There was fire everywhere. The buildings and streets burned and ran red with blood. People - civilian and ninja alike - could be seen screaming and dying as their charred bodies bled out onto the streets. What is going on? A man with a green vest ran up to him, grabbing his shoulder, shaking it and yelling something at him. What is he saying? Everything was muffled, the mans words bleeding into the chaos that was assaulting his ears. He didn't understand, why was he yelling at him? Why was everyone screaming? What is happeni-CRASH!

A giant red mass slammed down in front of him, crushing the nearby buildings and the shinobi in front of him. Red chakra oozed off of it, boulder sized gelatinous blobs rolling off of it and burning through everything they touched.

"KAKASHI!"

He swung around to face where the call had come from. An older teen with a dark scruffy face was running towards him, carrying a little girl in his arms.

"Asuma! Where's sensei?!" He called out, hurrying over to him. "Where's Minato? And who's that?"

"I don't know, it doesn't matter! She got scraped by the kyuubi's chakra and has a bad burn on her back! She needs medical attention now! I need you to take her to the hospital where Tsunade is, dad needs me back at the hokage tower to keep the kyuubi away from the civilian district!" Asuma tossed the girl at him, before leaping off towards the east shinobi district. "Hurry, we need you over there!"

"Wait Asuma! Don't leave me here with~! Dammit." Kakashi swore before sprinting towards the Konoha general hospital, carefully carrying the girl bridal style. He added chakra to his feet to speedily avoid a falling apartment complex, just barely sliding on his back under the collapsing building.

"Fuck! That was too close!" He leapt up onto a resturaunt roof, before continuing on towards the hospital. "You're a lot more goddam trouble than you're worth, y'know that?" He cursed and stopped quickly as an enormous red tail violently smashed down in front of him, cutting him off from his destination.

"Shit!" He turned and went to go take a different route, before coming face to face with a giant, burning, red, eye.

He stumbled and fell on his back, clutching the young girl in his arms. The kyuubi's searing crimson eye focused intently on him, before its face turned to leer at him completely, its crooked maw twisting into a hideous, deformed grin. It's jaw unhinged and opened to impossible angles, an orb of violent red forming in its mouth, expanding quickly.

He couldn't move. His arms and legs shook, his nerve completely shot. The girl in his arms whimpered, moving closer into his embrace to escape the unbearable heat from the beasts chakra. Its eyes curled up in evil joy, the sphere of pure demonic chakra collapsing in its mouth before blasting straight at them. It came closer and closer, moving in slow motion, ripping apart the very air that it touched. He held the girl to his chest as tightly as he could, and stared unblinkingly at his doom.

"KAKASHI!"

"KAKASHI!"

"Gah!" He sat up with a start, accidentally slamming his face into the low ceiling frame. "Ugh..." He flopped back down, clutching his sore nose. He looked over at his bedside clock and saw that it was 5:45 am. " Ah dammit, not right now Naruto it's not even 6 o' clock..."

His door burst open and a short golden haired little boy came running in, wielding shuriken as well as a kunai set in his mouth. "Preprr tuou ddee, fsslss skrrcrrw!" The words that the boy tried to speak were completely hampered by the sharp blade in his mouth, ruining the clearly well thought-out entrance. He spat the kunai onto the floor. "Bleh! I said Prepare to die, faceless scarecrow!" He lunged at Kakashi, his eyes shut tightly and screaming.

"Sigh... Naruto, please, for one day, can you try to be normal?" The boy opened his eyes, confused at his enemies lack of death cries. Kakashi held onto the scruff of his black shirt, making him appear like a harmless little creature, before letting him go, allowing him to plop down onto the bed and crawl under the sheets with him.

"But Kakashi, if I tried to fight you directly you'd beat me immediately. As as strong a ninja as I am, you are still more skilled than me. The element of surprise was my only advantage."

Kakashi sighed again as the boy snuggled to his side, reciting in his own words what Kakashi had taught him a few days ago. He had begun training Naruto once he had turned four, not doing anything serious, but ensuring that once the boy reached the academy he would be a few steps above his peers.

He stretched out, letting the cramps in his back work themselves out before settling back into bed, making room for the five year old to curl up in.

"Good job Naruto, I'm proud that you remembered that." The boy smiled, although he had already fallen asleep in his fathers arms.

" Alright Naruto, I'm leaving! Be sure to read that scroll on chakra flow theory before I'm back!"

"Yes Dad!" Naruto shouted from the kitchen, watching his father slip on a white trench coat and disappear in a silver flash. "Mann, I wanna do that, not read scrolls on theory." He finished up his plate of eggs before washing the dish and walking over to his father's study room. "But Dad said, "all of the best ninja techniques come from hard work, and practice". I guess this is the hard work part." He sat up on the desk and rolled open the scroll his dad had left.

"Chakra theory: The flow of chakra through the body"

"Alright, lets see if I can't finish this before lunch."

A few hours passed by, occasionally he would stop for a quick break to write down what he had learned in his own words, before continuing on. Finally, after four hours of tiring study, he had finished it. "Okay, according to the scroll, chakra flows through our body, in a manner similar to that of the air in our lungs. It starts out in the chakra coils, before flowing out into the rest of the body, and then returning back to the main coils. It's a cycle."

He brought his hand up to his face, staring intently at his pointer finger. "I know Dad said to wait until he gave permission, but I really think that I've got the hang of this." He closed his eyes. Slowly, he felt out through his body, looking for a source of energy, or as the book had said, "a gathering of heat. He could feel it everywhere, but it was too thin, the chakra not strong enough to gather- there! He could feel it in his belly, but what the book had described as a small fire he could only feel a raging inferno. "Amazing!" He thought. " I must have ridiculously thick coils for this kind of output! Okay, now I've gotta follow the path it travels through, and focus it into a point.

He felt the chakra travel across his arm, and halted it at the tip of his finger. He built up as much as he could bear, before thrusting his finger forward and shouting. "Hah!"

The pent up point of energy exploded from his finger, shooting forward and hitting the wall before expanding outwards, sending a gust of wind through the room.

"Wow," Naruto breathed heavily, stunned by what he had just did. " That was AWESOME!" He felt amazing! Having used his chakra externally his chakra coils must have started to awaken because now he felt incredible! Like someone had just set a wave of electricity through his body! Now he could feel the flow of his chakra through his body without even trying. He felt alive for the first time, like his life before had been a dull dream and now he was awake!

"Oh man, what else can I do? How else can I use this?" Before he started raiding the bookshelves, he calmed himself. "No, you already broke the rules by using your chakra, and Kakashi will be mad if I try to do anything more." He quickly cleaned up the room and rolled the scroll back up before heading out and into the yard.

He layed down and stared at the sky. "I wonder if he'll be proud of me? I'm pretty sure I'm the youngest kid my age to unlock my chakra, not even the Uchiha's start this until they're seven."

He frowned, before rolling over restlessly. "I should be satisfied with what I've done, no need to try anything else."

"But you could be so much more."

His head shot up, looking for the source of the voice. "What?"

"You could be so much stronger."

He got to his feet, settling himself into a fighting stance. "Whoever said that, come on out! You're treading on private property!"

"Oh, I assure you boy, this place is quite my own. If you wish to speak to me, go to the tea room."

He allowed his stance to relax. "But Dad said I can't go in there, it's private."

"Go."

He didn't know why, but he obeyed. He allowed his feet to carry him into the house, through the hallway, and to the sliding door, and shakily slide it open. Inside there was nothing more than a table and a sitting pillow.

"Where are you? There's nothing here."

"The wall to your right."

He looked over, seeing a small line in the wall. Pulling it open, a cabinet slid out, a seal layed flat on top of it.

"Allow me to take care of that."

The seal fizzled up into thin air, leaving only a lid. He pulled it open and peered inside. A blade and sheath layed there, resting on wooden stands.

"Pick me up."

"Huh?" Naruto reached inside and grasped the hilt of the blade firmly, pulling it out and looking at it. "What are you talking about, are you the bla-!" A blinding light emanated from the blade, filling the room.

"Hey! Stop, what are you doing!" Naruto yelled, shielding his eyes with his other arm.

"I'm sorry Naruto, but I need you again."

"What?! What do you mean again!?"

"To ensure that certain things do not come to pass, I need you to come with me."

"Where?!" Naruto yelled again, the light shining so bright that even behind his arm he could see it.

"You will see."

And then they were gone.

The cabinet closed by itself, and no evidence remained to show that they were ever there.

Their existence, had been erased.

7/22/13