Breaking Point

a/n When I said rewritten, I did honestly mean it…

When I was child I used to wonder at the meaning of the word that so many others seemed so fond of using. Father and Mother were the ones that confused me the most. Were they the people who raised you or were they the ones responsible for your entry into the world at large? Looks that could freeze the soul were among my earliest of memories but I had no Father or Mother to sweep me into their arms as they soothed away the ache that seemed to swell inside like an infection with no cure.

The concepts of a Father and Mother were just that.

Concepts.

Theoretically I understood who and what they were they were meant to represent but how can one with no recollection of ever having experienced them completely understand? I wasn't given anyone to await my arrival from the Academy. There were no bright, eager faces waiting for me to call out 'Tadaima!' in the loud, boisterous tones that had become my trademark. But I suppose that what I had was acceptable. Swiftly given hugs in rare displays of positive emotion and even rarer words of acceptance and encouragement.

But as I grew older and my circle of friends began to grow I realized that in the absence of a family to call my own I had slowly begun to craft one of both my own making and choosing. I realized that bonds of blood were just that. Bonds of that nature were no deeper or binding than those I had forged myself.

I had what I had so desperately wanted as a child left standing in the freezing outdoors while staring avidly in at the picture of warmth that a family portrayed. I had a family and I—I was happy. I was happy and then came the day where the summons was received with confusion and not a little trepidation at the sheer oddity that receiving official summons was. More often than not, I opened the door to find one of those belonging to the village named, 'Rookie Nine' and not one of the ANBU with their masks that concealed even the smallest hints that could be used to discern the reasons behind my being summoned.

Curiosity placed aside with all of the ease of a master crafter, I donned my own mask before bouncing out of the door with all the boisterous levity that only a prankster was capable of. I hold no illusions that I would have been different had circumstances not been what they were. I delighted in the pranks that I played and took even greater delight in the grandest prank of my entire career. It's hardly easy to portray a simple fool that even the most feeble villager could scoff at. Hardly easy but well worth the effort necessary to portray such a character with the ease of an actor presented with the role that defines his very career.

One day—one day I'll shed my mask and allow the village to see what they so dutifully spurned out of the memories of all that had been robbed from them the night of my birth. I'll remove my mask and allow them to see the child that could have been theirs had they only opened their eyes to see. The child that was Uzumaki Naruto. The child that was only what a slight frame showed him to be. A child with no grandiose claims of being the Demon Lord, Kyuubi no Youko. No because there would finally be the child with the dreams of becoming Hokage to protect those that mattered.

Smile stretching wider as I laced my fingers together amongst the unruly golden spikes that I'd been given by at least one of my parents, I felt my breath catch in my throat as the door of the Hokage's office closed behind me with a note of solemnity that I'd never before felt. My mouth dried out as I took in the somber expressions adorning the faces of those that I knew were the closest to deserving the titles of Mother and Father as the concepts I'd designated them to be.

Looking back on it now, I wonder if it was the absence of all disagreements that unnerved me or whether it was the united front that I'd only seen them display in front of Orochimaru. All amusement both real and feigned slipped from my features like the flood waters that I'd seen in the Rain Country during the monsoon seasons. Straightening my spine unconsciously as 'baa-chan held out a small scroll with nary a word, whether it be of caution or encouragement, I reached out with my own trembling one to take it.

I've been told on more than one occasion that I am too trusting and perhaps they are right. But my fingers scarred from countless hours of practicing with weapons rubbed along the scroll's sealed edge until I felt a raised portion that felt familiar to me. My eyes darted upwards to meet with Ero-sennin's own worried ones before I lifted one of my thumbs to my mouth. Teeth sinking in the rather scarred pad of my thumb, I ignored the momentary well of pain as I used the blood gathered to smear across the scroll's seal.

I'm not sure what I was supposed to think or really what I was even supposed to expect. Opening the scroll to find it covered in the same messily scribed, slightly slanted characters that I used was not among the many things that my mind concocted in those few seconds it took for the scroll to slide open. Allowing my eyes a moment to adjust I felt as though the very ground disappeared from beneath my feet. The momentum of falling robbed my breath from me and the wind forced tears to prickle at the corners of my eyes.

Shinobi show no emotion but this was nothing to do with the way that a Shinobi is expected to comport themselves. This was personal and in so many ways I felt as though I had been shoved back outside in that bitter, winter cold with nothing more than a rag thrown at me to seek warmth from. The tightness in my chest grew even as the first tear spilled from my eyes to slide a cool trail down my face to fall onto the floor with a nearly inaudible plop.

"Did you know?"

Voice strained from emotion I nearly jumped at the realization that the hoarse croak had come from me and not some old man reliving the pains of his life. Meeting their eyes with shadows of guilt and regret flitting through them, I felt the bile beginning to rise up from my stomach as I wondered at the feelings sweeping through me.

I had a Father and soon I knew I would have a Mother to call by name but in gaining that I had also lost something equally as important. Swallowing in reaction to the hard lump of emotion forcing my breathing to turn ragged I felt my head beginning to shake in denial. How long, I wondered as I took the first of many steps backwards, how long had they known and denied me that small piece of comfort? Sandals sliding across the ground as I whirled around to begin running, I closed my ears to the pleading voices behind me as I fled.

And as I fled I found myself allowing the tears to flow. I found myself swiping angrily at the shattered pieces of the familial illusion that I'd allowed myself to fall into. And I found myself wondering what family truly meant in the end when the finely woven webs of deceit were burned.