Hur hur: Um, so you know how anime's sometimes have revamped versions that come out later that are the same story only inherently better in darn near every aspect? This is Mad World's revamp. I lied. I wrote it, I couldn't help it. I hope you guy's like it cuz I do, hella.

Sweet Parody

Chapter 1 - Impossible

"Sasuke, come on, we need to get out of here!"

They'd found him, finally, after two years of training, after all the searching, they'd found him. Sakura, Sai, and Yamato were at his side. They'd cornered Sasuke in his private chambers within Orochimaru's base. It was cold, almost frigid within the small brick room, belying the mild spring afternoon outside. After all this time, here he was, and Naruto was going to take him home. He'd spent the past few minutes wearing Sasuke down, and his voice was becoming more and more emotional, something in his eyes was fading. His Sasuke was returning.

"No, Naruto, you need to get out, we aren't a team, and I'm not your friend," Sasuke's words were vehement, oozing the venom and loathing that was reminiscent of his bratty twelve year old self, the one Naruto remembered. As horrid as it might be to anyone else's ears, to Naruto it was nostalgic, and overwhelmingly endearing. If only it would last.

BANG. The door to Sasuke's private chambers slammed open and there he was, the man responsible for Sasuke defection: Orochimaru. He came to stand at Sasuke's shoulder, eyeing the two of them, and asking his apprentice what was the matter.

"Nothing, they were just leaving," Sasuke informed him, though the waver to his voice, and his choice of words were a mistake.

"Leaving? They'll do no such thing!" Orochimaru bit out.

Naruto wondered if the room was spinning for Sakura, Sai, and Yamato too or if it was just him. He hadn't even had time to tell Orochimaru to fuck off, as he had thought to a minute ago. Suddenly those eyes had been everything, their slit pupils boring through him and making him nauseous and powerless. He'd fallen to his knees, no, flat on his back. His spine was arching against his will, it felt like his eyes were being pushed out of their sockets. Something was filling his throat and he was choking on it, all he could hear was Sasuke's voice, it was forcing its way into his ears. It felt…wrong. Something was wrong, he couldn't…move. His ears were full of cotton; his mouth was rusty and coppery, full of the feeling of sleep. Maybe he should sleep, and all of this would be over. Sleep…

"Come, Sasuke…this is over."

"Yes, teacher," Sasuke's voice was gone, it was no longer his, now this strange warped thing. Sakura cried, but through her tears she could see what was happening to him. He was under Orochimaru's control, he was his puppet. That was why…he'd, he'd been talking to them before! They'd almost worn him down! But then they were gone, disappeared out the door and away.

Sakura knelt at Naruto's side, calling to him, trying to force her chakra into him to break through the genjutsu that he had been put under. She couldn't bring him out of it, this was different, this was no ordinary illusion jutsu. She couldn't do this herself. They needed to get Naruto home as soon as possible. They needed Tsunade-sama.

Pushing her chakra into her arms and legs she took the writhing, tense Naruto into her arms and hurried out of the base, Sai and Yamato on her heels.

Tsunade was…tired. She had spent the past five days working on a way to bring Naruto out of the genjutsu put on him by her old teammate. But nothing she had tried so far had worked. She'd gotten little over four hours of sleep and that was when she'd been forced to take 'breaks' by Shizune. She slept for all of twenty minutes before she couldn't stay asleep any longer and had to get working again. It seemed that as she was trying to bring Naruto out of it she was being met with a resistance that had far more strength than any technique she'd ever encountered. She was finally coming upon a theory as to the reason behind its potency but she didn't like it.

Naruto didn't want to come out of it. He was staying under because he wanted to be there, something in the genjutsu was keeping him from waking up, from reacting to the counteractive measures she was taking. A wall had gone up and locked her out, but there was still something going on behind that wall that she couldn't see or reach. But she couldn't give up, she had to keep trying. That brat had to replace her someday, and he had no time to hide away and skip out on training like this.

Tsunade wiped the beginnings of tears from her eyes disguising it as sleep grit in the hopes of satisfying Shizune who was glaring her down. She put her glasses back on, eyes settling on Naruto's limp form. When he'd first arrived they'd had to give him a sedative drip to relax his muscles, if his spine was allowed to arch in that manner for much longer his muscles would freeze up and he'd risk further damage. All they could do was relieve the genjutsu's hold on Naruto's body and limit it to his mind where they could further combat it until it relinquished control completely. The way he looked now, it was like he was sleeping.

Pulling a stool to the side of his bed, Tsunade sat down; skimming through a few scrolls she'd plucked from the library shelves. Whatever was going on in Naruto's brain (however small it may be) would be discovered in due time. She'd find a way to bring him back. She owed the brat. Tsunade would move heaven and earth.

Sakura entered the room only to find a team of medic-nins lined up against the wall, silent and Tsunade sitting next to a suddenly awake Naruto.

"Tsunade-sama! Why didn't you tell me he'd woken up?" Sakura shuffled over to the opposite side of the bed from her teacher, resting a hand over Naruto's though really she wanted to pull him into a suffocating bear hug.

"Naruto," Tsunade ignored her, "do you know this girl?"

"Huh, no, I don't know you either! What kind of accident?" Naruto's voice was strange, and babyish. Sakura stared blankly at Naruto, her mouth opening. Tsunade held up a hand and said, 'Sakura, please wait outside a minute.'

Her mouth closed, Sakura stood, albeit shakily, and returned to the hallway where she leant up against the wall, sliding down to the floor. She hugged her knees to her chest and watched as the hospital staff passed her by. How could…how could this happen?

Naruto had no idea where he was. He'd woken up in this strange room where everything was white and smelled clean. The sun was bright outside and a gentle breeze was blowing in through the window. He was wearing a white dress with grey dots all over it and there was a lady sitting next to him talking to him. She had a big chest and long blond hair in pig tails. Her face was heart shaped and nice, if not a bit pained and tired. There was also a group of people he didn't know lined up against the wall opposite him wearing white uniforms, they were watching him intently and it made him nervous and itchy. He scratched at his arm.

"Naruto, can you hear me?"

"Yeah, what's going on? Who are those people?"

"Naruto…?"

"What?!" he grouched, "who are those people?"

"They're some low rank medic-nins helping me with your case, they're here to learn," the lady's face grew pinched and tense as she asked him, "do you know who I am?"

"Nuh uh, where am I? What's going on?"

"You're in the hospital, Naruto," the lady said, "you had an accident."

"An accident? What kind?"

The door to the room opened and a girl he didn't know walked in, she had short pink hair and blue eyes. When she saw him her face lit up with the nicest smile he'd ever seen. He decided he liked her plenty, and not this weird pinch faced lady. The girl came and sat down on his left and took his hand. He wanted to pull it away because he didn't like holding hands with somebody he didn't know.

"Tsunade-sama, why didn't you tell me he'd woken up?" the girl asked the pinch-face lady. Tsunade was her name? Naruto wanted to giggle, that was a silly name.

"Naruto," Tsunade asked him, "do you know this girl?"

Naruto shook his head, getting tired of this all questions no answers business.

"Huh, no, I don't know you either! What kind of accident?"

Tsunade and the pink haired girl stared at each other, something passing between them that Naruto didn't understand. Then Tsunade asked her (Sakura) to wait outside, and the girl stood and left the room.

"Tsunade is a silly name," Naruto said, finally giggling.

"How old are you, Naruto?"

"Seven!" he answered angrily, "Why aren't you answering me? What kind of accident?"

"You fell out of a tree and hit your head; we're trying to establish what you still remember."

Oh, Naruto pouted, that was why his head hurt? He scratched his head and laughed at the idea of falling out of a tree. That was so dumb. Tsunade put her hand on his hand and Naruto wanted to jerk away, but her face was just so sad.

"Naruto do you remember…falling out of the tree?" she asked him.

"No."

"What's your name?"

"Naruto!"

"No, I meant your full name."

"Naruto Uzumaki."

"And you're seven years old?"

"Yeah!"

"Do you remember where you lived?"

"Um…"

"Do you remember any people, any names besides your own?"

Naruto stared at Tsunade and her sad, pinched face. He had to remember somebody, he knew lots of people, he was sure of it. It was on the tip of his tongue, like he knew the answers to these questions, he knew them, he just couldn't think of them at the moment. Maybe if she gave him more time. He grumbled and kicked his feet under the blankets of the bed he was in.

"Naruto-"

"No! I know the answer, I do, I just, I can't, you're not being fair!"

"I'll give you some more time to think about it, okay?"

"Mm'kay," he mumbled.

"In the mean time, while you're thinking about it, would you mind if Sakura came in to see you?"

"No hand holding," Naruto blurted, "but okay!"

Tsunade nodded, slowly rising from her seat. She told the 'medic-nins' at the wall to leave the room, that they were dismissed for the day. Then she opened the door to the room and left, shutting it quietly behind her.

Sakura had been staring at the opposite wall without realizing it when the medic-nins burst from the room, chattering excitedly, Tsunade coming out far less jubilant. Sakura felt Tsunade sit down next to her more than she saw her, after all, her eyes were still riveted to the wall. Tsunade let a hand fall on her shoulder and squeeze gently.

"It doesn't look like he remembers anything, except for his name, and his age," Tsunade said crisply, as detached as Sakura felt she was.

"He doesn't…even remember me?"

"No."

Sakura swallowed, her mouth feeling dry and uncooperative from having not talked for the twenty or so minutes she'd been sitting on the floor in the hallway.

"He wouldn't mind if you went in and visited him," Tsunade sighed, "but there's something you need to know, Sakura."

"What? What more could there be?"

"He thinks that he's seven years old."

"So he's a retard now?!" she shrieked, unable to keep her voice down, "He doesn't remember anything, and he's freakin'-"

"No, he's just…younger."

"But you just said-"

"I said, he thinks he's seven years old, I did not say he was retarded, Sakura. My guess is he is just as smart now as he was when he was seven. But for now, since he's woken up, there's nothing I can do. This is in psych's hands now. Later this afternoon we can have Ino and her father come in, and try to work with him. But other than that…there's nothing we can do."

"No, this isn't, this can't be…" Sakura stuttered, "I mean, this is Naruto we're talking about, right? This can't happen, he'll come out of it, he'll get better."

"Sakura, there is a very likely chance, that he won't-"

"No!" She was crying, where had the tears come from? She wasn't crying a second ago, "He'll get better! He'll get better! He'll get better!"

"Sakura would you like to come to my office and calm down…?"

"No!"

Tsunade scooted in front of her and took her into her arms. No, she couldn't be comforting her because there was no reason, Naruto would get better. Everything was fine, there was no reason for consolation, Sakura had her consolation and it was that this wouldn't last. Naruto would wake up tomorrow, or this weekend maybe and he would be back to normal. He would be embarrassed when he found out that he'd acted like a little kid, and she would tease him that it was no different than usual. Everything would be fine!

"Hey you, go find Hatake for me would you? Tell him to get here asap, no diversions or I'll have his head on a platter before he can finish talking to whatever animal he comes up with this time!"

Sakura leant against Tsunade, tired. Her teacher rubbed her back and combed her hand through her hair. Sometime in all of this she heard another voice near her ear.

"Sakura, come here," said the voice. She wasn't in Tsunade's arms anymore, but she was in someone else's. She looked up and saw a familiar masked face, one eye staring down at her stoically.

"Take her home, she should be with her family right now," Tsunade ordered.

"No! I want to, I want to see him," Sakura mumbled weakly, "I want to see him."

"Sakura you should really get some rest-"

"No! He said he wouldn't mind if I visited, I'm going to visit," Sakura growled, "if he doesn't remember anything he's probably lonely and confused and bored out of his skull, he should have someone to talk to."

"Tsunade, what exactly happened?" Kakashi set Sakura down and she stumbled blearily over to the door, wiping at her eyes.

"Naruto woke up, but-"

Sakura didn't stay around for the rest of that sentence, letting herself into Naruto's room and shutting the door behind her. Naruto perked up, having been staring out the window, leaning against the railing on his bed. When he saw her he smiled brightly, but drew his hands into his lap and interlaced his fingers like he was holding his own hand.

"Sorry you've been alone all this time, it was rude of us not to have someone stay in here with you," Sakura started, coming to sit down in the chair she'd occupied before. Naruto watched her curiously and then shook his head.

"It's okay, I was thinking," he said.

Sakura stared at him a moment, wondering what there was to say to that other than, "What were you thinking about?"

Too late. It was already out of her mouth.

"Tsunade asked me if I remember any people, or any names besides my name, but she asked so fast I couldn't answer! So she's giving me time to think about it."

"I see," she hummed, "have you thought of anyone?"

Naruto grumbled, returning his gaze to the view out of the window on the other side of the room, "No."

"Well," Sakura forced a smile onto her face, "my name is Sakura, so now you know a name other than your own."

"But I knew Tsunade, her name is silly," Naruto smiled though it was clear he was bothered by not being able to remember any on his own, "and I knew yours too, cuz she said it. But I think Sakura is silly on you too."

Yeah, and Naruto is silly on you, now we're all silly, hurraaaaay, Sakura really wanted to say something rude to him, something teasing but she kept it to herself. This wasn't her Naruto, she couldn't treat him like anything other than a little kid.

"Sakura means cherry blossom, right?"

"Huh?" Sakura stared at him, following his gaze out the window to a cherry blossom tree that was just barely visible from their vantage point, "Yes, it does."

"Your hair is pink even, like a cherry blossom!"

"Yeah…" Sakura wondered where this could be going, "it's why my parents named me Sakura, is because of my hair."

"I'm going to call you Flower girl!"

"...okay," just go with it, girl, just go with it.

"Cuz your hair is the same color as a flower!"

Naruto looked to her eagerly for approval of this name, and he was so excited Sakura felt like she would be a horrible person if she didn't approve.

"Now I have a name I can remember that's just my name for someone!"

Ah.

"Yeah! That'll show Tsunade," Sakura laughed, "she won't know what to do now."

Though she'd been mostly sarcastic, Naruto hadn't seemed to notice; he laughed too, "Yeah!"

Later in the afternoon after Sakura had talked with him for hours and generally tired him out, Ino and her father Inoshi were brought in to see him. They gave him enough sedative to knock him out and allow them to search through his mind for any memories that they might be able to bring to the surface. But every time they went digging too deep past blurry images of a boy with black hair, and a man with snakes, they hit a wall. They worked for several hours until, both exhausted; they had to return home after delivering the less than stellar news to Tsunade.

Sakura sat next to Naruto's bed, and when he woke up after the ordeal he was happy to see her. She would stay the night but as Tsunade had said earlier, she really should be with her family. They would have heard the news by now, and would be worried about her. At least, her mother would be, her father would tell her it was expected in her 'line of work' and she should get over it.

"I'll be back to see you in the morning, okay?" Sakura assured him.

"Okay, good night flower girl! Thank you for staying with me before," Naruto said through a wide-mouthed yawn.

"Good night, Naruto," she pressed a kiss to his forehead and left.

They were playing good guys and bad guys, good guys and bad guys. All afternoon long in a field that went on forever under a bright blue sky with white cotton ball clouds. Then he came to get them and he took them for dinner. Where was she? A family almost complete.

Naruto woke up in the hospital when the sun just barely spilling through the window and onto the floor. The sky was grey with that odd pre-dawn light that seemed so strangely empty. He stretched and yawned, wondering when Flower girl would show up. She'd said she'd see him in the morning. It was morning then.

There was another bed in the room, to the right of him, but it was empty. There were footsteps outside his room but none stopped next to his door and no one opened his door to peer in and check up on him. If he was important enough to make such a fuss over, Naruto figured that there should be someone to check up on him. He slouched in his bed, crossing his arms over his chest. He wanted to color. He looked around him, trying to figure out if there was a way to get someone to talk to him. There was a red button attached to the wall, flower girl had told him yesterday that it would call people if he pressed it. Naruto reached out and pushed the button, thinking that it would call people. It did, it called a lot of people.

Lots of people in white clamored into the room and were shouting things frantically at first and then angrily and exasperatedly a second later. Some of them even started yelling at Naruto, and he held his arms up in front of his face to block the yells.

"I just wanted to talk to somebody!" he cried over the commotion.

"What on earth is going on here?!" a stern voice bellowed over the rest.

"That brat pressed the code button!"

"Everyone out, everyone out!"

Soon all of the white uniformed people left, leaving only Tsunade standing there looking just as tired as when he saw her yesterday. She eyed Naruto wearily, approaching his bed and ultimately taking a seat on the stool to the right of him. She rested her elbows on the edge of the bed, setting her chin on her folded hands. Then she was quiet, looking at Naruto as if she were waiting for something.

"Was that a bad button?" Naruto finally asked.

"It can be, it's only supposed to be pushed when someone in the room is in a lot of trouble and could die, it's bad if you push it and nothing's wrong."

"Oh," Naruto slouched, "I thought it would call people for me to talk to."

"No, that's what this is for," Tsunade picked up a strange oblong device from the nightstand next to his bed, it had a bunch of different buttons on it, she pointed to the blue one at the top.

"Okay." Naruto took the button from her and held it in his lap.

"Did you just want someone to talk to?"

"I wanted to color."

"I think we can have that arranged," Tsunade chuckled.

Sakura sat next to Naruto, watching him color. It was late in the afternoon of the sixth day younger Naruto had arrived. He had endured so many 'tests' that day that it was a miracle he had enough energy to sit up and finish even one picture in his new coloring book let alone two or three as he had managed to accomplish so far.

Tsunade, as calm as she had beena few days ago, was violently refusing to let Naruto's case be transferred to psych so quickly. She had Inoshi attempt a few more searches for memories. A psychiatrist had come in and talked with Naruto for a bit, and only confused him and made him cry. Sakura, who had been protective of her friend already, chased the man from the room and told him to not come back. Then Tsunade had tried to tell Naruto stories of events he'd actually experienced, substituting names here or there, to see if it could jog his memory at all. It hadn't, it had mildly amused him for a time, until he fell asleep during one story and Tsunade gave up. The psych ward, while also under Tsunade's jurisdiction as head medic-nin, was pressing for control of the case and could otherwise overpower her if they submitted their plea to the counsel.

With the bias of the village delighting at the chance to call the kyuubi's jailor crazy, and psych knocking on Tsunade's door every minute of the day, it was a wonder the woman hadn't snapped yet. In her own way she was tearing at the seams and Sakura could tell. She didn't want to give up either, she wanted to help Naruto get better, and she wanted to get her Naruto back. But she wasn't sure it was possible. Even though she knew she wanted this strange younger Naruto to go away and give her back her friend, Sakura also knew that protecting this Naruto was now her first priority. Keeping him here at the hospital where he was tested for this and that, forced to try and remember a life he couldn't even imagine, was not good for him. If anything it just scared him and made him shut them out even more.

"What do you think flower girl?" Naruto asked her, showing a picture he'd just completed. It was a picture of two puppies chasing each other. He'd colored them obnoxiously neon colors that clashed in a way that made the puppies look radioactive.

"It's very nice Naruto, though I think that the puppies don't appreciate all that toxic waste on their fur."

Naruto giggled at her and turned the page, prepped to start on yet another picture. He was so excited to finally be allowed to color after all those tests that he was fighting off sleep so he could make up for lost time. Sakura knew he'd be regretting it the next day. The door opened and Tsunade peered in.

"Sakura, can I talk to you for a moment?"

"Sure, I'll be right back Naruto," Sakura stood up and stretched before joining Tsunade in the hallway.

Her teacher leant against the door after she'd shut it, and crossed her arms over her chest. Sakura just wished the poor woman could get some sleep; she looked even more tired than she did that morning.

"Anything today?"

"No, Tsunade-sama, but-"

"Yes, Sakura?"

"…but I think that we should start considering the possibility of relocating him."

"Relocate him where?" Tsunade snapped.

"I haven't decided yet but I was thinking the sanatorium might be our best bet," Sakura saw Tsunade's lips twist into a scowl, so she said, "I'm not saying we should give up, I'm saying that right now, stressing him out, keeping him in a place that is filled with people poking and prodding him is going to do no good. We would do well to move him some place more comfortable."

"But you are saying he won't get better any time soon, you don't think I can help him?"

Sakura sighed, eyeing her teacher with no small amount of trepidation as she said, "No, I don't think you can, I don't think anyone can."

TBC...