Disclaimer: I do not own Naruto some Japanese company does.
"Human talk"
'Human thought'
"Biju talk"
'Biju think'
In a dark cave somewhere in the land of the shinobi there was a dreadful process going underway. A large statue with many eyes was absorbing energy into its open mouth, on the statue's fingers stood nine cloaked figures, all of them terrifying and powerful. Out of the mouth came a beam of light that settled on a figure floating in the air as red energy escaped out of their eyes, ears, and nose, streaking past the figure's blond hair. The figure, known as Uzumaki Naruto, had but hours to live before the powers of the Kyubbi no Kitsune, which was sealed into the figure since birth, let the body and resulted in death.
Naruto would be in terrible pain now if not for the fact that the blonde retreated into the mind to talk with the 'tenet' in his body. Naruto sat cross-legged in front of the cage, on the cage was a piece of paper with the word seal written on it, that single piece of paper containing the powerful red colored fox known as Kyubbi.
"So you're sure there is no way to escape?" Naruto asked.
"I'm positive kit; the enemy was very thorough in their plans to make sure we wouldn't escape." The fox said as his nine tails swayed behind him
"I guess I won't be able to bring Sasuke back after all." The blonde said, "Man, I wish things could turn out differently, if I had done a few things different, a lot of crap that happened could have been avoided."
Kyubbi's head perked up and his eyes widened, "Maybe, maybe there is a way we could keep from reaching our end here and correcting the mistakes of our past."
Naruto's head also shot up and stared at Kyubbi, hope filling the blonde's eyes.
"What could we do? I'll do anything." Naruto said.
"It's an ancient technique use by yoki; it bends time and space and allows for something to cross between the two." Kyubbi said.
"You could send us back in time?"
"No, not us but information, I could send it to myself in the past and right some wrongs. I won't be able to send it far enough back to stop myself from attacking your village but I could send information to myself to instruct you on some things. It could work but we need to decide what to send and when."
"How so, shouldn't we just send all the information we have." Naruto asked.
"No, that would be one of the stupidest things we could do, if we send too much information we could end up causing the space time continuum to collapse and destroying every one in that dimension."
"So definitely need to be sure to not send too much, gotcha. Just send enough" Naruto said.
"Precisely, we will tell my past self about Akatsuki and warn him about Orochimaru to prepare you for what they will send your way."
"That alone probably wouldn't be enough; I have trained as hard as I could as long as I can remember, knowing a threat is there won't get me to become strong enough in the amount of time needed."
Kyubbi was shocked silent for a few seconds, Naruto played dumb so often that he would sometimes forget how smart the blond was. Kyubbi stayed quite while trying to decide what he was going to say as best he could.
"…we could let your past self know the secret you found out on your thirteenth birthday."
Naruto's eyes became hard and spoke with absolute determination.
"No, you know how hard that was for me."
"Yes I do, but it would cost drastic change, the change we were looking for, and we could do it before you really got your friends and you would eventually find out anyway. It should work in our favor."
Several emotions played across Naruto's face as she had an internal struggle before the blondes shoulders drooped in defeat.
"As much as I hate to admit it, your right, it will definitely change my life, besides this time you could tell the past you to lay off me and how much of a wonderful person I am."
Kyubbi smirked at antics of his vessel; that was defiantly Naruto, despite the fact that they were dying and were about to fundamentally alter the past the blonde was making jokes, they were bad jokes, yes, but jokes nun-the-less.
They talked and planned out what to do, it was decided that they were going to send the information when Naruto was in the Hokage's office after the forbidden scroll incident. They would also try their best to keep Zabuza and Haku from dieing in Wave country, but one thing was absolutely necessary if they were to be successful, Naruto had to be on the same team as Uchiha Sasuke. Too much that happened revolved around the fact that they were on the same team, and with some forewarning they might be able to keep him from leaving.
Kyubbi also made a decision without his vessel's knowledge, he would try to convince his past self to do something that he had been meaning to do, it would also probably help the past Naruto after the breakdown that the blonde was sure to have.
"Are you ready Kyubbi?" Naruto asked.
"Hai, if we don't start soon we won't have enough chakra to send the information at the chosen time. Put as much chakra into me as you can, I'll need all the help I can get to do this."
Naruto simply nodded and started to pump chakra into Kyubbi, and together they were going to do something no human has ever done, they were going to change history.
The members of Akatsuki were all very happy, they were about to accomplish one of their greatest goals, the capture of the nine tailed fox. They were all so sure of their victory, but then it happened, the vessels chakra pathways fluctuated, signifying that they were being used.
They all stopped wondering what they were going to do, but relaxed when all of the vessels chakra suddenly disappeared and the last of the yoki floated into the statue's mouth and Uzumaki Naruto fell to the ground dead. Unknown to them the Jinchuuriki had accomplished its last goal.
Iruka smiled encouragingly at a twelve-year-old Uzumaki Naruto as they sat in the Hokage's office as the third offered more words of encouragement that the blonde was not a demon, as Iruka himself had. Iruka put a calming had on the shoulders of the boy he had come to see as a little brother.
Then, out of no where, every one in konoha felt something, an enormous surge of chakra focused in the Hokage's office, the surge startled Iruka and he pulled his had off of the blondes shoulder as Naruto fell to his knees and clutched his stomach were the Kyubbi's seal was, but as soon as the chakra appeared it disappeared.
Naruto sat still for a moment, panting heavily, thinking it was over, when suddenly red energy cracked around him and his form wavered putting him through searing pain. Both Iruka and the Hokage recognized what the wavering was, someone trying do disable a genjutsu around the blonde.
The red chakra surrounding Naruto receded and the illusion around him shattered. The blonde's eyes fluttered and finally closed as he fainted, but 'Naruto' looked much different. The blond hair that once stood up now fell around 'his' head, his body looked skinnier and his skin was more fair. It was then that Iruka realized he was not looking at a 'he' but a 'she'. Those thoughts disturbed him greatly as he walked over to 'Naruto' and pulled her up from her slumped over position into a more comfortable one, as Iruka moved her he realized that there was no denying it, Naruto was a girl. It was then he remembered Naruto's Oiroke no Jutsu.
"Naruto, stop it, now is not the time to be using Oiroke no Jutsu." He said not as fact but more as hope. "Stop kidding around."
He got no response, and the Hokage sighed tiredly, realizing that an already stressful night just got more stressful; 'As the Naras would say' the third thought 'this is too troublesome.'
"Iruka, stop, you know as well as I that this is no trick." The Hokage said.
Iruka hung his head in defeat, he somehow felt very awkward at about the fact that the one that he had come to see as his brother was actually a girl.
"Why Hokage-sama, why didn't he" Iruka stopped himself and corrected himself, "she, tell me that she was a girl."
"That's very simple Iruka, she didn't know." The Hokage said.
Iruka was startled, 'How could she not know? If there a boy or a girl' he thought.
As if reading his mind the kind third Hokage spoke. "Only a handful of Jonnin, one of the Sannin, the council, and an up-and-coming genjutsu genius knew; no one else, not even Naruto, knew of her real gender. It was decided we would hide it when the people reacted badly to the fact that she contained the Kyubbi, as a male the people would, at worse, beat her but as a girl…"
"As a girl she could be raped." Iruka finished for the Hokage as realization lit up his face. He suddenly felt great pity for the blond, to have realized that some of your very foundations of life were wrong, all in one night would be very hard, but Iruka decided then that he would do what ever it took to help out Naruto…if that was still going to be her name.
"Hokage-sama, what is her name?" Iruka asked. "Naruto is a boy's name, so what is her real name?"
"She doesn't have one." The Hokage said after he took a long puff from his pipe. "We only gave her a boy name to simplify things."
"How did you do it, how did you hid the fact that he was a she?"
"We used a combination of a genjutsu and a henge, Keruei figured it out under my request. She was the up-and-coming genjutsue genius I spoke of. "
Iruka sighed as he looked at the blonde girl sitting in the chair next to him. He had enough answers for now and he felt extremely tired, what with getting impaled by his best friend and all.
"We won't be able to find out much about what just happened until she wakes up," The hokage said "but from what we can guess, for some reason the Kyubbi wanted it's vessel to know that he was a she. Whatever it's purpose we don't know, hopefully nothing bad will happen."
The third smiled at Iruka, and said kindly, "There are rooms here in the tower for the times that the hokage or a visiting diplomat has to stay the night here."
The Hokage stood up and walked around to the other side of the desk.
"Follow me, I'll take you to your rooms, I'll use Mizuki-san's betray as an excuse to postpone the assigning of teams for a little while. That will allow us some time to rest and decide what to do."
Iruka nodded then bent down and carried 'Naruto' bridal style out of the room with the Hokage, after a short stop in another room to place the blonde in a comfortable bed before Iruka went into the room next door and fell asleep before his head hit the pillow. He was so tired he didn't notice that the hokage went back into 'Naruto's' room instead of his own.
The third hokage sat in the dark staring at the blond shinobi, he loved the girl so much, she was as much of a grandchild to him as Konohamaru, perhaps even more so, and like Iruka he swore to himself that he would help his grandchild through this, even if that included waiting for said blonde to wake up in the middle of the night.
Sarutobi sat back and took a puff out of his ever-present pipe as he settled in for what was sure to be a long night.
'Naruto' woke up to find herself in a dark sewer with ankle deep water, since she never remembered ever being in said sewer her logical mind was telling her to watch out and be careful, though something seemed familiar about the place like it was a part of herself. As she got up she noticed a difference in the cloths on her, they felt looser than before. Shrugging it of as nothing she started to walk forward to where she could almost feel something calling for her to come there.
As she did this the logical part of her mind was telling her to stop because this was almost exactly like the horror film she watched last weekend, but she tended to ignore that side most of the time anyways. As she strode forward she walked into a large room that held a cage built into the wall across from her, upon the cell was the word 'seal', behind the gate stood the massive form of a red fox with its nine tails swaying behind it.
'Naruto' stood still for a split second, shocked; when she put two and two together to realize who it was she was staring at.
"Kyubbi" she said.
"Well done," the fox's voice boomed, yet somehow it was filled with sarcasm, "got it on your first try, give the girl a prize."
"Oi, fox get you genders strait, I'm male, you know a boy." She said.
"Obviously you haven't seen your self." Kyubbi said, one of the fox's tails dipped into the water and on the outside of the cage a mirror rose from the water in front of Naruto.
"Look into the mirror little vixen, and see your true form, I called you here for several reasons, I thought that this would be the best to get out of the way first."
The now scared girl took slow steps towards the mirror to see herself, except the usual sight that she saw didn't look back, instead a short girl with unkempt hair hung to just below her ears, she was by any standard rather skinny yet when you looked closely you get see fit muscles beneath her fair skin, though three things still remained completely unchanged, she still had the three whisker marks on both cheeks, bright blonde hiar, and the same vibrant blue eyes.
She took a small gasp upon seeing herself; shocked at her own reflection. Then anger was placed on her face as she turned to Kyubbi.
"Alright kitsune-baka stop now, I know how kitsune are famous for their pranks but this is ridicules."
Kyubbi smiled to himself, she was just like his future self described her, she had intelligence, beauty, a kind heart, and apparently was very brave; obviously the last one was because the little genin was yelling at the most powerful biju in existence without faltering. 'Yes, I probably will take my future self's suggestion.'
"I did nothing to you but reveal your true gender to you; despite the fact that it would be hilarious to change your gender on you I don't have that kind of power due to this stupid seal."
"Yeah, well prove it; I'm positive I'm a boy." 'Naruto responded.
Kyubbi smirked at the blonde, glad that she had made it so easy him.
"When you find something humorous you have to force yourself to laugh instead of giggle, you make yourself walk like a male would despite the fact that it feels unnatural, and despite the fact that you constantly ask that pink hair girl out you have never felt any attraction to girls. Should I go on or is that enough?"
'Naruto' stood there quietly contemplating her 'tenet's' words and the more she thought about it the more it made sense, the only thing that she could think of is why she looked like a boy for so long.
"Why," she asked "why did you bring me here?"
Kyubbi let out a sigh and stared down at the girl as she craned her neck up to look into his face, Kyubbi laid down and put his head low to make it easier on the girl as he explained.
"We yoki have an ability and techniques that humans could never hope to have, one of them is a technique that folds time and space and allows us to talk to ourselves in the past, letting us warn ourselves of something before it happens."
The blond simply nodded in understanding and motioned for the fox to continue.
"Well, I just got one of these from myself in the future to tell me some things."
"Oh and why would your future self talk to you after you got stuck in me and not before, frankly the most you could talk about is how dreary your caged area is."
"I didn't have the power to do so; it took your strength and mine to get the message this far back."
"Oh, and why would my future self help you?"
"Simple, we were dieing." Kyubbi stated as if he was talking about the weather, his vessel however didn't take it nearly as well.
"WHAT!!! I was dieing, who did it, when did it happen, why did they chose now to send back the information?"
"KIT" Kyubbi interrupted. "Slow down, one question at a time, though unfortunately I can't answer many of the questions, my future self just warned me about threats to come and key points to influence the time stream."
"Yeah well, what did you tell yourself…er your future self, I mean what did…never mind you get the idea?" The vessel said, causing a slight chuckle from Kyubbi.
"Sorry kit, I can't tell you much, if I did you could alter the future too much and make it worse than it was. However I can tell you some of the ideas of our future selves to bring about the change we seek. The first was that I reveal to you your gender at a sooner time, the second is that as we go on we will invite keep people to join together to combat a group known as Akatsuki, and the third is something that is entirely up to you."
"Oh? And what's that?"
"I want to adopt you into my clan as my child." Kyubbi said in the softest and most sincere voice that any human had ever heard him use.
"What, why would you want me, of all people, in your clan, much less as your adoptive child, I mean, shouldn't you hate me because I'm your vessel?" She asked.
"Why wouldn't I want you as a daughter? From what I see you're strong, kind, intelligent, and good looking. Plus there is the fact that you are all of these even through the hate the village put on you. Their attitude and actions toward a vixen is sickening, let alone a kit like you."
The jenjurikin found herself frozen for multiple reasons, the first being the female pronouns and adjective used towards her, which she wasn't quite use to, and the fact that she had never thought she would be complemented in such a manner, let alone by Kyubbi.
"As for why I don't hate you, it's rather simple, you didn't seal me, you were entirely unwilling in the matter, well you might have been willing but who knows you weren't even a day old at the time. It would be like blaming the blacksmith that made the kunai that stabbed you instead of the one that actually did it. Besides, I deserved to be sealed because of all the innocent blood I shed in my rage."
'Naruto' stared in aw at the look on the fox's face, his ears back and eyes downcast, his eyes in that moment held nothing but guilt.
"I'm sorry," she fond herself saying causing Kyubbi to look up at his vessel to see the sincerity that the girl had in her eyes.
"You look so much like her."
"Who"
"My mate, Hikari, she had the same eyes as you. She was the most beautiful vixen I have ever seen."
The vessel took notice to the fact that he was referring to her in past tense, meaning one thing.
"What happened?" she asked
Kyubbi stared at her for a moment before simply stating, "Let's just say that a snake killed her and leave it at that."
"You need rest, while in here your body can recuperate but your mind cannot, and that's probably the most damaged thing at the moment. Besides there is someone in the real world that would like to talk to you, and please consider my offer, you will also get some 'benefits' if you were adopted."
"I'll think about it but I already have a lot to think about."
"Of course, good night kit, and sleep well. Oh, and now that we have met we can communicate while your in the real world."
With that 'Naruto' could feel her mind going from one world to the next while her thoughts meditated on current events and how her life would change.
The third hokage was starting to consider going to bed and just waiting till morning, when his 'granddaughter' started to stir and opened her eyes, she blinked her eyes rapidly and turned over to look at the third.
"Oji-san?" she asked while rubbing her sleepy eyes.
"Yes, Naruto, I know you probably have many questions, but we are both tiered and barley coherent, what ever you want to ask will have to wait till morning. Just rest and know that everything is fine." The hokage said.
"Hai, Oji-san, goodnight." She said.
"Goodnight Naruto-chan rest well, you have a big day ahead of you tomorrow."
The Jinchuuriki simply snuggled into her pillow and fell into blissful unconsciousness. Sarutobi smiled lightly before leaving the room to get what little sleep he could.
Ok there is the first chapter, hope you like it.
Now I need some help, I need some ideas for how 'Naruto' is going to keep her hair, keep in mind its length. I also request suggestions for her attire; she won't be going around in 'Naruto' cloths for too long.
Finally, for those curious as to why I keep putting 'Naruto' it's because, as stated, it's a boy name and our 'Naruto' in this story is a girl, she will get a female name, but right now she doesn't have one and thus she is not really Naruto.