The dust-battered a worn man; his cloak fluttered with each breath of the intense wind. To his side was a woman in a similar cloak clutching a child to her chest. Her striking green hair could be seen occasionally as the storm tugged at her hood. The child was, under normal circumstances, too old to be clutched to her chest. In this instance, it was simply the safer option.

"Dad, how much farther to the Konoha bunker?" The child's voice spoke of great irritation. It embarrassed him to have to be carried like this, but he knew that he could not hope to escape if they were attacked. Sure, he was fast, but their foes were nigh on lightning fast.

"Sorry kiddo, we're not going to the bunker." The father's voice sounded wary. Everything, from the tension in his shoulders to the kunai in the palm of his hand, screamed of a man ready to fight for his life.

"I thought it was taking a little too long to cross the wastes." The child's reply, though noticed, was left hanging by his parents. His comment was only meant to try and ease his own nerves. Even he could feel the power of those approaching.

"Naruto." It was a simple statement on the mother's part, but it drew Naruto's attention to the fact that the chakra signatures had sped up. The youngster was put down, his own cloak with the hood lowered fluttered around him. The boy's eyes stung and his hair whipped around with a life of its own as the dust attacked.

His parents talked for a few seconds in hushed tones while the boy looked around the barren landscape. The remains of a once-luscious forest was now naught but ash. And villages that had been in the area had been reduced to rubble. It was bleak, to say the least.

"We have to..." "Yes, we have to." He caught the tail-end of his parent's conversation, and they seemed to be comforting each other. Naruto grabbed his partner and clutched her to his chest, his chin on her head as tears fell from beneath the hood. After a few seconds, the woman spun around fast enough to make the child jump. His mother's expressive orange eyes focused on his, and sadness was what he saw within them. That sparked a shred of anger in the boy. He didn't like it when his mother was upset.

The woman brushed her green hair from her face, her tanned skin looking very dark under the shade of her hood. "Boruto...me and your father are gonna send you someplace safe, ok? We'll come and get you when the fight is over." Boruto stared into his mother's orange eyes with his own of the same shade. Tears spilled over in Fuu's eyes, soon to be a small waterfall. Behind her, Naruto was fiddling with something on his arm. "When you're there make sure to remember this. Don't trust anyone except your friends, and...we love you." Boruto was unprepared for the crushing hug he was engulfed in. He could now see that his father was also crying, his face grim as he focused on some kind of odd bracer on his right arm. Boruto wrapped his arms around his mother comfortingly.

"It isn't good, is it Dad." Naruto met his son's gaze and shook his head. As Fuu released Boruto, Naruto removed his bracer and roughly grabbed his son's arm, strapping the bracer on tight. It engulfed most of Boruto's forearm and had a decent amount of weight to it. "Ow Dad, what the heck are you- huh?" A bag was then thrust into his hands, and he took notice of the bracer's design. The base was what looked to be a tough, brown leather, however, the surface was marred with so many Fuinjutsu seals that the brown only poked through in small patches. Small metal pipes adorned the surface, all converging on a large circular centrepiece. The centrepiece was some form of small clock, gears and dials visible within. The glass had a single circular seal over it. Around the outside of the clock were Kanji inscriptions going from one to three. The watch also had a small circular key for twisting, the same as would be found on a stopwatch. The small green rucksack in his hands held the weight of a familiar mission pack. His father also chose this moment to hug his son with a rare ferocity. Naruto's voice was raw with emotion. "Remember what your Mom said, alright? You know she'll kick your arse if you don't. I don't have time to explain how the bracer works, but I've set it up and got it ready for a single trip already. You just have to push your chakra into it." He could tell his son was confused, but with Kaguya and Obito drawing closer he had no time to lift the confusion. He cut off Boruto's reply. "Just do as I said...and keep practising your Rasengan. It will keep you safe. There're a few scrolls in your bag. Some of them have supplies, some of them have jutsu and training routines. There's also a few sentimental things. You should be able to keep going on this until we find you. When I say now you push your chakra into the bracer and don't stop running, ok?" As Naruto leaned back he saw his son nod, but his son had begun to cry. Boruto was a smart child, he'd probably already figured out what was happening.

Boruto winced as he was roughly pushed behind his parents. The whole family could see Obito and Kaguya only a few dozen meters away. Naruto and Fuu comfortingly clutched each other's hands and left the shimmering tear tracks on their faces. Obito's smirk was vile, his lust for this fight evident on his face.

Kaguya's soft features were marred by a single tear rolling down her cheek. The rabbit Goddess had actually her sanity after being gone from the world for so long and had very nearly ended those that dared to bring her back. However, it was not to be. Despite being the origin of chakra itself, she fell prey to the sheer cunning of Obito. Between his Eternal Mangekyou Sharingan, the Sharingan of dozens of resurrected Uchiha and the mind jutsu of resurrected Yamanaka the men had actually managed to control the Goddess. They had done this through the same methods they used to control Bijuu with the Sharingan. She was now openly weeping for the crime she knew she would be forced to commit.

"Naruto." Obito drew out Naruto's name, savouring it and enjoying its impact. The older blond flinched.

"You've evaded us for far too lo-" A roar cut off the man completely as Naruto instantaneously formed a Rasenshuriken in each hand and launched them at the Uchiha.

"Boruto, go!" Fuu called out with a distinct waver in her voice before sprinting into the fray. At that moment, hell erupted. Naruto's truth seeking balls began to carve paths through the landscape, Obito let forth titanic spheres of fire and Kaguya began to unleash the vast arsenal of techniques at her disposal. Boruto could see it, all of it. This was a battle that would leave a large portion of a country uninhabitable.

Obito had phased past Naruto and flew towards Boruto with the intention of ending the child's short life.

"GO, NOW!" Startled out of his daze, the blond child forced his chakra into the device on his arm. The blue pipes lit up, the seals on the surface danced in intricate patterns, and the seal on the glass casing took the form of a summoning seal. The last Boruto saw of his parents was Naruto aiming a Rasengan into Obito's back, his visage screaming death for his son's attacker, and Fuu being impaled through the stomach by Kaguya's hair.

"MOM!"

With a flash and a bang the child was gone from that dimension, the smell of sulphur being the only hint he was ever there.

Near an abandoned Uchiha village

Naruto increased his pace as he launched himself from branch to branch. His fists were clenched tightly at his sides and his face locked into a snarl.

'I'm so close now, I can't give up! I'm bringing you back Sasuke, even if I have to-'

His inner monologue was cut off as something burst forth from the branch he was aiming to land on. He barely managed to plant his foot on the edge of the branch and push off backwards as a masked figure stood in some sort of silly pose mere inches from where he had planted his foot.

"Hello there! And there, and there, and there too!" An irritating high pitched voice called out, sounding akin to what someone would expect from a jester.

Naruto landed on the grass below as Team 8 and the remains of Team 7 landed behind him.

"My my! I didn't expect so many Konoha ninja to be hanging around all the way out here. Are we having some sort of- wah! Rude!" The orange masked man threw his hands up in shock as a second Naruto passed through his chest with a Rasengan in hand. In truth, the man had only known the attack was coming due to Kiba and Sakura focusing on something behind him, but the Konoha ninja did not need to know that.

Naruto's clone landed alongside the original and both glared at the Akatsuki member. The masked nin's red cloud covered cloak fluttered as he waved his arms. "That was just mean! There's eight of you and one of me! You Konoha ninja are rude and unfair."

A strange static feeling became noticeable around the area. Everyone's hair slowly stood on end, making for an amusing sight as even those with long hair were not immune to the effect. Both sides of the confrontation glared at each other, expectant of an attack.

Crack!

The piercing noise was accompanied by a flash and some kind of odd burning smell. The static field slowly died down and everyone's eyes slowly recovered from the flash. Right in front of Naruto was...what appeared to be a younger Naruto. On closer observation, however, there were some differences. His hair was less spiky, his eyes were a vibrant orange instead of ocean blue and his cheeks were only adorned with two whisker marks on each side. The boy looked to be around eleven, with a much rounder face than Naruto himself.

The blond Genin and his clone both noticed two things faster than most could comprehend. The first was that the boy -who was very similar to himself- appeared to have gone through hell. The second was that the masked stranger had changed drastically. His body was much more tense, his chakra felt downright menacing and he was currently heading towards the boy at a high speed. The child proceeded to scream with such rage that even Tobi was slightly taken aback before trying to leap at the masked man. He didn't succeed, as Naruto had already grabbed the boy around the waist whilst his own clone ran at the Uchiha. "Find Sasuke!" Naruto yelled as he set off in the opposite direction.

He didn't even wait to find out if his team did as he said or not, he was already leaping from tree to tree as fast as he could. He was slightly surprised by the memory of the masked man taking his clone out with a vicious stab to the neck.

"Hey kid!" he shouted over the rushing wind in his ears and reached into his pouch. "Take this kunai. If the bad guy shows up, stab him!" The blond child took the kunai and desperately held onto Naruto's chest, wide eyes focused on the scenery behind them the whole time.

The bark cracked under his feet every time he landed. Countless times the two were nearly smeared against a tree as Naruto took a precarious sharp turn to try and throw their pursuer off of their trail ever now and then. The wind tugged at their hair and clothes.

In his mind, Naruto puzzled over the child that seemed so similar to himself. He did not think he would have noticed, if not for two things. The first thing was the whisker marks, a trait so rare that he had never heard of another with them. The second was the sheer state the child was in. It reminded him of, well, himself. His musings were cut off when he felt the menacing chakra begin to creep up, gaining ground on the two and sending chills up his spine. Whoever this kid was, he knew that an Akatsuki member being after him couldn't mean anything good. Maybe he was even another Jinchuuriki?

The orange eyes of the boy widened massively as he felt the teen holding him miss a branch, only noticing the cause as he looked up. Tobi had stabbed a kunai into the back of the teen's neck, intent on using him as padding for a high-speed landing. Blood splattered through the air, right before it popped. The child's world was shrouded in smoke as his support vanished, but the kunai in his hand also became much bigger.

The original Naruto, Henged as a kunai, slammed his sandaled foot into Tobi's face with devastating force, kicking off from the man and propelling them in opposite directions.

'I think I got it. He can't do his weird ghost trick if he wants to hit me!'

The boy in Naruto's arms was astounded, and he finally had a chance to properly look at his saviour.

'Blue eyes, whiskers...did Mom and Dad have an older kid that they kept a secret? Mom...Dad...'

Naruto slammed his foot down on another branch, propelling him sideways into a flip that shifted the pair out of the path of a gargantuan fireball. They soared sideways, ending up above a river. "Sweet Kami, that was fucking huge!" The fireball jutsu proved to be a distraction as the pair were slammed into by an axe kick.

Naruto's senses were immediately muted, the water doing a good job of making the world seem far off. The river was actually rather deep, and that's when a moment of Uzumaki brilliance struck. He made a cross seal, forgoing calling out the jutsu due to being underwater, and wrestled his chakra into the jutsu. He pushed it to the extreme, filling the river with hundreds of Naruto's, each of which leapt from the water to attack Tobi. At the same time, Naruto pulled his kunai pouch free. Thankfully, the waterproof material had survived the battles he had faced so far. His other hand held the younger blond close, despite his struggling for air.

'Let's see if you can ghost through this!'

Naruto pumped enough chakra into his pouch to trigger every single explosive seal stored within. Finally, he used the water walking exercise...incorrectly. He pushed an amount of chakra to his feet that no one could even call a little too much. The intensity of the chakra pushed to his feet served to propel him through the water.

Boruto's lungs screamed for air as the two rocketed downstream at an extreme pace. The flow of the river was uneven, and many times Naruto took the hit against the riverbed or a rock to keep the boy safe.

The expected shockwave finally arrived, but it was more powerful than Naruto had thought it would be. He was tossed head over heels through the water and any attempts to stabilise were futile.

Both boys were swept around by the current for at least a minute before it deposited them on a small bend in the river. The two boys slowly pulled themselves from the river, coughing and hacking as they tried to clear out any water they had taken in.