Okay, so this story I've actually been allowed to adopt from ScopeShot, since he said he was too busy with school to continue it. So everyone who's reading it let us wish him a good luck on his studies. Also I changed a few things in the story but you'll figure them out later. Now onto the story!
Dattebayo – Normal speech
Dattebayo – Normal thought
Dattebayo – Demon speech
Dattebayo – Demon thought
Naruto stood away from the rest of his team. He tried to stop the tears from falling but he couldn't, it just hurt too much. Two of the people that he considered friends were now dead. After Haku was killed by Kakashi's Chidori that was meant for Zabuza, Zabuza had seemed uncaring and called Haku a good tool. It had made Naruto's blood boil with rage and anger and he expressed his feelings to the 'Demon of the Bloody Mist'.
It wasn't long after that the Demon of the mist cried and let go of his pent up emotions at the death of his apprentice and friend. After this Gatou showed up with his thugs. Even at the thought of him, Naruto was angry. He had kicked Haku's corpse and spat on him then proceeded to inform Zabuza that he never had any intention of paying him. If looks could kill, Gatou would have died on the spot.
Zabuza then killed a few members of the mob around Gatou then killed him. At the end of it all, Zabuza was too weak to continue and collapsed on the ground. The thugs would have attacked team 7 in their weakened state but the villagers came and they were frightened away.
All of them were celebrating the liberation of their land; all except Naruto. He stood rooted to the ground away from his team until he noticed some movement where Zabuza lay. He moved over to him to see if he was alive. He was but only barely. With tremendous effort, he opened his eyes and spoke to Naruto.
"Hey gaki, looks like I'm not gonna make it." Zabuza breathed out while gasping for air.
Naruto just stooped down next to the man to listen to what he had to say.
"Gaki, we may have been enemies from the start, but there's something that you need to know. Even if we never met before, you showed me what it was to care for someone again, even if it was too late."
Naruto gazed at Zabuza and saw nothing but sincerity coming from him.
"I'm glad I could help Zabuza, in any way I could." Naruto whispered out.
Zabuza allowed a small smile to grace his lips, now visible as the bandages were no longer there.
"I want you to wield my sword kid; Kubikiribocho." Zabuza said, coughing up a little blood.
"I can't Zabuza, it doesn't seem right to wield your sword." Said Naruto.
"Don't worry kid, it's all good. I couldn't think of a better master for my sword. Out of your team, you've got the most potential and your heart is as pure as Haku's." replied Zabuza with another small smile.
At the mention of Haku's name, Naruto bowed his head in respect.
"Time is running out for me kid," said Zabuza as he gasped for what little air could enter his lungs, his breathing now more labored than ever, "I want you to go to my hideout, there you will find some things that should make your life as a Shinobi easier. That what you need and then torch the place. You can get there by…"
He slowly and painfully gave Naruto the directions to this hideout while holding on as best as he could, When he was done Naruto spoke up.
"I-I don't know what to say. Thanks don't seem to be the proper thing here."
"Don't worry kid just do me four favors. First get rid of the orange jumpsuit, it screams 'kill me kill me' and was one of the reasons we found your team at first. Get rid of that mask of yours as well," That earned him a shocked look from Naruto, "What didn't think I wouldn't notice when someone wearing one?"
Naruto just chuckled slightly, "Funny how my enemy saw after only a little time, yet my team never knew."
Zabuza tried to chuckle but wasn't able to and ended up spiting up more blood. "Also, I want you to be the best that you can kid, give them hell when you go back to Konoha; show them what the future Hokage can do."
Naruto smiled a true smile when he heard this and let yet another tear escape his eye. This was yet another person who actually believed in him, and he'd be damned if he let him down.
"And finally, could you take me to him, I want to see him one last time before I depart from this plane as it will be my last." Zabuza asked.
"Sure thing Zabuza, my pleasure." Naruto replied.
Naruto then carried Zabuza over to his fallen comrade and friend. When he laid him down facing Hakum Zabuza spoke for what would be his last time while coughing up blood.
"I guess this is it Haku, my time has finally come. At least, I was able to do some good before I went away. Be well my friend." He finished as his eyes closed shut. With that final statement, Momochi Zabuza, member of the Seven Swordsmen of the Mist, finally passed on.
Naruto simply stared on for a long time, as he was deep in his own thoughts. Finally he walked up to his sensei that was some ways away with the rest of his team and the villagers. "Kakashi-sensei, can I have some time to go bury the guys after the villagers leave?" he asked, earning the attention of the silver haired jonin.
"Yes, you may," Kakashi replied, although he was curious as to why his student wanted to bury the dead nins, but chalked it up to some emotional connection that Naruto was able to gain with them.
With permission granted, Naruto waited patiently for all of the rejoicing to end. When t finally did, he slipped away quietly to do his self-appointed task.
***3 day time skip ***
Naruto stood near the clearing in the woods with his head bowed. He had buried Zabuza and Haku three days ago and had come to their graves each day thereafter at noon. The only other member of his team who ever followed was Kakashi who did so two days ago to say a small prayer for the missing nin and then departed shortly after.
The time that they had spent after the battle on the bridge was simply a waste for Naruto. Every morning when they woke up, Kakashi would tell him and Sakura to continue their tree climbing while he whisked Sasuke away to teach him separately. He had voiced his disapproval once but was strictly silenced by his sensei under the threat of reporting him for insubordination. He had been stunned by his sensei's attitude but was even more stunned when Sakura, after their sensei and other teammate left, told him that he shoul just shut up and take the scraps that he was given.
After all, he was an orphan and a nobody whereas Sasuke was an Uchiha and deserved special treatment. She had even gone on to say that the team would probably be better off if he just rolled over and died like a good little dog, saying that he was the weakest link on the team and kept them from advancing.
After that discussion, he had simply walked away and spent the rest of the day on his own.
He was currently thinking of some way to get away from his team to Zabuza's hideout and was coming up with no solutions. Suddenly it hit him like a ton of bricks.
'Shadow clones of course!'
He almost slapped himself for not thinking of it earlier. Satisfie3dd with his plan, he headed back to the house to prepare for his day tomorrow.
He awake at 5 the follow morning. He had packed his bag overnight and was now ready to go. He thought of leaving without saying anything but decided against it. He walked over to his sensei's room and knocked before entering. When he entered, his sensei was sitting with his Icha Icha paradise book in hand.
"What do you want Naruto, can't you see I'm busy?" Kakashi asked, annoyance clear in his voice.
"Yeah, I just wanted to let you know that I will not be training in the usual clearing today. I will be a bit further in the forest and probably won't be back till tomorrow afternoon around 3." Naruto said.
"Whatever," Kakashi said, shrugging his shoulders completely dismissing the issue entirely.
Naruto was kind of disgusted with his sensei with the way he dealt with him. He didn't even think twice about letting go. Trying his best not to look a gift horse in the mouth, he headed out of the house to do his "training".
When he was about a mile away from the house, he made a clone of himself, pumped with half of his current chakra reserves and headed out to find the hideout.
It didn't take him as long as he thought it would to find the hideout. He had estimated it would take about four hours but it only took two. Cautiously entering the area, he made his way into the hut and found the area he was in to be empty. Thinking back to what Zabuza said, he remembered where he had to go. He moved, walking towards a wall that was bare except for a single deer head. He removed it and found a lever under it. Pulling it down, he heard a grating noise and the wall parted to reveal a hidden area.
Taking some time to get adjusted to the dark, he searched for a torch and found one near the top right area of the wall. Lighting it, he took some time to look at the area he was now in.
A few hours later, he had collected almost everything from the room. There were many books on different subjects, there was also a wide variety of the scrolls detailing things such as politics, human anatomy and chakra control. He packed all of these and continued searching until he came to one of the areas that he looked forward to the most; the one with Jutsu. He was practically drooling at the sight of so many scrolls and struggled to keep himself under control. His first respone was natural, considering the most useful technique that he had been stolen from a scroll, a forbidden one at that
He pulled his self together and looked at the different scrolls. One was marked Ninjutsu, another Genjutsu, the third Taijutsu and the last Kenjutsu which seemed to be the biggest of the four. Away from these was another with a barely recognizable label marked Fuuinjutsu. He looked at it skeptically wondering if it would do him any good. He was about to turn in leave it but stopped, 'How could it hurt me to just take it with me?' With that Naruto turned around at grabbed, deciding to take a look at it really quick.
Opening it, he noticed that the title was 'Basics of seals: Uses and Theories for Beginners'. At the name he almost let it go be continued to read it anyway. Names could always be misleading.
Five hours had gone by and he was still seated in the same position reading. The scroll on sealing had interested him greatly simply because of the first line on the scroll which read "Sealing has a wide variety of uses, from use with basic storage scrolls to sealing demons…". From then on he had been hooked and didn't let the scroll go.
He had read a lot but understood only the mere basics. One of which was how to seal items into storage scrolls. The way to do it seemed like something from some recipe.
"Place item over scroll and just slam hand onto scroll and add chakra while saying 'Seal!'. To unseal items do the same thing only say 'Unseal!'"
He was tempted to laugh at the simplicity of it but didn't, it would seem like he found a solution to carrying all of the stuff that he had collected.
Following the instructions on the scroll, which had provided him with a sample storage scroll, he tried to seal the items that he had collected into it. Gather them together, he placed them on the scroll ad did as instructed. He was pretty surprised that it had worked, seeing that it was almost too easy to be true. Admittedly he had expected it to fail considering his past experience with jutsu of any kind. Taking this as a positive sign, he resolved to learn more about sealing when he had more time. For now, he needed to get out but not without making a finally sweep; where he found a large stash of cash that Zabuza had told him about, some kunai, senbon, explosive notes, flash notes, and other useful weapons and equipment. Adding these to the scroll, he made his way out of the hut.
Before leaving, he carefully placed a lot of the explosive notes in and around the hut and moved a fair distance away before letting them explode in a bright display of fire. He decided that it was probably time for him to head back to the house considering it was late in the evening now.
He arrived at the clearing that he left his clone in three hours later. He had taken his time to get there as he was in no hurry and would probably not be missed by any of his teammates. Thinking of this still left him feeling bitter but he decided to let it be.
When he dispelled his clone, he suddenly felt kind of funny, almost like he remembered al of what the cone had done. Passing it off as his imagination, he settled in one of the trees and prepared to go to sleep seeing as they weren't expecting him to show up any time soon.
***Next morning***
He awoke the next morning to find a squirrel three feet away from him about to prance on him, but it ran away when he turned towards it. Yawning loudly, he got up and searched around to find if everything in place, which it was so he stretched and was about to go train but was stopped by a loud grumbling sound coming from his stomach.
Rubbing his stomach he quickly remembered that he had been so absorbed in his searching and reading that he had forgotten to prepare any lunch for himself. Laughing at his own misfortune, he went to a nearby river to catch some fish.
After he caught a few finish using his clones, he quickly fried them up and eat them with a smile on his face. While eating his fill, he gazed at the water and something suddenly came to him. During the first battle between his sensei and Zabuza, they had been walking on the water. 'How did they do it?' Naruto kept questioning. He knew it had to do with chakra, just like tree climbing. He decided to try it out on his own. Even if it didn't do anything, it was still a good skill to have, so he quickly began trying to walk on water. After falling in the water several times, he quickly figured he had to take a different approach to it. He was only able to stay on the water for maybe two seconds before he fell back in. Thinking back to the tree climbing exercise he thought on what he could try. 'If I have to find the right amount of chakra to walk on a solid surface, maybe on a moving surface it requires continuous chakra since it's not a solid surface.' Naruto concluded.
Naruto go back up one final time and decided to give this new thought a try. After a few tries he was only sinking a little into the water.
An hour later he was able to stand and run on the water, he jumped in excitement and starting yelling how great he was, unfortunately when he jumped he stopped the flow of chakra and fell back into the water. As he was under water he started to curse his stupidity and quickly swam back to the shore.
Deciding it was probably time to head back to Tazuna's house; he gathered all of his belongings and went on his merry way.
When he arrived, he saw Tazuna walking back towards his house with Sakura I tow. Kakashi and Sasuke were nowhere to be found which he expected.
That night Kakashi called all of the team members together to inform them that they would be leaving for Konoha in the morning the following day, since the bridge was now complete. Nodding their understanding, he left them for the night to go read his Icha Icha, not even once glancing in Naruto's direction or asking what he was up to in the time he was gone. His teammates didn't care, as both turned like their sensei and left without uttering a single word to the blonde.
Tazuna's family on the other hand was an entirely different story. Tsunami, Tazuna's daughter, had forced him to eat something good as well as inform him that Inari, her son, had been worried sick as well as her father.
He was at least someone cared for him, and apologized to them for worrying them needlessly. After quickly catching up on what all happened, he said his goodnights and went up to catch whatever sleep he could.
*** The Next Morning ***
The day to leave came and the team assembled on the end of the bridge facing Hi no Kuni. The entire village had turned out to see them off as they were forever grateful for what they had done. After some tearful goodbyes from Inari and Naruto, the Team left for Konoha.
Some random villager spoke up as they were almost out of sight, "So what are we going to name the bridge?"
Murmurs of curiosity were heard in the crowd.
"We should call it 'The Super Awesome Bridge that Tazuna build'" Said Tazuna, with his arms crossed over his chest and a giant smile on his face.
"Baka Tou-san!" Tsunami said, wacking him on the head causing him to dramatically cry, "Let's call it 'The Great Naruto Bridge' in honor of a boy – no a young man, who, in the midst of adversity, gave our country hope and brought us out of our depression.
Silence sounded for only a single second before deafening shouts and cheers of approval were heard. It seemed that they all agreed that that heart of one young man, who refused to give up, had changed an entire country for the better.