If it were not for amaya no shiori's story, Reflections Across Time, I would not be writing this. I do not claim to be a fast updater, so be wary about when the next chapter may be out.
Disclaimer: I lay no claim to Naruto. I can't even lay claim to some of the writing. Those would belong to amaya no shiori.

From Wish to Nightmare
by Nanikato
8/13/08

The forest never looked so dark and gray, so menacing. What am I doing? He was running, rushing to... to do something... No, to rescue... to rescue...

Shadows lurking ahead grew larger and larger. Suddenly those shadows emerged as shinobi. Those symbols... I don't recog— Iwa-nin! Wait, how did I know.. Ack! Two, no, three of them... I can't waste any more time... Wait, time to what? Time... Time to.. to save... Ri—

A running figure, a mere boy, kept his momentum as he ran and fluidly dodged around his enemies before twisting around and throwing a barrage of kunai at them. The boy vanished into the tree tops. His breathing was quiet, but labored and his eyes were frantically scanning the forest. A feeling descended on him; a sudden prickling and a lurch in his stomach. Behind me!

Whipping around, the boy's dark eyes widened as he saw the rapidly approaching blade—

A sharp gasp echoed in the small, bare apartment. Sitting up, Naruto groaned, still panting, still shaking from the dream. Throwing a weary glance at his clock, the boy grumbled. Two in the fucking morning... Damn it! That whole mess with Mizuki-sensei must have gotten to me more than I thought...

He lay down, trying desperately to fall asleep again. The rest of the night was spent tossing, turning, and thinking.

It was six thirty and Naruto had long since given up on sleeping. Slowly, he pulled himself out of bed, changed, and began to trudge his way to the Academy.

He was tired. Too tired to get out of Sakura and Ino's way as they savagely shoved him out of their way to get into the classroom. Too tired to bother answering Shikamaru's question of just why he was there if he failed the Academy tests. Too tired to realize that he just sat next to Uchiha Sasuke while the said Uchiha's fan girls were busy fighting over that seat. Too tired to respond to his rival's derisive sneer. Too tired to notice Iruka-sensei's worried glances. He was just too damn tired.

It was a quiet, simple day, the type of days Kakashi favored. All should have been right with the world. Yet despite the peace, despite the normality, Kakashi found he felt troubled.

Everything was the way it should be…except for the fact that one of his genin was acting strangely. If Sasuke had been acting differently, or even Sakura, it wouldn't have been so worrying but it was Naruto. The loud blonde had been anything but loud lately and it was bothering nearly everyone.

He still remembered that look on Naruto's face when he walked in late on their first meeting. It was a cross between confusion, annoyance, and some recognition. "Why are you late?" Naruto had asked, "You were always one for rules." What the blue eyed boy had said seemed to confuse everyone.

"Naruto, do you know him?" Sakura had asked curiously. Naruto only gave Kakashi a strange look before shaking his head.

Kakashi's introduction had garnered an extremely bizarre reaction. Naruto stared at him and wouldn't look away. He had spent most of the meeting quiet as a clam other than his equally odd introduction. "My name is…Uzumaki Naruto. I like ramen and training. I dislike arrogant geniuses. My dream…is to be acknowledged, I guess."

He had perked up somewhere near the end of the meeting and had bombarded the entire group with his chatter. Even though he acted the way Kakashi had been told he would act, Kakashi saw that the blonde was still confused.

Kakashi never forgot what Naruto had told him or the emotions in his eyes, the words striking some hidden part of him harshly.

He turned away from the memorial stone abruptly as he realized he had been brutally glaring the stone down. Deciding he had made his team wait long enough, he went to go meet them.

As usual, he was greeted with a cacophony of loud noises and he thought he heard a distinct "You're late!" somewhere in Sakura's lecture. He turned a lazy eye on her before dismissing the lecture. He had heard it before, after all.

"Maa, let's go get a mission." His sharp eye didn't miss the tired way Naruto held himself. On the last few missions, the blond had seemed exhausted to the point of falling asleep at random times.

None the less, the boy pulled himself together and began to lead the way to the Hokage's tower with a loud cheer. The cheer didn't last long when the Sandaime began to list of D-ranked missions for them. "No! I want a real mission! I want to prove myself, old man! How can I do it when I'm doing chores as if I wasn't a ninja?"

Sarutobi took a puff off his pipe while Iruka began to lecture the group. "Naruto, the different mission ranks are there for a reason! You have to start at the bottom—"

"Alright," the Sandaime seemed amused. "We have a C-ranked mission you may take. You'll be escorting a man named Tazuna to Wave country." He signaled for a man to come in. He didn't miss the way the entire team seemed to suddenly perk up.

The man was obviously drunk, the sake bottle in his hand only emphasizing the point. "These brats are gonna be guarding me? Pah! They look pathetic, especially that short one with the idiotic look on his face."

Naruto's response wasn't unexpected. "Kakashi-sensei, can I kill him?"

The jounin's eye curved upwards in that strange manner he used to smile. "Maa, the contract says we can't kill him." Feeling amused, he added, "You can kill him once we're no longer bound by the contract."

"Yatta!" The boy cheered. He grabbed his teammates by their wrists and began dragging them out the door. "Come on, come on! The sooner we complete the mission the sooner I get my revenge!"

Kakashi didn't bother trying to stop him; Naruto was too kind to actually kill anyone and he had the right to intimidate the client. Even if he was angry enough to truly want to kill the client, the anger would fade before the contract ended.

Naruto's mind worked furiously as he let his mouth run on autopilot. Despite what most thought, he was not stupid and he could think. Currently, his mind was dwelling on the strange dreams he had been having. It continued to bother him in the waking world and the images kept haunting him.

"Ne, ne, we finally got a good mission!" He cheered. "And even better—it's out of Konoha!"

"Shut up, you idiot!" A girl with strange markings on her cheeks barked at him.

The girl kind of reminded him of Sakura-chan. He recognized Kakashi-sensei in the background but it was accompanied with a strange feeling of rivalry. It reminded him of the feeling he got whenever he saw Sasuke.

Naruto noticed a puddle on the road and grinned. In this weather a puddle was a godsend and he loved jumping in puddles. Of course, it never occurred to him that it was a trap. So when two men emerged from the puddle he was completely unprepared.

"Watch out!"

Thank goodness those dreams were still affecting him or else his reflexes would have never been good enough to put up a block. There wasn't much time to do anything else before Kakashi-sensei knocked them out.

"Someone's been lying about the mission perimeters." Kakashi's visible eye narrowed in Tazuna's direction.

"Again?" Naruto groaned. It had everyone staring at him in confusion. He himself was confused. "Never mind. Start talking, old man!" Kakashi's attention shifted to Tazuna and Naruto nearly sighed in relief until he noticed the look in his sensei's eye. 'We'll talk later' was silently conveyed.

Naruto listened quietly as Tazuna explained the situation in Wave, his expression shadowed and withdrawn. "This has become a high B, low A-ranked mission. My team can't handle this and we're not obligated to follow through on the contract."

"I'm going."

"Hm?" Kakashi looked over at Naruto.

"Even if you decide to go back to Konoha, I refuse to."

"The mission rank has changed, Naruto." Kakashi said, his eye showing a strange sort of mixture between pride and fear. "We can go back to Konoha and we won't be reprimanded for it."

"What kind of ninjas are we if we run at the first sign of danger?" Naruto demanded. Kakashi almost flinched at the nearly familiar answer but Naruto didn't notice. "We can't just back down now! Lots of people are counting on us!"

Sasuke, not wanting to be shown up by the 'dead-last', nodded in agreement. Sakura's consent came quickly after as she was quick to agree with her crush.

Kakashi sighed as he realized that all his students were against him and would most likely not listen to him until he agreed with them. "Alright, fine. Things will get tougher from here on, you realize that right?"

Naruto didn't care to acknowledge that last tidbit. Things would get tougher, yes, but it had all turned out all right last time…mostly. He grimaced as he recalled his own grisly death. Okay, so maybe it hadn't been completely alright for him but things had worked out in favor of his teammates. That had to count for something!

…did that mean he was going to die again?

That was such a morbid thought and he quickly switched to a different train of thought. He took to staring intensely at Sasuke's back. Why a fan? He tilted his head as he considered the symbol on the broody boy's back. Why not something cooler? Then again, nothing seemed to fit 'Uchiha' better than a stupid fan. It almost looked like a ping pong racket, though…

His attention switched to Kakashi when the man tapped him on the shoulder. "Again?" Kakashi prompted when Naruto only stared at him.

"Oh! Um, I actually have no idea why I said that." Naruto confessed. "It's just—I've been having weird dreams lately."

Kakashi didn't see any lie in his student's eye. In fact, he saw blunt honesty. "Nightmares?"

"Kinda…sort of…not really." Kakashi's eye rolled at the hesitant answer.

"Well, tell me if they get worse." With that said, Naruto swiftly found himself walking alone again.

Naruto wished he had a bag of rocks; that way, he could throw them at Sasuke and he wouldn't be so bored. "Naruto! Stop glaring at Sasuke-kun's back!" Or he could annoy both his teammates. That worked too.

"You have got to be kidding me." Naruto's flat statement drew the attention of his two teammates.

"Does this look funny to you?" Sakura screeched at him. Tazuna flinched from behind them as the demon of the mist, Momochi Zabuza, lunged for them. He was intercepted by Kakashi and the two had a short skirmish before Kakashi was trapped on the lake.

"Run! None of you can handle him!" Kakashi told them, visibly panicked. "His clones can only go so far from the original and he can't move while he's holding me here; run, now!"

A ninja who cannot obey orders is trash…

Naruto blinked, feeling something inside him awake and stretch before assessing the situation.

…but those who do not care for their teammates are worse than trash.

"We aren't leaving without you, Kakashi-sensei." Naruto growled. He would never abandon a teammate.

"How could you abandon Rin? Fine, you do what you want, but I'm going back to rescue her."

Beside him, Sasuke smirked in agreement. "Weren't you the one who told us to care for our teammates?"

"Yeah, get your priorities straight!"

"Hehehe, cute kids you've got there, Copynin." Zabuza sneered at them. "Acting as if they were real ninjas—ha, they've probably never killed anyone before."

That's not true! Naruto wanted to protest. Even if it was only a dream, it felt real enough to suffice. Blurting out that he had killed before would only make the others stare at him strangely, though, and he didn't want to face another interrogation. "And I suppose you've killed lots of people." He crossed his arms and scowled. "Well, la-di-freaking-da. You aren't the only one who's killed lots of people, you know! Even mass killers are human and you all die sometime."

His short speech had everyone staring at him. He nervously scratched the back of his head. The tension was cut when Sasuke scoffed. "The dobe is right." There was no doubt that he was thinking of Itachi.

"I was going to let you go if you handed the old man over," Zabuza said as one of his mist clones headed towards them. "But since you have decided to defy me, I suppose I'll have to dispose of you."

"Run!"

"Sensei, you're being a hypocrite." Naruto pointed out before his serious expression was melted by a grin. "Besides, remember who you're talking to: I am U-Uzumaki Naruto and I'm the future Hokage!" He mentally frowned—he had almost said another name. The only question was whose?

He determined to put those thoughts on hold when a mizu bunshin got up close and personal with him. The bunshin collapsed, but not from anything he had done. "Pay attention, dobe!" Sasuke growled at him, hands flashing into seals. "Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu!" He systematically took out another bunshin.

Naruto blinked in shock as Sasuke spewed out a large fireball. That jutsu looked very, very familiar. In fact… "Katon: Gokakyu no Jutsu," He spewed out a similar fireball and smiled at the familiarity of the heat. He was getting strange looks again though. Crap. He didn't like strange looks. Looks in general yes, but not when they were questioning his sanity.

The fireball evaporated a bunshin, but parts of it splashed onto him. Hm…he missed his goggles, he thought as he blinked water out of his eyes in an irritated manner. They did have a tendency to help keep unidentified objects away from his eyes. It was decided then. He'd find his goggles and wear them, no matter how geeky it looked.

They weren't really getting anywhere. Whenever Naruto or Sasuke took out a bunshin, Zabuza just made another appear. It was rather annoying. They'd have to take out Zabuza himself, Naruto concluded. "Sasuke!" he called, throwing his teammate a large object.

Sasuke scowled at him before seeing what he held. His scowl twisted into a gleeful smirk. A flick of the wrist opened the large windmill shuriken up and Sasuke threw it with practiced ease towards the real Zabuza. The mist devil smirked and jumped over it without releasing the water prison. "I'll give you points for aiming for the real me but you'll have to be smarter than that."

Sasuke's smirk became an outright grin as a second windmill shuriken appeared from the shadow of the first. Zabuza's eyes widened but he quickly caught the sharp weapon with his free hand. There was a poof from behind him and his head swung around to see what had happened. Naruto grinned at him before flinging a few kunai at him. In order to avoid getting killed by said kunai, Zabuza jerked to the side, coincidentally releasing the water prison at the same time.

Kakashi wasted no time on becoming offensive. Zabuza mentally cursed as he began making hand seals only to be imitated. It wasn't long before he was overpowered. Luckily for him, Haku stepped in to save him.

In the midst of the battle, no one noticed Naruto land on the water for a split second before falling in.

Late at night, Naruto stared at the worn down ceiling above him as he once again analyzed his dream. He couldn't understand why he was having these dreams. It was annoying, and frustrating, and…and…

Naruto sighed, feeling as worn down as the little house he and his team was currently staying in. He didn't want to offend Tazuna and his family by saying or even thinking this, but the shack seemed barely big enough to support one family let alone a few extra people.

He turned onto his side and found himself nearly nose to nose with Sakura. With a silent yelp, he quickly flipped over only to find himself facing Sasuke, which wasn't much better. How'd he end up between them anyway?

"I want to sleep next to Sasuke-kun!" Sakura chirped. Sasuke's expressionless look melted into one of panic and pleading.

Kakashi took in both looks before sighing and saying, "Naruto, sleep in between them."

And now he'd had a dream about a fan girl named Rin fawning over a younger Kakashi. Squirming out of his bedroll, he languidly stretched before padding out of the house. He heard Kakashi shift about a bit just before he left the house. With the chakra exhaustion, Kakashi shouldn't wake up for another—

"Yo," Naruto blinked as he found his teacher's face right in front of him. It wouldn't have been half as odd if not for the fact that Kakashi was standing upside down on a branch. "What are you doing, Naruto?"

"Sensei!" He yelped. "Um," Naruto fumbled for an excuse. "I just wanted to go on a walk."

"That's dangerous," Kakashi told him as he hobbled off the tree. "You should always inform your team where you'll be."

The blonde shifted nervously. "I know, I know."

Kakashi's visible eye narrowed. "Alright, what is it?"

Naruto noticeably jerked, his whole body shuddering. "Eh? What are you talking about?" Naruto's eyes frantically covered every inch of the ground in front of him. "I don't know what you're talking about. Kakashi-sensei, you're strange. You always say the weirdest things—" He was cut off when one of Kakashi's crutches bumped into him.

"You're babbling."

Naruto remained silent but his eyes took on a haunted look that dragged out every single paternal instinct Kakashi possessed.

"Naruto, you can tell me what's bothering you."

"Gah," the boy scuffed his foot against the ground. "I can't—it'll sound stupid." Kakashi gave him a look that implied he was being stupid—again. Naruto sighed, giving in. "The dreams are so real—they make me feel like I'm another person."

Kakashi raised an eyebrow.

"See! I told you it would sound stupid!"

"No, it's just that you sound like a middle aged person going through a mid-life crisis." Kakashi snickered. He quickly sobered though and said, "Listen, you shouldn't take those dreams so seriously. They're just dreams."

"Okay, sensei." Naruto turned to head back into Tazuna's house but tilted his head back at the last moment. "Ne, sensei, do you know anyone named Rin? She's got these weird marks on her cheeks." He motioned with his fingers.

Kakashi's gaze sharpened, his mind beginning to come up with ideas he didn't like. "Yes, she was my genin teammate."

"What happened to her?"

"She's dead."

Naruto felt an inexplicable sadness at those words and frowned. Kakashi stared at him, almost as if waiting for an outburst. Rin…Rin was dead. Naruto's hand came up to grip the cloth above his heart. It felt like someone had stabbed him. Naruto gazed at Kakashi almost calmly as his surroundings darkened.

"Naruto?"

Ne…I really didn't think this would actually happen.

Warm fingers gripped his shoulders and the throbbing in his chest dulled slightly.

I only wanted a little more time…

Naruto found himself looking into eyes that were both his and not. Naruto felt a thin barrier in his mind crack.

Looks like there's only one, ne, Kakashi?

Naruto's return to the waking world was abrupt and sudden as he shot into a sitting position. He gagged as his dream memory supplied a remembrance of the most horrible tasting food ever. If Sakura ever decided to cook for the team, he wouldn't eat it! Rin's food was bad enough and Sakura showed several signs of similarity. Although, if Sakura made puppy eyes, he'd probably end up eating her food out of pity; that's how Rin got him to eat.

"Welcome back," Kakashi drew Naruto's attention to him. "Care to share why you passed out?"

"I dunno," Naruto blinked as his mind backtracked to the point where he'd blacked out. "I felt weird. I feel fine now, though."

Kakashi stared him in the eye for a moment before bringing his orange book back up to read. "Alright; we're going to go training. There's a good chance Zabuza's still alive."

"What?" Naruto yelped. "I thought he was dead!"

Kakashi's eye curved in amusement. "Well, hunter-nin usually remove their target's head on the spot, regardless of who is present. The fact that this one didn't indicates that they're an imposter."

"But he got hit in the neck." Naruto deadpanned.

"Two words: faked death."

"Argh! You mean that was all for nothing?"

"You know, Sakura said the same thing." Kakashi put his book away and replaced them with crutches. "Come on, Naruto, time to train."

All of Naruto's frustration flew out an imaginary window and was replaced with excitement. "Yatta! Are you going to teach us something cool?"

"Yes," Kakashi chuckled maliciously. "It'll be 'cool'." Kakashi cackled to himself as he hobbled out the door with Naruto right behind him.

"Climb the tree," Kakashi told them blandly.

There were several blank stares. "Climb the tree?" Sakura asked.

Kakashi nodded and confirmed, "Climb it."

"We know how to climb trees, Sensei. Really," Naruto sighed melodramatically, placing a hand over his heart. "To think you have such a poor image of us."

"Perhaps you can climb trees," Kakashi said, "But can you climb them like this?" He hobbled over to the tree and continued up its side until he stood on the side of the tree. His eye curved in amusement as his students' gaped in awe at his ability to defy gravity. Well, two of them, anyway.

"Okay, Sensei, we get it, you can stop showing off now." Naruto grumbled, folding his arms against his chest.

"The feet are supposed to be the hardest spot to focus your chakra," Kakashi began to lecture, not moving in the slightest. On the inside, he sulked over the fact that Naruto didn't find it cool. "If you can focus the right amount of chakra to your feet, you can stick to the tree."

Naruto huffed and marched over to the tree. Kakashi watched in interest as his loudest student began to experiment on different chakra levels with one foot.

"Listen," Rin told him sternly, "The best way to learn this is to know how much chakra you need to walk up. If you charge in headfirst like you normally do, you'll just injure yourself."

He didn't listen and just ran straight at the tree. He fell back down with a thump.

"Baka!" Rin shrieked at him, losing all composure. "I told you to take your time!"

"'Take your time'," Naruto mumbled under his breath, "Easier said than done." He noted when his foot shot off the tree and when it stuck. When he was fairly confident he'd found the right level, he focused the same amount of chakra to the other foot and began to steadily walk up the tree.

Half way up, he wobbled and quickly marked his spot before he lost his grip. Once he had landed at the bottom, he glanced up to see how far he got and to see if he could guess what went wrong. To his surprise, Sakura was already at the top.

"This isn't so hard," she giggled.

Naruto felt like laughing along side her. "Yeah, you go, Sakura-chan!"

Kakashi eyed all of their marks before telling Sasuke "It looks like the rookie of the year is the farthest behind."

Angry, Sasuke took another running start at the tree. He had expected Sakura to be good at chakra control but for Naruto to show him up too? That was too much.

Naruto watched Sasuke practically throw himself at the tree with amusement. He vaguely noted that Sakura and Kakashi had disappeared somewhere but kept most of his attention on his tree and Sasuke.

Sasuke could use a few pointers, but Naruto knew that Sasuke would never accept help from him. How could he get Sasuke to listen to him? He watched Sasuke fall off the tree again and suddenly had an idea.

"Slow and steady wins the race," he spoke aloud as he began testing his foot against the tree again. "Rushing will only lead to failure."

He watched Sasuke from the corner of his eye, noting smugly that the bastard had stopped running at the tree and seemed to be contemplating Naruto's technique. He almost cheered aloud when Sasuke actually began to copy him.

I'm getting somewhere with them, Naruto thought with a smile. Perhaps this won't be so difficult after all.