Welcome to the rewrite! The old version of this story is just over 100 chapters, so New Readers, there's a lot to come! Old Readers - thank you for joining me on this! I can't wait to see what all of you think :)
Disclaimer: This applies to all chapters. I do not own Naruto, nor do I intend any commercial gain from the writing of this fanfiction. This story is purely for fun and writing practice.
Many Thanks: ItyGirl, KatieBees, Silverhawk88, and animechick247 for their support in both the original TUtN and this rewrite, and for listening to me ramble on about ideas and writing woes XD This would not have been possible without you guys. A HUGE thanks also to everyone who read, reviewed, favorited, and followed the old TUtN - you're the reason I got so far in the first place! And a special shout-out to supporters on Ko-fi, who've tossed donations my way to keep me physically fueled for writing and drawing.
Chapter 1: Fuumaki Kaiya!
Hiruzen looked out over the village as its surviving citizens worked to repair what they could. It had been a long two weeks since the Kyuubi's attack; bodies were still being recovered from the rubble, and many were impossible to identify. Burial rights would have to wait; people needed housing, trade had to be reestablished so there wouldn't be a food shortage, and missions had to resume before other villages could suspect any weakness. The Third War had only ended a little over a year ago and international relations were hardly stable. Hiruzen had taken up the Hokage's mantle once more, a familiar face to a distraught people…but he wondered just how much longer he could do this. His own wife, such a pillar of strength during his previous reign, was gone, taken during the attack; Minato and Kushina, the hope of the village, the ones who should have brought them into a new era of peace…gone.
How much more loss could the village take? How much could he take? As Hokage, he couldn't show his grief publicly; the people needed him to be strong, to lead them once again. He would do it so long as he was needed.
But to lead everyone to believe that not just the Fourth and his wife, but their child had perished as well…when that child was very much alive…
Behind him, the click of a cane made another presence known. "It is for the best, Hiruzen. You know this. For the Jinchuriki's safety, this is how it must be."
"I know, Danzo," Hiruzen all but growled, his patience with his old friend wearing thin. He needed Danzo and the other Councilors, now more than ever; his ability to see clearly in the chaos of tragedy was something Hiruzen himself struggled with even after all these years. However, the man's cold logic always felt out-of-place in times of grief.
Danzo came and stood beside him at the window, which afforded a view of the hospital in particular. "Is that the group?"
The people he spoke of were just leaving the hospital now: a woman in a habit carrying a rudimentary basinet led a small group of children from the main entry. This was the latest batch of orphans to be cleared by the medics for the trek to the orphanage, the new home for the few who had no other relatives to take them in.
Unlike the other groups that went before them, this one was unknowingly escorted by a few masked Shinobi who followed from the shadows. When the blond baby began to cry, then shriek, the ninja tensed, their hands hovering near their weapons. Hiruzen held his breath; next to him, Danzo's visible eye narrowed. Both watched with baited breath for whether the baby's fit might become something more.
Then, one of the other children darted forward. It was a girl; her jacket's hood fell back as she stopped next to the basket and reached her small arms inside, revealing a head of bright crimson hair. She softly rubbed the baby's tummy, unaware of the many eyes on both of them, until the boy quieted.
Danzo turned and left as the situation diffused on its own, but Hiruzen's eyes softened at the sight. Perhaps…perhaps everything would turn out well, after all.
The Third Hokage looked over the scrolls placed in front of him, then back up at the team that brought them in. The three-person squad was clearly exhausted, though they each stood at attention.
"You three did extremely well," Sarutobi Hiruzen said, addressing the team. "You completed the mission sooner than expected, without alerting any other interested parties. Go rest - you've earned it!"
The three shinobi smiled and bowed their heads. Hiruzen watched as they filed out, their postures already relaxing. Date Gorou, Kusato Hikaru, Fuumaki Kaiya - they were shaping up to be the village's best reconnaissance team outside of Anbu. Gorou was a strong multiform fighter; Hikaru had an excellent mind for strategy and was adept at illusory and deception techniques; and Kaiya was fast and skilled with seal- and code-breaking. Together, the three of them were quick, efficient, and thorough.
They were also only in their late teens and had just come off of a month-long mission in a sparsely populated region, and as they left, their respectful posture and demeanor melted away to their more natural dispositions.
"Damn, it's good to be home!" Gorou, the tallest of the three, said as he stretched his muscular arms overhead. He let out a big yawn, closing hazel eyes and mussing his spiky, olive-green hair.
Hikaru wrinkled his nose, his deep, plum-colored eyes drooping under light brown bangs. Several centimeters shorter than Gorou, he was also slimmer and less muscular. He adjusted the hem of his sleeves, pulling at an errant thread that had come loose, making a mental note to patch the otherwise pristine lavender shirt when he got home. "Close your mouth, you'll attract flies with that breath of yours."
"Oh, blow me, pretty boy."
"No, thank you."
"Why? Afraid you'd fall for me?" Gorou said with a teasing grin.
Kaiya groaned and had to restrain herself from slapping them each upside the head. "Oy! Give a rest."
Gorou gave a low whistle. "Someone's tetchy! What's up, Kaiya-chan?" He reached over to ruffle her crimson hair, but she caught his wrist before he could.
"I've been traveling with you bickering idiots for over a month and I'm ready to knock your heads together! I'm tired, hungry, and dying for a bath, so please," she said, pushing Gorou's other hand away as it reached toward her head, "shut up and stop touching my hair!"
"I'm not actually touching your hair."
"And I'm pretty sure I'm not an idiot," Hikaru added. "Gorou, on the other hand..."
Gorou grinned widely and threw his arms around his teammates' shoulders. "Eh, you both love me. You know it."
Kaiya rolled her eyes, but grinned nonetheless. Even Hikaru smirked as he shrugged Gorou's arm away. The three had been a team since their Genin days; teasing and sarcastic insults were simply part of their everyday banter. They agreed to meet for dinner and went their separate ways, though after a few steps, Hikaru stopped and called back to his female teammate.
"Kaiya! Did you want this?" He pulled out a small, wrapped item from his pack.
"Oh - thanks! I almost forgot." She sprinted back and took the minute package from him. Hikaru had been holding it for her since a point in the mission when she'd had to squeeze through a very small corridor, requiring her to remove her jacket and packs.
"Who's this one for?"
"Naruto," she replied, placing the item in her own pack.
"The noisy, blond boy?" He raised his eyebrows. "Wasn't the last one for him too?"
Kaiya brushed a crimson lock over her shoulder. "Mm - but I think he's graduating from the Academy soon, so I thought I'd get him something special." She glanced at Hikaru, who had a "I don't want to say something" sort of look, prompting her to raise a brow in inquiry. "What?"
He shrugged. "You just seem to...favor him sometimes. I thought you tried to be fair with souvenirs."
She smiled. "Yeah...But I dunno, there's just something about him. I know most of the village thinks he's just a troublemaker...but they don't know what it's like to grow up like he did."
"Like you did, too."
She shook her head. "It's different. I mean, it's not like being an orphan gets you a golden ticket anywhere, but Naruto…some of the villagers are just plain vicious, while others ignore him when he's right in front of them."
"Sorry - I didn't mean to bring up..."
"No, it's okay," Kaiya said, waving him off. "I'm just kinda tired. See you later for hotpot?"
He nodded and she turned back down the street. The buildings grew gradually less uniform as she went; tin roofs replaced shingles and chipped paint became commonplace. Women aired wet laundry from their windows, shouting across the narrow alleyways to each other with the latest gossip. A ball rolled into her path and Kaiya easily kicked it back toward a group of kids without breaking stride. After a few more turns and a quick climb up a metal stairway, she was passing her door with its rusty hinges and faded apartment number. There was someone she wanted to see before settling in for a quick nap.
Two doors down from her own apartment, she rapped her knuckles but refrained from announcing herself. He should have been out of school by now; Kaiya bit back a smile as she imagined his surprise when he opened the door. Whenever she came back from long missions, he would jump on her, demanding to know every detail but barely letting her get a word out before informing her of the goings-on at the Academy. He was an irrepressible ball of energy, exhausting and annoying to some, but Kaiya loved him for it.
No answer. Kaiya knocked again and checked the time. Was school still in session, or had he gotten in trouble yet again? With a sigh, she decided to check around more after getting a shower and short nap.
"Tadaima," Kaiya called into the empty studio as she kicked off her shoes. It was a bit dusty from her absence, but still as neat as she'd left it. The studio was cozy, certainly one of the smallest units in the building, but she didn't mind; it had been her home since she moved from the orphanage on the outskirts of the village to join the Academy. She'd give it a proper clean tomorrow; for now she went straight to her shower. Once clean of the road's grime, she collapsed into bed, savoring the softness of her mattress.
Before closing her eyes, Kaiya grabbed her pack and took out the small gift she'd gotten for Naruto. Unwrapping its protective paper, she held the item between her index fingers and thumbs of both hands: a small, lacquered wooden frog, ornately carved and painted bright orange and black, smooth except for a nick in the side. She'd found it at the market of a small town two days out from Konoha and had gotten a good deal on it for the nick.
Something about the little frog reminded her of Naruto - his cheeky grin, colorful outbursts, that habit he had of squatting everywhere. She'd started bringing souvenirs from her traveling missions a few years back, cycling through the younger children she'd grown up with as something to remind them that someone was thinking about them, and not just as a village burden. She didn't have much money and only recently started earning a significant amount from her missions, so she stuck with finding or buying one small item per mission for a different child each time.
Kaiya hoped that Naruto would like it. Although she didn't want to admit it, she did tend to favor him. As she drifted to sleep, her mind turned to some of her earliest surviving memories - a crying infant with tufts of blond hair, quieting as she hummed, staring at her with eyes as blue as her own...
"Iruka-sensei!" Kaiya waved in greeting to the tan-skinned, ponytailed teacher in the yard.
He brightened and waved back. "Hey, Kaiya-chan! Good to see you! Looking for Naruto?"
"That predictable, huh?" Kaiya tucked a lock of hair behind her ear self-consciously. "He's not at home - I wanted to make sure he was doing okay."
Iruka laughed. "You really have been gone a while this time, haven't you? Well, I'm sure he'd rather have told you himself, but…he graduated this time!"
Kaiya's eyes widened and a slow, joyous smile spread across her face. "Seriously? I mean, I knew he would - eventually - but still! So is he on a mission now? Who's his squad leader?"
Iruka held up his hands at her rapid-fire questions. "Whoa, whoa - there's a lot to update you on, I guess! C'mon - can I treat you to a bite to eat? I'll catch you up on everything."
"Only if I can treat you."
"Not an option!"
"He learned Kagebunshin from a scroll?" Kaiya had to keep her voice down in the tea shop, but she couldn't keep the incredulity from her tone. The standard clone jutsu had always been one of Naruto's worst, but the Shadow Clone jutsu was normally a forbidden technique for anyone below Jonin rank! It required a deep well of chakra and enough control to not spread oneself too thin, lest they deplete their reserves to lethal levels.
Iruka nodded, pride evident in his whole face. "Mm! And you should've seen him, Kaiya-chan - he made dozens of clones! Mizuki didn't stand a chance!"
Mizuki. The Academy teacher who'd tried to use Naruto to steal the forbidden scroll in the first place. Kaiya was glad he was already in jail; if he'd somehow gotten away, she'd have been hard-pressed to not want to hunt him down personally. He'd taken advantage of Naruto's need to prove himself, his loneliness…things that made her heart hurt to even think about. If she'd been there for the last month while Naruto was struggling…would he have fallen for Mizuki's ploy?
Iruka saw her face fall. "Kaiya-chan, don't blame yourself for not being there. You have missions - Naruto knows that, too. And everything turned out okay in the end."
Kaiya nodded and gave him a smile. "Yeah…you're right. I'm glad you were there, though…and hey, thank you for always being there for Naruto, Iruka-sensei."
A light blush spread across Iruka's scarred nose and he rubbed the back of his head. "You know, you don't have to call me 'sensei,' Kaiya-chan! I never actually taught you or anything!"
"Old habit, I guess!"
"So…" Iruka swirled his tea pensively. "Any luck lately on the parent front?"
Kaiya sighed. This was an old search for her; she remembered nothing about her parents and only had her name, 'Fuumaki,' to go on. "Nope…I kinda stopped looking a while ago, to be honest. Sandaime-sama told me they were probably civilian refugees who died in…well, in that attack, which is why there's no record of them. A lot of people on that block died, so there aren't even neighbors to ask about them."
Iruka's gaze lowered in sympathy. "Sorry, Kaiya-chan…I miss my parents too, but…" He trailed off. He missed them, but at least he still had his memories of them.
Kaiya just waved him off. "No worries. So - that's what happened just after I left…how's Naruto been doing since then? Did he get assigned a team?"
Iruka hesitated, looking like there was something else he wanted to say. It was in how he paused, how his eyes shifted briefly to the side - but before Kaiya could inquire about it, he again grinned and nodded. "Yeah, he's on a team. They're actually on their first away mission now…"
Kaiya rolled up her second scroll for the week and rubbed her eyes. Her limbs were getting fidgety from sitting for so long, and it was such a beautiful day out... She strolled out of her apartment, intent on returning the scroll and getting some kunai training in before meeting her teammates for dinner. Hikaru was cooking for them this time, which was never something to be missed.
As she locked her door, she looked down the hallway toward the apartment two doors away. Naruto was still away on his first C-rank mission. Iruka had finished catching her up on recent events - becoming part of a squad along with Uchiha Sasuke, passing their initial Genin team test, their first handful of D-rank missions. She'd laughed when she heard that both boys complained about how easy their missions were - it certainly sounded like them.
I hope they're both all right, she thought, hopping over the railing and skipping the stairs entirely. She didn't get far into the village before a familiar voice stopped her in her tracks.
"Kaiya-nee-chaaaaan!"
Kaiya looked up, her face automatically brightening. There was one person in the village proper who called her that with such exuberance, and his spiky blond head was bouncing toward her now.
"Naruto - welcome back!" Kaiya ruffled his hair when he came bounding to a stop. "Hey, I heard you actually graduated!"
Naruto made a comically offended face and pointed accusingly at her. "Eh, what's with the surprise?! Of course I graduated! AND - Kaiya-nee-chan, you won't believe this-" he took on a victorious stance - "I just completed an A-RANK mission, ya know!"
"What?!" That couldn't be right - he was only a Genin! Just what had his instructor signed them up for?!
"Oy, baka - stop bragging to everyone on the street."
Kaiya looked up to see that the rest of the team had caught up. It was the dark-haired boy who caught her attention first: Uchiha Sasuke, the last surviving member of the famed Uchiha Clan. It had been a while since Kaiya had seen the kid up close, and he seemed - if it was possible - even more serious. She gave him a warm smile. "Sasuke - good to see you back!"
He just averted his eyes and huffed moodily. Kaiya bit back a sigh and turned her attention to the other two. One was a pink-haired girl Kaiya only vaguely recognized; perhaps this was the same one she'd heard Naruto talk about before? The girl only had eyes for Sasuke, though. Next to her was their sensei, a tall, silver-haired man with most of his face covered by a mask. Hatake Kakashi, the legendary Copy-Nin - they hadn't spoken before, but Kaiya knew him by reputation. The man had his nose buried in a book, and a questionable one at that; he hadn't even looked up yet. Kaiya frowned and stalked up to him, pulling the book down so he'd be forced to make eye contact.
"What's this I heard about a Genin team going on an A-rank mission?" she demanded.
Kakashi blinked his solitary eye at her but gave no answer. His expression was nearly unreadable thanks to the mask, and his eye gave nothing away as he stared down at her. At first, the way he looked at her made her uncomfortable, as though that one dark eye was picking her apart like a puzzle…but soon, annoyance began to set in at his silence.
"Well…" The pinkette beside him spoke up. "It wasn't actually supposed to be an A-rank mission, see…we all thought it was C-rank. By the time we realized, it was a little late to come back, so Kakashi-sensei agreed that we should finish it." With every word she spoke, the pinkette grew more confident. "And you should've seen the state that village in the Land of Waves was in! They needed our help, but couldn't afford it-"
"Sakura." Kakashi snapped his book shut. "No need to explain. I'm going to write up the report - you three, go home."
"Ne, ne, Kaiya-nee-chan!" Naruto tugged at her jacket. "Can we go get Ichiraku? I'll tell ya all about the bridge they're naming after me, ya know!"
"Can you go one minute without mentioning that, dobe?" Sasuke shot, crossing his arms.
Naruto whirled around and grabbed Sasuke by the collar. "Teme-! Just 'cause you were out cold for most of the fight-"
"What was that?!"
Naruto and Sasuke locked themselves in a glare-off, holding each other by the collars and positively growling until they were pulled apart by the backs of their shirts.
"Jeez," Kaiya sighed, an amused smile playing on her lips as she let go of the two boys. "I guess some things never change. Now why don't you two be gentlemen and introduce me to your teammate?"
A few paces away, Kakashi, who'd opted to walk rather than poof away, glanced back over his shoulder to see Sakura hit Naruto over the head after he declared her to be his girlfriend. His keen eyes took in the boys' body language around the redhead: Naruto was completely at ease, even affectionate toward her, while Sasuke clearly knew her but perhaps didn't want to admit to it. Then he took in the redhead herself: Crimson hair fell midway down her back, the top layer pulled back with a clip, leaving two chin-length locks to frame her fair-skinned face. Her bright blue eyes twinkled in amusement at the boys' obvious rivalry. She didn't wear standard Shinobi garb; instead, she had a grey jacket with rolled-up sleeves over a fitted, dark peach tunic and black, calf-length leggings. She was left-handed, going by the location of her leg pack, but a wide utility belt slung around her waist had pockets primarily on the right side - ambidextrous, perhaps. Her Konoha plate was sewn onto the belt.
Naruto asked again about getting ramen, but Kaiya smiled apologetically and knocked on the top of his head. "Sorry, Naruto - I'll have to take a raincheck. I have to return this and meet my own team. Later though, 'kay?"
She looked up then as the distinct feeling of being watched made the hair on the back of her neck stand up - but where the Copy-Nin had stood just a second before, there was no one.
Kaiya rapped her knuckles lightly on Naruto's door later that night, wondering if he'd still be up. He was usually pretty good about getting to bed at a reasonable hour, unlike her; she'd always had a sort of buzzing energy that sometimes made it hard to keep normal hours.
When he answered, he was already in his pajamas, but any sign of sleepiness evaporated once he saw her. "Kaiya-nee-chan! Whatcha doin' here?"
"I have something for you," she said. "Mind if I come in?"
"Mm!"
When she gave Naruto the little frog, he thanked her and put it with his small collection she'd contributed to over the years. Then something odd happened: rather than try to chat her ear off like he'd wanted to earlier, his small shoulders drooped and his face become strangely solemn. "Kaiya-nee-chan…there's something I gotta ask you."
Even his usual verbal tick was gone for the moment, and that had Kaiya worried. "What's up?"
"Well…you know that Mizuki guy? From the Academy?"
Kaiya nodded. "Iruka-sensei told me what happened. He used you to get that scroll…Naruto, I'm sorry I wasn't-"
"No, no, that's not what…" Naruto shook his head. "He…he told me somethin' about how the Fourth Hokage died…about a demon fox…"
Kaiya looked down at the table. She was familiar with the tale, as was most of the village, though it was forbidden to speak of it; she'd learned of it directly from the Hokage a few years ago after he'd caught her sneaking into the records office to learn more about her own family. The night she'd lost her parents, a demon fox, some sort of freakish supernatural phenomenon, had attacked the village; nearly half the Shinobi population and many civilians lost their lives that night. The Fourth Hokage managed to defeat the creature, but at the cost of his own life.
As for Naruto…she'd heard rumors among the villagers since then. It was always in whispers, but sometimes she heard older generations speak of Naruto as though he was the demon fox. Sure, he'd been born on the same day, but how did that mean anything? "Naruto, you had nothing to do with that!"
Fists formed at his sides. "But…I did. That demon fox…the Fourth Hokage sealed it inside of me."
"Who told you that?" Kaiya demanded. "Mizuki? Those are just rumors-"
"So you knew, too?" His voice was strangely quiet, but it silenced Kaiya like a whiplash.
"Naruto," she pleaded, reaching out to take his shoulder. "I never believed those stupid rumors for a second. You shouldn't either-"
"They aren't rumors, ya know!" He jerked away from her touch, his voice shaking. "Iruka-sensei told me so, and on the last mission…I…I felt it…this weird power in me…"
Iruka had told him? Kaiya knew Iruka well enough to assume that he wouldn't lie about something like this, at least not knowingly or maliciously. But the idea that the infamous Kyuubi, the cause of that tragedy almost thirteen years ago, was in Naruto…that, she couldn't quite wrap her head around.
What she could understand was that right now, Naruto looked ready to either lash out or run away - both were reactions he had when people assumed the worst of him. Kaiya knelt and engulfed him in a hug before his young mind could spiral into doubt and anger.
"Naruto…listen to me. I don't care if you have a demon fox, a ghost, a freakin' seven-headed toad or anything else sealed in you. You're Naruto, and that's all that matters to me, okay?"
Tears of relief sprang to Naruto's eyes; she felt them fall into her shoulder as he hesitantly leaned into her embrace. "It's just…I know that's how you lost your family, you know…"
"Well, you're my family now," she replied, holding him tighter as her own eyes prickled sympathetically. "Don't you forget it. Now, I'm gonna get to the bottom of this, okay? I'll talk to the Hokage if I have to, and to your sensei, and see what's really going on. We'll figure this out."
Naruto, his eyes already drying, grinned and nodded. "Right!"
Kakashi sat at his desk and opened a file he'd procured from the records office. With his rank and his previous time in Anbu, it hadn't been difficult to find or take out, though he did so in secret, not wanting to answer any awkward questions about his interest. It was rare for the Copy-Nin to be curious about anyone, and he certainly didn't want to draw attention to this particular curiosity.
Name: Fuumaki Kaiya
Rank: Chunin
Birthdate: November 28
Blood Type: B
She'd be turning eighteen this fall, and there was a note about being evaluated for Jonin promotion. Strengths included speed, stamina, and code- and barrier-breaking; weak points were mainly genjutsu and general chakra sensing. Pretty decent with hand-to-hand and melee, but better with defensive and evasive maneuvers - fitting for someone who primarily dealt with intel and reconnaissance missions. Dozens of B-rank and the very occasional A-rank missions recently, mostly focused on recovering sensitive items or gathering preliminary information on people or places, all done with her originally assigned squad. Teammates were Date Gorou, fifth son of a family known for its physical skills, and Kusato Hikaru, only son and heir to the Kusato Corporation, the largest metal weapons manufacturer in the Land of Fire. He'd been the squad's leader since their teacher, Yoshida Yuuma, had been killed…in the Uchiha massacre?
Kakashi blinked. He remembered all too well that particular incident - but there'd been a non-Uchiha killed there, too? That should have been more noteworthy, yet as close as Kakashi was to the incident, even he hadn't known about it.
A soft knock on his door jolted Kakashi from the file. Who on earth was at his door this late in the evening? Not Guy, surely - the man wouldn't be nearly so subtle in announcing himself.
Another knock - with a sigh, Kakashi pushed himself out of his chair and answered, only to find the very person he'd been reading about standing outside. She looked like she'd just been about to turn around and leave when he opened the door. "Oh! You're here!"
"K - Fuumaki-san?"
Kaiya tucked a crimson lock behind her ear and smiled sheepishly up at him. "Hey…uhm…Hatake-san -"
"You can call me Kakashi," he said automatically, then wondered why he had.
"Kakashi-san…" She tested the name on her tongue before straightening. "I wanted to apologize for before. I shouldn't have jumped to conclusions about the way you lead Naruto's team. It's just…well, I've kinda looked after him for years now - we're both from the orphanage - so I guess I was pretty shocked to hear about the A-rank mission and all."
Kakashi blinked. "How'd you get my address?"
Kaiya smiled innocently. "I have my ways." Kakashi stared at her, unblinking, until she caved. "Relax! My teammate's brother's wife's sister-in-law works at the records office. I asked. Wasn't sure how else to get in touch, and I don't like leaving things like this hanging, you know?"
"It's nothing." He started to back away and close the door, but she stuck her foot into the door jam before he could.
"Wait! That's not all I came for," she admitted. "But I'd rather not talk out here - can I come in?"
Kakashi fixed her with another calculating stare. If anything, he looked like the last thing he wanted to do was invite her in; Kaiya knew it was forward of her to ask, but she didn't see any other way around it.
"What is this about?"
Kaiya kept her foot in the door jam. "Naruto…his power."
Something flitted across Kakashi's face, though with most of it covered in the mask, Kaiya barely caught it before it passed. He stepped aside. "Come in."
Kaiya's shoulders loosened in relief as she stepped past him into the small apartment and kicked off her shoes politely. "I won't stay long, I just didn't want to talk out there, you know?"
Kakashi said nothing, just crossed his arms and looked at her expectantly.
Geez, not one for visitors, I guess, she thought, suppressing her urge to look around the apartment to gather information on him. It was such a second-nature impulse to her that it was a struggle to keep her eyes solely on him. "So…Naruto told me about the Kyuubi being inside of him."
"He really shouldn't have."
"So it's true, then?" Kaiya pressed, taking a step closer. "The Kyuubi…it's actually inside Naruto? Yondaime sealed it in him when he was just a baby?"
Kakashi closed his eyes in exasperation at falling into such an obvious verbal trap. She hadn't known for sure about the Kyuubi being in Naruto, but he'd inadvertently confirmed it for her. "How do you know about the Kyuubi in the first place?"
"Told ya, I have my ways," Kaiya retorted. Her face softened. "Look…I know you don't know me, but I've known Naruto since he was a baby. I just want to help him. He…he said he felt what the thinks was the Fox's chakra on the mission; that doesn't sound like something that's supposed to happen with a seal."
Kakashi sighed. "I appreciate your concern, but Sandaime-sama has been informed of the leak. He assured me that it's a perfectly normal part of the seal that Yondaime-sama used."
"What seal?" Kaiya asked, eyes shining with curiosity. "What was used? Is there anything on it-"
"Not for a Chunin," he said, holding his hand up to stop her. "It's nothing for you to worry about-"
"It is if it has to do with Naruto! Look, I've been studying Fuinjutsu for a while-"
"It's an incredibly advanced technique," he interrupted again. "So keep studying."
"That's -" Kaiya stopped. "Wait…what?"
"I said," Kakashi restated, "keep studying Fuinjutsu. I saw the scrolls you were carrying earlier; if they're any indication, you're on your way. As for Naruto - the Hokage is perfectly aware of the state of his seal; what he needs right now is to learn to control his chakra, and that is what I intend to work with him on. Now, was there anything else, or can I go to bed?"
Kaiya shook her head.
Kakashi took her shoulders, turned her around, and opened the door. "Then good night."
She was pushed out into the hallway and the door shut before she could protest. "Well, excuse me for trying to help," Kaiya muttered as she made her way out of the building.
Meet Fuumaki Kaiya!
-17 years old
-Chunin rank, up for Jonin promotion
-orphaned during the Kyuubi attack with no memory of her family
-looks after Naruto and, to an extent, Sasuke
And welcome to To Unravel the Night (the rewrite)! This first arc is largely based on canon events, though we'll see serious divergence from that later on.
Reviews are love, and I try to answer every one of them!
NEXT TIME: A new project brings Kaiya to Kakashi's door again…we'll see what sort of relationship she has with Sasuke…and get a look at her skills in action.
Stay Tuned!
