A/N

Soooo ... this is my first story, obviously. This idea is one of my favorite 'what ifs' that I have thought of and I haven't seen anything remotely like it done by anyone else so I figured "Fuck it, might as well".

The premise of this story is that Naruto is not Minato's son, not Asura's reincarnation, not destined for greatness, not even the main protagonist if this story follows what I have in mind (its doubtful it will seeing as I rewrote this thing a dozen times). He is just an Uzumaki orphan that became the Kyuubi Jinchuriki. Hell, I would have actually dropped him being an Uzumaki if it wasn't required for him to hold all of Kurama. The knowledge of who is his Jinchuriki is also a secret from most of the village.

Seeing as this A/N is gonna be as long as the actual chapter soon I'll just get to the disclaimer.

I don't own Naruto, duh.

xxxXXXxxx

Sasuke stared despondently over the water. A month ago, he would have been relentlessly training his Gokakyu no Jutsu in this very spot to impress his father.

'A month ago, I still had a father.' He thought bitterly, face scrunched up in anger. The young Uchiha still couldn't understand why his brother had done it. The brother Sasuke had known just didn't match up with the person who had massacred their clan.

'Unless it was all just a lie.' A voice in his head spoke up. Sasuke didn't want to believe it but he had to ... for now at least. 'I'll find you Itachi. I'll hunt you down and -'

The sound of feet dragging pulled the Uchiha from his thoughts. Turning to see who was out here at this time of night, the academy student spied a familiar head of red hair moving along the road.

'Is that Naruto?'

The normally energetic redhead was surprisingly subdued, staring at the ground in front of him. It was odd, to say the least. Odd but a welcome distraction from the downward spiral that were Sasuke's thoughts.

As if feeling the eyes watching him, the Uzumaki looked up to see his absentee classmate watching him. Clearly not expecting to see the other boy, he gave the raven a tentative smile.

Sasuke felt like lashing out at the boy. 'How dare he smile, be happy?! When my family was just murdered.' He was about act on his violent urges too if he hadn't looked into the boy's eyes first. They were sad and held something akin to ... understanding ... in them.

'That's ridiculous. How could that orphan know what its lik-.'

Scowling, he turned back to the body of water before him, trying to ignore the shame and anger he felt at his lack of awareness. As the footsteps continued once more, Sasuke glanced down at the reflective liquid to see a pair of blood red-eyes look back up at him.

A myriad of emotions ran across his face. Shock, elation, anger, confusion. Quickly spinning around, he stared at the retreating boy's back.

'I-is he why my Sharingan activated? I thought they only awakened in a fight.' Sasuke couldn't be sure, but he was fairly certain Naruto had nothing to do with it.

'Did you make any friends today, otouto?'

Sasuke shook his head. Why was he thinking of that, now of all times? Even with these thoughts in mind, he still called out to the other 8-year old for some reason.

"What are you doing out here so late?"

Even as the redhead turned in surprise, the Uchiha heir knew the Uzumaki would never truly understand his situation. But still, it couldn't hurt for him to talk about it, if only for one night anyway.