm going caused a pale pink eyebrow to scrunch up before a light groan could be heard. "Naruto-kun, it's a weekend turn off the damn alarm," the figure shifted trying to snuggle into something that was not there. Suddenly the figure sat up jade green eyes opened wide looking around. Sakura took several deep breaths looking around the room. "My childhood bedroom, then the jutsu was successful," Sakura's eyes water rubbing her face with her hands, "I can't believe it worked," she laughed weakly while the tears ran down her face.

Sakura Haruno Uzumaki stood up looking at her twelve year old self in the mirror and almost scowled at the image. Before her was the image of the flirtatious Uchiha fangirl, the image that had constantly put down her future husband and limited her own capabilities. "I'm going to destroy this image, starting with," the rosette haired girl grabbed a kunai lying on her dresser and with one swift slice; her long pink locks were cut and dropped to the ground. "I'm not Sakura Haruno, Uchiha fangirl; I will be Sakura Uzumaki, Naruto's future wife, confidant, and mother to his children." At that thought she frowned, thinking of the four children she and Naruto had raised before their deaths by their former…teammate. Minato, Jiraiya, Nagato, Kushina, my poor babies, I miss you four so much. I will remember and love you always. Sakura knew that even with the best chances, it was highly unlikely for the triplets and her baby girl would be born as they were. After all, sperm and egg relationships and whether or not they split and how many times they do is a random thing. However I can hold on to the hope that you four will be born again in some fashion. I will live for you though and raise any child I have with your father I will love with the same love and care we did for you.

Taking a few deep breaths, she wiped the tears from her eyes and scooped up the hair depositing it into the trash. There were a few stray strands still on the floor, but it was still less than the amount of hair she sees other girls parting with when they run their hands through their hair. She then looked into her closet wincing at what she saw, a shrine to her former crush, littered with photos, stray strands of hair, kunai, shuriken, ash from that fireball jutsu of his, fingernails, academy papers he left on his desk, is that blood? Sakura visibly cringed now seeing her past self in a whole new disturbing light. Okay this is the first thing to go! With some difficulty she lifted the shrine and tossed it out her bedroom window.

She turned back when she heard a feminine pained shout. Looking out the window she saw her shrine land on a purple-haired girl around her age. Wait is that Ami? Should I apologize? I mean it was- she couldn't finish the thought when she burst into laughter. Hell no! That bitch deserved it anyway! That's for all those years of hazing me in the academy, you skank! Looking out her window, she was visibly disturbed to see Ami salvaging her discarded shrine and running back to her house with a squeal praising Kami her new gift from above. Sakura face-palmed herself…hard. Please tell me I wasn't that bad all those years ago.

No, we were worse, CHA! Inner Sakura stated loudly.

With that hurdle over, she turned back to her closet and saw red… literally. "Looks like I'm going to need to either make some alterations or get a whole new wardrobe," with a sigh she pulled out one of her battle dresses and scowled at it as she put it on. Turning back to the wardrobe and frowning deeply. "New outfits definitely, even with alterations these things are abominations and more so than Naruto-kun's orange jumpsuits at least he had an excuse."

Walking out of her room, she went downstairs heading down into the kitchen, watching as her mother made breakfast, "M-Morning mom," she stuttered a bit trying to hold in her emotions. This could be harder than I first imagined. Her mother, Mebuki Haruno was her splitting image… if she had blonde hair. Yes, Sakura had actually gotten her natural hair color from her late father, Kizashi Haruno. Her father was a successful merchant a light hearted, loving father, and husband. Sakura had been grateful he hadn't died during the Kyuubi attack. No he, and one of the genin teams he had hired to escort him to Tetsu no Kuni had died in a bandit ambush when Sakura was five. It was only thanks to Ino that she grew out of the shell she formed around herself to cope.

She took a few cleansing breath then frowned at her meager breakfast, "Um mom, where's the rest of my breakfast?"

Her mother turned blinking and smiled a bit, "So going off your diet already?"

Sakura mentally slapped herself. Number three of a dozen things I'm going need to change. By Kami how completely stupid, I was! And look at my chakra reserves! Sakura mentally checked her chakra reserves and while larger this time around was still smaller than what she had in her previous life. I do have more yin chakra than I am used to having, must be the time travel. But geeze it is going to be a pain getting myself back up to where I was before the three year training with Tsunade-sensei and the war. Sakura simply nodded to her mother and watched her helpings get larger. Having shoveled down her breakfast, she was about to leave when she heard a gasp. Turning she saw her mother looking at her in shock.

"Sakura-chan, what happened to your hair?" Mebuki asked looking at her.

The rosette simply shrugged running her hand through her shortened hair, "I felt like shortening it," glancing casually at the calendar which showed the graduation exam, would be the next day. "That means," she mutters then giggles remembering the day. "I'll be a ninja in a couple of days felt like a change would be good for me," she paused. "Um, speaking of changes mom, is their anyway we can go shopping for some new clothes those battle dresses need to go?"

Her mother blinked a moment, "I think so, if not I have some of your aunt's old patterns she left me before she disappeared, I'm pretty sure I could alter them. But why are you changing so much? Did something happen with Sasuke?" From Mebuki's knowledge, Sakura had been infatuated with that boy ever since she started going to the academy. It was rather strange for her daughter to change so abruptly when just yesterday she was bragging about how she sat next to him in class. This could be a good thing though. That shrine of hers creeped the hell out of me. I think I even saw hair, fingernails and blood.

Sakura snorted crossing her arms trying to hide her disgust, "That teme, he doesn't even notice me and when he does he glares at me telling me to leave him alone; so I think it's finally time to let Naruto have his chance."

Her mother froze for a second turning to her, her expression not one of fear, hatred or disdain; but one of confusion. Mebuki's sister often told her to form her own opinions on the blonde boy. When she asked why, she was told that her sister held complete faith in her sensei's seal. "Naruto Uzumaki?"

Sakura nods and smiled faintly, "yeah, he's kind of had this crush on me since my first year at the academy," she replied tying her red ribbon in her hair and waving goodbye to her mother. Heading toward the academy, she noted how shocked her mother was at mentioning she was actually going to let Naruto have a chance. She hated having been so shallow in her early years. But all of that is going to change, I want my husband back. I want his arms around me, again on those long cold nights. She paused as her thoughts changed to the perverted. And I want him to plow into me until my brain turns to mush and with his stamina that never took very long. Inner Sakura giggled perversely at the thoughts cascading over the both of them.

XXX

Sakura walked quietly, watching many people going about their day some even friendly enough to give her a wave in greeting. She half waved back at them heading for her class glancing up every now and then at the Hokage monument shaking her head. Today was the day Naruto painted the Hokage Monument. He painted the entire Hokage Monument in broad daylight in front of the entire village, wearing a neon orange jumpsuit and not a single person notice until he was done and he started laughing like a mad man. What was I thinking when I was chasing after that teme, not even fully trained Jonin could have pulled this off. She grinned when she had an idea stopping in midstride.

Sakura raced back to her house and emptied her piggy bank. Just enough. Besides today is a review day, and seeing as I have basically already lived it there is nothing really to study for. So what better way to spend my day than with the love of my life, Cha! She raced to a hardware store where she bought several cans each of black, white, red, gray, silver, dark brown, light brown, yellow, blue, and flesh colored paints. Paying extra to have her contents sealed into a scroll she raced toward the monument to see Naruto setting up shop.

Seeing him about to start abusing the monument, Sakura called out to him, "Naruto wait!"

Naruto froze abruptly he was about to start work on the monument to prove the village that he should be the next Hokage when he heard his crush call out to him, "S-Sakura-chan! It is not what it looks like! Honest!" He was going to tell her more when she walked up to him. He braced himself expecting her usual brain crushing hit. What he got was something wet and rough on his nose as his sinuses were filled with a strong odor of chalk and ink. He visibly cringed at the smell but paused when he heard giggling. Opening his eyes, instead of seeing his nose, he saw a blob of white paint, and his crush giggling at him with the incriminating paint brush in her hands.

Sakura tried not to laugh, honestly she did, but the rush from her first prank, and seeing the love of her life alive and well was too much for her. She had to stamp down hard her first reaction at seeing him, which was to put her arms around him and never let him go. Seeing him frown at her she stopped laughing and wiped the tears from her eyes. She held up her hand as he was about to speak, "Save it Naruto. If we want to get this finished before the academy lets out, we'd better start now." Seeing his puzzled look she sighed, "The monument Naruto-kun, the two of us are going to paint the Hokage Monument, only instead of defacing it with Kabuki like you were planning I had a better idea. We should give something back to the public, remake the Monument and make it last."

Seeing her supporting him in this endeavor and hearing the suffix to his name, Naruto's face almost broke from his huge grin. "All right! Let's get to it Dattebayo!"

XXX

[This scene was inspired by The Gallant Toad Sage and his work Restart Part 2. Be sure to read it everybody! It felt right putting this scene into another time travel story.]

They had just finished painting the Monument. Each Hokage looked like they did when they were in their prime, complete with eyes colored and all. Sakura took extreme care in making her future father-in-law look like he did before he sealed the Kyuubi into his son. The dynamic duo had them painted to be smiling warmly upon the village with kind gazes. Instead of four solemn rock-formations looking down on the village, one would instead see the four giant heads of the Hokage smiling as they protect the village. What was special about this paint was the fact that it held special properties. By storing chakra into the paint, the image would never fade, be it time or rain. And with Naruto's chakra pumped into each paint can prior to painting, the paint and Monument will be there long after the village was gone.

With their work done, Sakura and Naruto had an impromptu paint splash fight using the brushes. Their skin and clothes littered with paint blotches and a few angry red marks from where the brushes rubbed to roughly. Needless to say they were laughing and having a fun time. Something that Sakura had missed out on the last time because of her unhealthy feelings towards someone who never had or would returned those feelings to her.

It was this scene that Hiruzen Sarutobi, Koharu, Homura, Danzo, Iruka Umino and a small brigade of chunin came upon.

Naruto spotted the old man first, "Hey Ojii-san! I made you young again! See?" The man in the pointy hat chuckled. Everything he did, Naruto did with the best intentions.

Iruka was the first to react with is big head jutsu, "What the hell do you two think you are doing? This mountain is sacred and you defaced it with paint! Naruto, I can understand, but you Sakura? I thought you were a good student. Clean it up now!" Naruto was cowering behind Sakura, but she stood tall and proud.

"Sorry Iruka-sensei, but the paint is permanent fused with Naruto's chakra. That paint is never coming off," she smiled fondly. "Besides, I think the village will like it this way. It is almost like we have brought them to life."

One stray chunin scoffed, Sakura glared at him cursing that she couldn't off the silver-haired traitor, "I don't care change it back now!"

Iruka looked at the Monument a bit more carefully and had to admit it looked pretty good, every Hokage looked like they did in their prime and the detail was amazing, especially the Fourth Hokage. He turned to his fellow instructor, Mizuki, "Why do you hate it Mizuki? Looking at it now I find it to be a calming and reassuring image."

Damn Demon lover! Mizuki discreetly glared at Naruto, though not discreetly enough for Sakura glare right back at him, "Because they were meant to be the way they were before. It was the will of the previous Hokage to be preserved in rock. By...coloring them, these two have shown that they disrespect their immortal image."

[Copied speech time, sorry it is just too good to stick in one story]

Sakura interrupted him, "Stone isn't immortal. Like all this, time will wash it away. Do you see this mountain? It'll be gone one day. Do you see his body?" Sakura said, pointing at Naruto, "It'll be dust one day. Time, Mizuki-sensei, is an excellent teacher, but it kills its students. The only thing immortal is the soul and its will of fire. You want them to be immortal? Then honor their memory. The past Hokage weren't stoned faced and unsmiling. That is disrespect if you think that is how they looked at the village. That," She said, pointing to the freshly colored mountain, "Is how they truly looked upon the village. With love of its people and what the Village stands for. That is the way they would want it if they were here today." It was an amazing speech; sadly it was ruined by her paint riddled form.

Naruto stood beside her, with his arms behind his head with a wide grin, "Yeah, the Hokage live forever in our hearts! Will of fire and all of that, Dattebayo!"

I'll kill you yet you damned demon, then I'll deal with your new whore! Mizuki glared at the blonde urchin like he was something he found under his shoe before turning away. "I still say it was better the way it was before."

It was at this point Hiruzen cut in, "I don't know, I kinda like looking at myself with no wrinkles," he turned to the rest of the bingo club, "What do you think?"

Homura adjusted his glasses before smiling fondly, "I rather like it, and it feels like Tobi-sensei is here with us again."

Koharu's usual frown turned into a wide smile as her eyes opened slightly to show a hint of green, "It does doesn't it?" she smiled fondly, "it feels good to see his face again."

Danzo opened his lone eye and…smiled? Yup the old stone faced Danzo actually smiled. He turned to the pair of students, "Say, do you think you could paint me up on this rock?"

Sakura smirked, "Only when you make the cut first, Danzo-jii-sama."

Naruto grinned cheekily, "And before that you'll have to wait till I give it up! Dattebayo!"

Everyone who knew Danzo was paled at what these cheeky brats just said. It got worse when they saw his shoulders shaking. But instead of snarling in anger, Danzo was…laughing? Hiruzen looked around worriedly thinking he was going to be assassinated with how hard and loud Danzo was laughing. "You two have guts. I see you will go far in the world of shinobi." With that Danzo disappeared in a shunshin to who knows where.

With the excitement over, Iruka and Mizuki turned to Naruto and Sakura grabbing each by the arm. "Come now you two, we have to get to the academy afternoon class is about to begin." And with that the instructor and student pairs disappeared in a shunshin as well. The other chunin followed suit. Leaving Sarutobi with his teammates.

Taking a drag from his pipe, Sarutobi chuckled, "ol stubby is right, they will go far."

XXX

She sighed happily as she and her future husband entered the classroom with their instructor and the potential back-stabbing traitor. She spotted everyone gathered and winced mentally as she put the sight of their deaths to their faces. Ino died defending a weakened Choji. Choji eventually dies from extreme chakra exhaustion brought on by those damned Akimichi food pills he used to give his calorie control mastery an extra boost. Shikamaru was killed by Sasuke and Madara after giving everything he had and was promoted to Elite Jonin posthumously by Naruto-kun. Kiba died defending his home and family; as well as Kurenai-sensei and her baby. Shino died after every one of his kikai bugs had been destroyed by Madara. Hinata died from a Chidori through the heart by Sasuke, but not before she had weakened him enough for Naruto to slam a Rasenshuriken into him completely obliterating him. That's only the rookie eleven; Lee, Tenten, and Neji had similar fates. Worse Tenten had been two months pregnant with Lee's third child. Sakura walked quietly towards her seat next to Ino who was currently sitting next to Sasuke. She jumped a bit when she felt Naruto squeeze her hand softly. She turned to him with a serene smile before looking towards Ino. She frowned a bit at how she ruined their friendship over a stupid crush that wasn't worth it all those years ago. It is time to make things right. It is stupid to keep this distance between us. I am not losing my best friend again. With a deep breath she hardened her resolve and marched up the stairs sitting next to her, with Naruto in the aisle seat.

"Hey forehead, what's with the paint and why are you hanging out with the dobe? Finally realize that Sasuke-kun is too good for you?" Ino teased, the rosette haired girl gave a weak smile and sat down. Naruto made to defend Sakura's honor but was stopped once again by her raised hand.

"As if Ino-pig," she replied. "I realized I am too good for Sasuke," GASP! Every recipient in the room, including the instructors started paying attention to Sakura's conversation. "I mean excluding Hinata, every girl in here has fawned over the Uchiha for the past what five years, all it got us is a whole lot of nothing," Here Sakura did her best impression of an Uchiha grunt whilst brooding, and then performed the fangirl squeal-n-sigh combo. "For what, for a boy whose balls haven't even dropped yet, and who doesn't give any of us the time of day? Hell, he could be gay."

Sakura's rant was interrupted by a cry of "Bull shit!" Everyone looked around looking for the source of the shout, only to realize it came from their resident Uchiha himself. "I'm not GAY!"

Sakura scoffed, "Hmph, prove it!" At Sasuke's confused look, she continued, "Kiss Ino-pig and hold it! With tongue, and I had better see those hands moving south across her back till they can't go no more!"

To everyone's surprise, he conceded, "Fine, come here Ino." To everyone's surprise, but especially Ino's, he started frenching her as his hands slowly moved down her back. Gathering her senses about her, Ino's tongue started to fight Sasuke's back into his mouth before his pushed hers out and they fought to gain oral ground. Feeling his hands on her ass, Ino brought her arms to the back of his neck and pushed him closer to her.

It was at this point that to everyone's disappointment, Iruka ended the spectacle, bringing the content rating back to TV-G. "That is quite enough; you two can either continue this after school or in detention." Ino and Sasuke broke apart faster than you could say 'Itachi'.

Sasuke surprised everyone again however when he turned to Ino once more, "Hn, fine so Ino-chan, are you doing anything later today or what?"

Ino turned towards Sakura mouthing, "thank you Sakura-chan" before turning back to Sasuke as they talked animatedly.

Sakura then began to mentally run down her jutsus as Iruka and Mizuki took the roll call for afternoon classes. Apparently while the jutsu knowledge was present as she could picture each one, how much chakra they took, and how to implement them; the problem was she lacked almost all of the chakra capacity or the endurance. Dammit! Just perfect! I'm back to square one; I'll need to retrain my body. That totally sucks, but at least this time I can get a jump on it. I'm also going to help Naruto surpass himself, which means teaching him the Rasengan before our team placements. Only problem is that it'll raise so many questions about how he learned it. The only ones who know it right now are Lord Jiraiya and Kakashi-sensei. I may have to give away something or use that mind transfer jutsu Ino-chan taught me before she died. I just hope I don't need to resort to that. As much as I want my Naruto-kun back and to have plow into me like a screen door during a typhoon, I love to get to know him again without all the undo pressure we had in our previous life. She missed Inner Sakura's perverted giggle.

Sighing to herself, she looked at the syllabus that Iruka-sensei had given them for the final exams tomorrow; she groaned at the last test. She knew for a fact that the academy headmaster made the final test and it was he who designed the last stage specifically to prevent Naruto from ever passing. Naruto only found out what happened after Iruka-sensei became headmaster. She looked up in surprise as she heard a shout. The surprise didn't come just from the shout; but the fact that it was Shikamaru who shouted.

XXX

Shikamaru had left home much earlier than he normally would this morning, and with good reason too. It was his troublesome mother's time of the month, he and his father's personal waking nightmare. Over the years, Shikamaru had learned how to dodge his mom's troublesome mood swings, especially the ones that brought on the three d's: first there was the ear clincher of death, then the rolling pin of despair, finally the frying pan of DOOOOOOOM! His normal routine to avoid all troublesomeness in the mornings was to keep his room clean if his mom ever inspects it, brush his teeth before and after eating breakfast, put his bowl in the sink, shower, hang his towel to dry while putting his dirty clothes by the washer (1), get dressed, tend the deer with his dad, and give his mother a kiss on the cheek before going to the Academy with Choji.

That routine was blown out of the water when she woke him up much earlier than his routine allowed, had him get dressed and head straight to the academy. She was shouting something about a mountain and paint and Naruto for some reason. It was too troublesome to dwell on so as soon as he got to the academy he took a nap at his seat by the window, only to wake up to see Sasuke and Ino make-out. He sighed after Iruka broke them up and turned towards the window to see the Hokage Monument… in full color. "What the hell happened to the monument?" Shikamaru broke off as he turned back to the class, paused when he saw Naruto and Sakura riddled with paint splotches matching the mountain. "Dammit Naruto, now you have infected Sakura-san with your troublesomeness too. First she wakes me up, now you have her pranking."

Mizuki glowered, "Damn brats." Filthy demon and his whore! Mizuki hid his expression of disgust while Iruka put a curious look onto his face.

"Still what did you have to prove by defacing the monument?"

Sakura answered first, "Iruka-sensei, Naruto and I may have been screwing around but we also pointed out how lax our security has been if two academy students wearing a shiny orange jumpsuit and red dress managed to paint the entire monument in broad daylight. What if instead of paint, they were paper bombs? I mean if we were enemy shinobi, we could have caused a lot of damage to the village by blowing up the monument and using the remains as a vantage point to fire jutsu left and right. While you all had huge boulders falling down on your heads."

Iruka blinked a few times Naruto was also looking at the pink haired girl in wonder, the Chunin coughed into his fist turning to Naruto, "You are right, so Sakura, Naruto, for your infiltration theory and tactics portion of the exam, I gladly give you an S rank and inform you that you don't need to take that portion of the exam."

"Really Iruka-sensei?" Naruto asked.

"Yes, however it doesn't excuse you from skipping class so as punishment everyone will review the substitution jutsu," Iruka stated everyone groaned some even glared coldly at Naruto. Sakura growled to herself she remember she had been just like them in her first life blaming Naruto for every screw up, while it was true in this particular instance and it was justified. She made a promise she would not let people treat her Naruto like garbage.

A few minutes later Naruto unveiled his Sexy jutsu blowing Iruka back with the mother of all nose bleeds. Fighting down the urge to bash her future husband in the head for that perverse jutsu, Cha, I forgot he had that stupid pervert blasting Jutsu. Still Iruka-sensei shouldn't really put down a jutsu that can knock him flat on his ass. She giggled watching Iruka try his hardest to beat some form of discipline into the blonde haired boy.

"Iruka-sensei, while the image is offensive, you can't deny that it had disabled you and others effectively. If this had been a battlefield situation, Naruto could have given all of the males and some of the females a bloody smile to match the bloody noses."

Iruka grumbled but conceded, "Fine, for your creative use of henge, you get full marks."

When the academy let out, all the kids could think about were Naruto and Sakura's rendition of the monument and Naruto's unique henge.

XXX The Next Day XXX

The exams were even easier for Sakura the second time around now that she knew what to expect. She passed everything she did but held back just enough so she could be place into squad seven, Like it really mattered, Kakashi-sensei would have passed us anyway. Especially after Naruto-kun and I found out why we were assigned to his team. My aunt, Sasuke's uncle, and Naruto's father all were members of the previous team 7. Sakura frowned a bit watching Naruto, while he had passed his infiltration and evasion exam with flying colors, his Taijutsu exam, put him at rank D mainly because Mizuki didn't hold back and Naruto's taijutsu was nothing more than that of a brawler, his Genjutsu detection and releasing skills didn't even get a rank as he sucked at it mostly because of his huge volume of chakra, as for his chakra capacity however also had been given a Kage rank. He spent the entirety of his previous life just being able to detect Genjutsu much less cancel it and it eventually got him killed. Sakura's eyes watered thinking about it. The last exam of the day was the basic ninjutsu. Yet this did not give Sakura any real source of comfort. Her future husband would not become proficient in Ninjutsu until that night. Please be okay my Naruto-kun, she thought. Watching Naruto enter for his ninjutsu exam she had begun writing down the stages for the Rasengan using a minor Genjutsu to mask what she was doing as she made the final touches for later in the evening.

XXX

Sakura had entered Naruto's room and gently placed the scroll on his bed, she had mimicked Minato Namikaze's hand writing perfectly. It was something her husband had taught her in her previous life. She thought about giving him the scroll on the Hiraishin but she was already corrupting the time stream. A part of her didn't care if it meant corrupting the time stream she was going to make sure Naruto survived to live to old age this time, not dying trying to break out of a simple Genjutsu. I will not lose my husband this time; we will not lose our little angels this time. We are going to grow old together, bask in our family, and make sure that idiot Sasuke never leaves this time even if we have to kill him. This I swear as my Nindo.

Sakura left, but not before she cleaned up Naruto's apartment and got rid of the spoiled milk. "To think if it hadn't been for this junk Naruto might have actually stolen my first kiss. Glad he did though, I would of thought it was Sasuke that I kissed and probably be even more obsessed with the emo-teme," the rosette haired girl snorted then smiled picking up one of Naruto's shirts holding it to her nose closing her eyes and gently taking in his scent. "Oh kami how I miss you, Naruto-kun," she whispered tears falling onto the shirt before she put it down. She left after a few minutes trying her hardest to recover from the sense of melancholy she was going through.

XXX

By mid-morning Naruto Uzumaki had returned after a night filled with both ups and downs, the upside he now had mastered a more advanced version of the clone jutsu, the Shadow Clone Jutsu. He also graduated after helping Iruka-sensei take down the no good lying traitor Mizuki. That had been one of the major downers of the previous night, I never thought Mizuki hated me that badly, now I know why. The fourth Hokage sealed the nine-tailed inside me, why? It was confusing and the third hokage didn't give a good explanation for it when he asked. Evaded the question and said I'd know when I became sixteen or Chunin whichever came first. Growling in frustration he opened his apartment and found something he hadn't quite expected, his room had been straighten up and cleaned. I've seen people ransack it before even set fire to it but clean? Rubbing his head in confusion he noted one of his shirts was out of place, he also noted a scroll sitting on his bed that hadn't been there the day before. He walked up and opened it looking at the contents not really caring if it had been a booby trap.

Inside he found directions for a jutsu he had never seen before, "Rasengan," he muttered aloud looking at the three diagrams, the first was showing a ninja holding a water balloon, looking closely at the diagram and smirked. "I can get this done before team placements," he noted a small note at the bottom of the scroll. "Use shadow clones to master chakra control, tree walking, water walking, and the leaf balance," the next set of diagrams showed what the note meant. "Oh yeah I got this."

Taking the scroll rolling it up he placed on the dresser then went to get changed grabbing the shirt he stopped looking down at the shirt feeling a damp spot. He felt the area of the damp spot and frown, "Not a water spot," he brought it to his nose and took a gentle sniff a very familiar smell tickled his nose, and only brought confusion to his mind. "Sakura-chan," he frowned a bit looking at it then glanced around the clean room again. How did she know where my apartment was and why did she clean it for me, I thought she liked that teme Sasuke?

With a mental shrug and a promise to find out later if the evidence was true or not, he quickly changed heading out to the training fields to master the jutsu he had been given. During the following week he had use the suggestion of using the shadow clones to master the tree walking and water walking exercises while going through the motions of learning the Rasengan. Outside of the third day Naruto had mastered the first stage of the Rasengan rotation, now he was working on force using a white rubber ball.

Not far from his location in another training field, Sakura was retraining her slowly building chakra reserves and stamina by doing the chakra control exercises she gave to Naruto. She was also retraining herself in the taijutsu she picked up from Tsunade and Naruto after he mastered his mother's taijutsu style. This will cause questions later on but I don't care. I'll hold back until Naruto and I become chunin. She dropped to her knees gasping for air after just three hours of work. "I use to be able to do this for almost half all day," she got a dirty grin on her face. "And sometimes the entire night with Naruto doing something else, but now I can barely make it till lunch without falling on my ass, starting from scratch completely sucks. But at least when I get enough of my chakra reserves high enough I can use the Shadow clone jutsu to speed things up," she said to herself.

During the day of ID photos Naruto simply appeared atop the Hokage tower dressed as is, too tired to create the kabuki paint idea he had in mind for the ID photos. He walked into the Hokage's office and deposited his photo which the Hokage looked at. Looking up from the photo he saw how tired Naruto looked. "Have you been getting enough sleep Naruto?"

"Oh yeah, I'm just squeezing as much training in as I can before team placements, old man," Naruto smiled.

Sarutobi blinked, "really what kind of training?"

"Chakra control exercises, and this really cool jutsu I found," the blonde shinobi thought a moment, "say old man you wouldn't happen to know a fire jutsu, wind jutsu, lightning jutsu, water jutsu, and an earth jutsu would you?"

Sarutobi's eyes widen a second, "Why would you need five different elemental jutsu?"

Naruto chuckled, "I found something really cool about the shadow clones that I wouldn't have figured out on my own. The person that left a scroll of this new jutsu I've been working on also told me about the knowledge transfer the clones give me. Right now they're working on my chakra control and the third stage of that jutsu."

Third stage? He's working on a jutsu that has stages? Hmm interesting. He's also discovered the secret behind the shadow clones. The fact that his clones are working right now with the control exercises, very interesting maybe his control of the nine-tails will come that much sooner. However who gave him the hints and this mysterious jutsu? Sarutobi pursed his lips and shot his eyes toward the door just as a small figure came running in holding a shrunken. Naruto glanced at the figure that unceremoniously crashed to the ground after tripping on his own feet. Konohamaru… great just what I don't need. He sighed watching as his grandson started accusing Naruto of tripping him just as Ebisu entered, Looks like my grandson doesn't understand who he's dealing with this time. After Naruto slugged the smaller boy he turned back to the Hokage.

"Well old man, do you have those jutsu's or not?" Naruto asked.

"I have a few fire based and earth based jutsu's you can try to master, I also have one or two Wind jutsu you might be able to tackle, some water jutsu as well, but lightning based jutsu's are extremely rare. Most lightning jutsu's are restricted to the Hidden Cloud village."

Naruto frowned, "Well darn I was hoping for a decent lightning jutsu."

"Why do you need so many jutsu Naruto," the old man asked sounding worried.

"Oh not so many just five one for each of those elements, it's something I'm cooking up," Naruto smiled giving the Hokage the nice guy pose which cause the old man to shudder.

"Very well I'll see what I can do, come in tomorrow before orientation and I'll have your scrolls. Or better yet I'll drop them off at your apartment early tomorrow."

"Your awesome old man," Naruto leapt over the desk and grabbed the old Hokage in a hug before taking off which made Konohamaru and Ebisu to look on in shock.

"Hey gramps, what about me?" his grandson asked.

Sarutobi glanced at the boy, "maybe once you've graduated the academy and practice enough chakra control I'll help you with some jutsu as well."

"Really thanks grandpa," the reply shocked the old hokage. It had been nearly three years since his grandson had called him that.

XXX

Naruto whistled a bit then grimaced as he felt one of his clones dispel, with it however was the information he was waiting for. "Rasengan mastered," he muttered to himself. He tightened his hand into a fist then looked up and smiled uneasily. His beautiful pink haired vision of loveliness stood arms crossed a passive expression on her face having just come out of that Ino girl's flower shop. "Hey Sakura-chan, can I take you out on a date?" he asked cheerfully sure he knew that just a request will likely get him pounded into paste but he was feeling really lucky.

Sakura reached up rubbing her chin playing at thinking about it, "Do you have the money for it?"

Blinking a few times in confusion not sure if he heard it right, he opened up his Gama-chan. His monthly allowance had come in and because he had been training more than eating he had most of his money still. "Yeah, so does that mean you want to go out with me?" he asked in greater confusion.

Sakura was trying her hardest not to laugh out loud at his face which was mixture of panic and hope. He just looks so funny when he's confused, in the five years after we married it's still his funniest expression. She looked like she was thinking about it, "Alright I guess we could go out," she replied she heard a gasp behind her and turned to see Ino eyes wide and mouth agape.

"S-Sakura-chan? y-you're actually going to accept going out on a date with Naruto? The dobe?" Ino asked Sakura saw Naruto's face droop a bit.

"Yeah, so what," Sakura snorted her eyes flashing in anger. "Let me tell you what have I got for chasing after Sasuke, Ino, absolutely nothing but five years of cold shoulders, looks of indifference, or told to 'Go away,' and everything else. I took a really good look at myself a few days ago. You want to know what I hated myself as a person. I wasted my time tending to my looks for someone who wouldn't give a damn, while physically abusing the only boy who did, when I should have been focusing on my skills as a kunoichi of Konoha. I grew out my hair for the same boy only because I heard a rumor that he likes girls with longer hair. I looked into my closet that morning and found a shrine Ino. A shrine, to Sasuke Uchiha, that I am pretty sure had hair clippings and his blood," Sakura visibly shuddered remembering that tasteless object and treasuring the memory of pegging Ami in the head. "I tossed that shrine out the window and it nailed Ami in the head. I looked out the window and saw her carry it back to wherever the hell her house is, screaming something about Sasuke and gifts from above. I don't want to be that type of person Ino-pig. Being that kind of person made me do a stupid thing." Sakura's eyes teared up a little as she looked towards her best friend, "I broke up my friendship with my best friend; the same best friend who would build me right back up when bullies would break me down, the same best friend who gave me the strength I needed to stand on my own two feet so that those bullies would never get to me again. I broke up my friendship with her for a stupid reason; for that stupid insensitive teme." her eyes softened looking at Naruto. "I'm giving Naruto a chance, now."

"R-Really Sakura-chan?" Naruto asked looking at her in awe.

Sakura nodded, "I gave Sasuke more chances then I like to care about, I'm so over him it's not even funny."

Taking his hand and slowly leading him away from the flower shop Ino looked practically dumbfounded and a little uneasy at how close her pink haired rival came to the truth. Wow it's like she hit an epiphany. With a mental shrug Ino's face broke out into a starry eyed smile. "Well one less girl competing for Sasuke-kun's heart."

Author's Note: I made some changes to this fic after re-reading it, so beta readers are welcome for this one as well as any others I'm having trouble with.

1: they have power-lines, TV's and indoor plumbing, why can't they have a washer and dryer?