AN: This is my first attempt at writing fanfics so please don't be too harsh on me. The summary might suck, sorry about that most probably will be changing that title too. Please enjoy, follow, favorite and REVIEW
Also, can anyone please help me writing a good enough summary? Please...
REVIEWS ARE LOVE, REVIEWS ARE LIFE...
Disclaimer: Obviously i don't own Naruto or any characters. the OC's and the jutsu ideas though... MINE.
Age- one week
My name is Rajesh. I am an Indian programmer working in US. Or at least I used to be (damn you Trump!). It wasn't all bad mind you. I got a request for resignation, and me and my wife both got new jobs in Canada within a month. I did die in an accident on the day I was going to resign. That sucked. After the living programmer gig I was dead for a while, I don't exactly remember how long I did that but just being there in a dark place with absolute nothing gets kinda boring after a while. It also ruins your concept of time. Anyways after that whole afterlife thing I'm again trying something new here. I mean we Indians are no strangers to job skipping. It's not like I have any control over my situation whatsoever, but thinking like it's my doing helps a little. Otherwise I would just be blaming some random omnipotent entity and that is absolutely useless. So about this new thing, I guess I'm giving the whole 'living' thing a try once more, which is interesting because Hinduism has so many categories and classes and castes and entire different belief systems that it gets a little difficult to keep track of who said what regarding the afterlife. One belief is that you get judged and then the evil souls are purged by Shiva and the good ones become a part of Vishnu. Another says you get salvation after your body gets cremated and after that the soul doesn't need anything else. Another belief system is the cycle of life, which says you live your life, you die, your soul is cleansed and you start over again. But I don't think the cleansing thing happened with me seeing as I still remember my past life.
Oh did I tell you that I have a twin this time? Yup, I haven't really mastered the whole 'turning the neck' thing or the 'seeing' thing yet so I don't know how they (and I) look or their (and mine) gender (hopefully I'm still male) yet but for the short periods of our lives, we've existed together and whenever they cry and wail I can't stop my body I just start crying too (it's kinda embarrassing really but I'm an infant now so who cares).
The whole child birth is a magical moment is so full of crap. It's propaganda I say. Because no one in that delivery room is happy. The mother is in pain, the father is scared out of his mind, the doctor is annoyed/tired/worried and from the baby's point of view it isn't a good experience either. Ever had to go to work or college or school on cold winter days but you are in your bed within a warm blanket nest? You have to leave the cozy, comfortable bed and face the cold harsh world. Now increase the comfort you felt in the bed by at least ten times and increase the coldness and harshness of the world by fifty time because infant body is extremely weak, add on the annoyance you feel when instead of getting out willingly someone is pushing you out violently and now you know how a baby feels.
But all that doesn't really matter now because I'm extremely worried at the moment. I don't know how long I've been alive for (most of the time I'm tired and sleeping) but whatever waking hours I have spent have been like cliché self inserts fanfictions. The people taking our care speak Japanese, there have been quite a few shouting matches around us, the birthing was not a good experience and some chaotic (and maybe violent I don't know I slept through most of it) event occurred right after our birth. Till now my life has shown perfect signs of being a cannon character's self-insert twin. Maybe I'm just overthinking it. My wife was right. I should have stopped reading them long ago. I'll figure out that I was worried for nothing once I start seeing. Right.
Age- Four months
Or so I thought. The first time I was clearly able to make out my twin's face, I knew I was screwed. My twin brother has blonde hair, blue eyes and three whisker like scars on each cheek. My brother is Uzumaki Naruto. I had read many fanfictions with similar scenarios. There was that one with Shikamaru's twin, the one with Ino's twin, the one with Sasuke's twin, there was one where Naruto had a twin sister as well. None about Naruto having a twin brother. Wonder what that is about.
I am Naruto Uzumaki's twin brother. Any hopes I had about staying on the sidelines are out the window. I'm not one of those people who think they'll save the Uchiha clan or motivate Sakura early or save Sandaime from Orochimaru. That kind of thinking is the entire problem of this world. Forcing others to follow your way is never going to work, that is what happened in canon. One guy thought he knew the best and therefore he should help other see the way. This single sentence can explain the entire story of Danzo, Pein, Madara (I know he was manipulated by Zetsu but that is the answer he arrived at) and Kaguya (she went crazy with power later but her intention behind eating the steroid fruit was AGAIN WORLD PEACE). The irony of the story of Naruto is that so many people dedicate their lives to bring about peace and then they all kept fighting to prove that their way was best. Everybody is trying to solve everybody's problem and forcing them to swallow their solution (that came out wrong!).
Either way the massive fanfiction community teaches us that there are quite a few ways to deal with this dilemma.
1) Grow strong enough and then run away: Appealing. But by the time I am strong enough to be considered S-rank the whole mess would have sorted itself out already. So what's the point?
2) Try to manipulate people and events using the foreknowledge available to get a better outcome: Not happening
3) Take care of yourself and others you grow close to and let the rest take care of themselves: Sounds like a dick move but THAT'S WHAT TRUMP DID … Ahem sorry about that. Yeah so that may sound a little selfish but that is the popular approach towards life on modern earth and look how happy people over there are.
4) Deal with shit as it comes: Very popular amongst engineers. The classic procrastination approach. Has its pros and cons but might get some very interesting results.
5) Wreck the plot line: Don't want your life to be a predictable story? Change a few key events and BAM all your foreknowledge is useless and you have life's surprises-that-hit-you-in-the-nuts-when-you-are-not-looking back.
6) Mix-bag: Use a combination of multiple approaches. That one sounds interesting. There are too many threats and nuisances lurking around that will come later to bite Naruto (as the whole world revolves around him) and therefore, me, and that is going to be problematic. Instead of being the global savior all I have to do is ensure me and mine's safety. That actually does sound enough and doable.
One thing at a time. The first objective I would like to achieve is bladder and bowel control but that is a long ways away. The first thing we can do is solving the problem of locomotion and communication. No worries. Naruto was born on October 10th, judging by our caretaker's clothing, its winter now so January or early February. That make us 3-4 months old, babies generally can sit on their own by the time they are 6 months old. So I guess it's time to start rolling practice.
Age- Seven months
Objective complete! We must be around 6-7 months old now. It took a little longer than I expected but we can now sit on our own and maintain our balance long enough. It was a bit difficult at first because the caretakers left us in the crib all day long and trying to convey the message that I want them to put us on the floor was a little difficult at the time. But after I mastered squirming, Naruto did too and that made the crib really cramped and they started leaving us on the floor during daytime.
Sitting and crawling came together, and that lead to our daily excursion trips to explore our surroundings. We don't live in an orphanage like I expected. Instead we live in a house. I haven't seen outside yet but I'm betting that this is an out of the way place in the forest surrounding Konoha protected by powerful barriers and seals meant to keep outside things outside and inside things inside. And it makes a lot of sense to put us here instead of the orphanage.
The person who sealed one of the most powerful beings in this world inside two infants is dead. The person who understood said seal and had the experience of having said powerful being inside themselves is dead. The person who might have had a chance to understand the seal to some extant is out in the world spreading counter-intelligence and running a spy network. The rest of the Konoha is barely holding itself together. They are playing blind here. They don't know if the seal was properly applied or not. They don't know how an infant's rapidly growing body and chakra coils will affect the seal. If something does go wrong they want it to happen outside there city to avoid loss of even more lives and resources. This place must be surrounded and observed by ANBU 24/7 to avoid anyone from outside doing any funny business and to make sure that we are stable and safe (ourselves as well as for others).
With our increased activity, the time Hiruzen spends with us daily has increased as well or maybe I'm awake long enough to notice he's still there or we can actually do stuff to engage him with us long enough. I guess it's a mixture of all those. The point is he spends his evenings with us and again it makes sense to me. The whole jinchuuriki are close to the kage is not a convention or anything, it's a necessity. It's basic common sense to have someone capable of going nuclear in the future emotionally close to you to ensure loyalty. In many fanfics the sandaime left Naruto in an orphanage trusting the matrons to be good with him which totally stupid. Even if the matrons treated him fairly and he had a good life at the place how come he is suddenly so close with the man to call him ji-ji when he clearly understands how important the hokage is? No matter what Naruto's condition might be Hiruzen must have visited him frequently, no, the hokage would have met him almost daily inside as well as outside the orphanage and he must have been allowed to come to the hokage's office whenever he wishes. Continuous contact to instill a belief that even if the whole world is against me the hokage will have my back. The person will eventually be grateful and return the favor ten times over.
He points at pictures and things and calls out their names. He is teaching us to talk. He also reads stories from books to us, even if we don't understand a word of it (me because I'm not that good at Japanese while Naruto because he is, well he is an infant so…) we do try to imitate the sounds he is making. I guess the next objective is to establish communication.
Age- Nine months
I finally found out my name and I couldn't be more relieved. My name is Arashi (storm), my brother's name is Naruto (maelstrom) and our last names are Uzumaki (whirlpool) and Namikaze (waves and wind) which makes a nice theme. God forbid if Kushina would have named me Menma (dried bamboo based topping) and with my brother being Naruto (can also mean fish cakes slices) the theme would have become ramen. Oh the horror!
For the past month and a half, I have been trying to speak and the noises I make have been coming closer to what they should sound like. I think I should be able to speak broken words in a few weeks.
I've been thinking and I realized that there might be problems and threats against me and Naruto much earlier than I assumed. The biggest threat to us right now is the one inside konoha. In cannon Minato sealed the yang half of the kyuubi in Naruto while he sealed the yin half in himself. Here he had two sons so it might be possible that he sealed one half in each of us. I don't have any way to confirm whether or not I am a jinchuuriki till I can channel chakra but if I am then that creates a few problems. In canon, Danzo wanted Naruto under his control. He wanted Naruto to be a weapon of mass destruction. But Hiruzen wouldn't allow it. Here we have a spare. If the hokage is too stubborn, Danzo just might try to take one of us. Or worse, the hokage might agree to Danzo and him keeping one each, because let's be honest here, despite his kind, grandfatherly image, he is a military dictator. If he thinks that giving one of us to Danzo might help the village he just might do it. Now Naruto can't be in ROOT, he needs to be out here, taking names and making friends to save the world and I don't want to go to ROOT because who in their right mind would want to? I'm going to be conscripted into their army of super soldiers in return of the satisfaction of being said super soldier and that's it. I am not going through any more lunacy for konoha. But if Danzo does try to take one or both of us then I don't think I'm in any position to resist as I am now. The more time passes, the more they will consider us stable and the more the chances of an abduction attempt to ROOT increases.
Age- One year
It's our first birthday and Hiruzen or 'ji-ji' as he likes us to call him spent the entire day with us today (I think it's a clone the hokage should be a busy person). Anyway he brought us new toys, he played with us in the yard and he read us stories. I took Japanese in college for one semester so I know a little hiragana, I was trying to read the book myself when he saw me and started teaching me to read and gave me two more picture books. If in canon he did the same with Naruto, then no wonder they were close. He practically raised Naruto. As far as birthdays go, It was a good day, the week after that not so much.
I want to say I called it because I totally did. Our place might be surrounded by ANBU (I have no proof of that but its common sense really) but they never show themselves to us (their presence just seems logical). Other caretakers in civilian garb look after us (I'm pretty sure they are shinobi too. Again, it just logical). These caretakers keep changing every few days. No single person has been here for more than a week.
One such caretaker on her first day come in our room and distracted Naruto with a new toy. It has flickering lights and everything, very eye catching especially for a one year old. While he was distracted she picked me up and left. Ever since we can walk and run the caretakers take us out to the yard every day for a few hours. We can do whatever we want but they never let us go near the wall surrounding the compound. This woman took me across the wall outside the compound. At first I was calm thinking the ANBU wouldn't let just anyone take me but the farther away we got the more panicked I felt. I had never been more than a few feet away from Naruto in this life. All of a sudden this woman was separating us, something wasn't right. By the time the compound walls started growing smaller, I was having a full blown panic attack. The weird thing about my anxiety was where it was coming from. Until now I didn't want to go to ROOT but now the panic, the anxiety was not by thought of going to ROOT but instead it was about going away from Naruto. Sure he was my biological twin but he was mentally younger than me by two and a half decades and I had just gotten over the fact that he isn't a fictional character anymore so why am I dreading the separation so much instead of the real threat that is the brainwashing I will get when I'm in ROOT. The ROOT training was 'a' reason but a very minor one. Not as big as being away from him. I felt a tug on my stomach and I thought I was going into the mindscape but instead the pull was outwards towards the compound. All of a sudden, all my distress and anxiety was replaced by a burning sensation in my stomach and the woman just dropped me. I tried to run towards the house and before the woman could try to stop me the ANBU were here. A cat mask teenager with long purple hair who I think was Yugao picked me up and brought me back to the nursery where I found Naruto bawling on the floor. I ran towards him and he latched onto me and cried.
He calmed down after sometime, by then the ANBU were gone, or were hiding again. When he told me that he was looking for me and then his tummy started hurting I knew he felt the same thing I did. I pulled his shirt up and yup there was the seal, clearly visible. I pulled up my shirt and I had the same seal on me.
This evening just confirmed a few things to me, 1) me and Naruto have one half each of kurama in us 2) Danzo wants at least one host 3) Hiruzen doesn't want to give either 4) our seals are somehow connected and we know when the other is in trouble (how cliché twins with sixth sense).
The ANBU took over the duties of the caretakers after that. Neko-san would wake us up in the morning and take us to the yard to do some stretching exercises and then we would run around the yard. I wasn't a very active person in my previous life, few in the modern world are but here I had an overabundance of energy and that is a given because I am an Uzumaki, a jinchuuriki and a toddler. Naruto seems to have even more energy than me. He just never gets tired. Another difference that I have noticed between me and Naruto is that he heals faster, while the scrapes and cuts a toddler can get while running around aren't that much to begin with, he heals without any scarring by the day's end while for me it take 1-2 days which doesn't make much sense to me given that his advanced healing was credited to kurama and Uzumaki heritage and I have both of them too. It's another item for the list of thing I need to figure out I guess. After the chaos in the yard we would clean up, have breakfast and then another ANBU same (turtle) would sit down and teach us to read and write. I want to check weather my Uzumaki heritage and previous life experience as a programmer will help me in learning fuinjutsu or not so I pay extra attention to this part but Naruto just can't sit still for more than a few minutes. I have to persuade him after every little while to continue with the lesson. After that we have lunch and are left on our own to play and roam around the house. Ji-ji comes every evening. He reads us a story or tells one himself. The stories and the material are very basic (what do you expect, they are for one year olds) but since my grasp on the language isn't as strong as I would like I'm ok with it for now. Ji-ji stays for dinner sometimes but leaves just before it most days and after cleaning up we are put to bed.
Our second birthday is in less than a month and if I remember correctly then Naruto was moved to his apartment when he was 4 so that means either the 2 years we will stay hear or at the orphanage. The orphanage seems likelier as the ANBU team we are engaging could be put to use better elsewhere and the seals don't need any more monitoring.
I'm not expecting much from the orphanage but let's hope for the best.
