After some time I'm finally on the third and final story of this little series of mine. One of the main purpose for it is to wrap things up. Here's hoping that I'll be able to do so. Disclaimer, I don't own Naruto.

Internal Dispute

Chapter 1
Misdirect

"Not again." Naruto, as Fox, was doing a patrol of Konoha at night. Was an uneventful one and was about to call it a day when he suddenly noticed something. On closer exception he saw a group of village shinobi taking out boxes of supplies out of a building. That wouldn't be an issue if it weren't for the fact that there were more shinobi on the ground, unmoving.

"Guess getting home anytime soon is out the window." Creating a few shadow clones he got into action. "You do understand that this'll put a real blemish on your guys' records?" That got the attention of those there.

Immediately they tried to get rid of him but with the clones they were outnumbered. Soon the issue was resolved and Fox was going to interrogate one of the few people who weren't unconscious. "Now, are you going to cooperate and tell me who you're working for or do I need to persuade you to do so?" To help with the intimidation he put out a small amount of killer intent mixed in with demonic chakra.

That did the trick as it caused the man to lose any defiance he may have had. "I don't know." he quickly confessed. Unsure, Fox increased the intent that he was putting out. "We never saw them. That's all I know, I swear."

No reaction came from Fox and the man started to worry that he would be killed. When the intent started to disperse it was believed that he was going to get out of it unharmed. "Yeah, I figured that you would." Without a word, Fox punched him in the face that knocked him out.

Suddenly, received the memories of the sole clone that he sent to alert the ANBU of what happen. Having no reason to remain, he left just shortly before the ANBU got there. "This is getting repetitive."

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Quietly opening the door, Naruto entered and quietly closed the door behind him. Not even halfway home he needed to release his Fox transformation. For the rest of the way he struggled to get home as he was nearly completely exhausted. "It's getting worse."

Too tired to do anything else, Naruto decided to go straight to bed. "I'll be fine after a good night of sleep." He was about to enter his room when the door opposite of his opened and revealed his girlfriend, Hinata Hyuga. Unable to help himself, he appreciated the large light blue nightshirt she had on that reached mid thigh but did little to hide her figure. "Sorry. Did I wake you up?"

"Not really." answered Hinata. The reply didn't hold any weight as she was leaning against the doorframe and her eyelids were already drooping downward. "I was halfway to sleep when I heard the front door being opened." It was a doubtful excuse but Naruto decided not to question it. "Had another rough night?"

"Sorry to say that I did." admitted the worn-out blond. "I thought I was going to get a quiet night." Stopping for a moment he let out a long yawn before continuing. "But that didn't happen." Again another yawn came out.

Noticing the state of her boyfriend, Hinata went over and gave him a light kiss on the lips. "You're out on your feet. Go to bed and get some sleep. Forget about what happened tonight until the morning." Too tired to argue, Naruto smiled and gave her a kiss before the both of them returned to their respected rooms and slept.

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"So, I heard you had a busy night." In the Fifth Hokage's office, Tsunade was having a private conversation with Naruto. The topic of course was of the incident that occurred the previous night. "Have anything you want to mention?"

"What is there say?" asked Naruto as he sat in the seat in front of the sannin's desk. "What you got in the report from the ANBU that showed up was basically everything that happened. Shinobi grouped together with no real affiliation with each other to steal supplies from the village for some mastermind. All the while, this mastermind remains in the shadows, keeping their identity from being discovered." The mere reiterating of what was known frustrated Naruto further.

He wasn't the one as Tsunade was showing her own signs of annoyance. "We've encountered similar incidents and hadn't had much luck in solving this mystery." Pausing briefly, the sannin noticed the condition of the blond in front of him. "Are you all right? You look beat."

"I've just been tired from the past coupe of days." That caused a wary stare from the medical specialist. "With this whole thing that has been going on for the past week I haven't gotten much sleep. Add that with Sakura so kindly offering to accompany Haku to deliver Kisame's sword back to Kiri, Anko being part of the negotiations with Ame to resolve the whole Akatsuki incident and Kin on her honeymoon with Lee, I've been on my own. Of course, my 'extracurricular activities' haven't helped."

"Is that the whole reason?" questioned Tsunade. "You and tired aren't usually put together. Have anything else that you would like to tell me?"

Naruto knew what she was alluding to but wasn't sure if he wanted to reveal it. Hinata was the only one who had any real clue about what was going on between him and Kyuubi and even that wasn't a whole lot. "Not really. Sorry." Until he better understood what was going on, keeping things hidden was for the best.

Tsunade suspected that he was hiding something but decided to refrain from prying as it wouldn't do much good. "I'll take your word for it. Getting back to the matter at hand, while you may of not have much luck, that hasn't been the for all of us." Opening one of the desk dressers she pulled out a thin folder which was handed over to Naruto.

"Fortunately our interrogation unit was able to get something." Opening the folder, Naruto looked inside and whatever he saw caused him to let out a few choice curses. "As you can see this does cause some concern." No dispute was made as the young blond felt the same.

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"Care to explain yourself?" In one of Konoha's maximum security cells, the Fifth Hokage was speaking with the sole inhabitant.

"I don't know what you mean." wondered the occupant. They remained sitting in the lone chair in the cell with their back toward the Hokage. "Care to be more specific?"

"Don't patronize me, Danzo. I want to know what you're trying to accomplish by having your ROOT agents causing disturbances throughout the village. I repeat, what are you trying to accomplish?"

During Tsunade's mini rant, Danzo still had his back toward her and showed no actual reaction to the accusation. "You must be mistaken. ROOT has been disbanded since my unjust imprisonment." Even as Danzo spoke there wasn't anger in his voice.

"Unjust? You were planning a coup d'état to place yourself as Hokage." Knowing that her anger was starting to get the best of her, she calmed herself before continuing. "Also, it wouldn't be in your nature to simply let go of people who can be of use for you without being able to rein them back in. The question is how."

Only silence came from the war hawk and when it was thought that was all that was going to be given, he finally spoke. "I'm afraid you've jumped to the wrong conclusion."

Instead of getting angry, Tsunade kept her composure. She turned around to leave but before leaving she gave a few parting words. "You continue to play the innocent act all you want Danzo. But know that whatever you're planning won't succeed." That said, the sannin left the holding cell, never looking back.

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"Didn't turn out well, did it?" questioned Shizune. Seeing the condition of the office already gave her the answer. Strewn throughout the office there were empty sake bottles and broken remnants of one of the chairs that had been there. In her chair behind her desk was Tsunade who had a sour look on her face.

"That would be an understatement." the female Hokage begrudgingly admitted. "He claims he has no what I was alluding to but I know that he's somehow involved. Too bad there's no way to prove that though." To add to her foul mood, Tsunade went for more sake but discovered that she had already used up her supply. "Please tell me you have some good news."

For a moment Shizune hesitated in giving an answer. "I'm afraid not. Ever since last night there hasn't been a single disturbance. None of the hunting parties that were assigned so far have run into multiple dead ends in finding any leads."

"Of course, that would make things easier." complained Tsunade. "Something's coming and hopefully we'll be ready." Truthfully, the sannin hoped that would be indeed the case.

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Days Later…

"All right, class. Today we're going to learn the basics of using your surrounding environment to your advantage." announced Iruka. "Can anyone tell me why knowing your surroundings can be a pivotal thing in a fight?"

"Because it could be used to our advantage." one of the students responded, unsure if it was the correct answer.

"Correct. Now can anyone else tell me why it's good to know your surroundings?" Before any of the students could answer, a group of shinobi appeared surrounded the students, armed to attack. Knowing that something was wrong, Iruka was going to protect the children but was stopped when someone appeared behind him and pressed a kunai to his neck.

"So to prevent being ambushed." answered the man to the earlier question.

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"Given the circumstances of the current situation I'll get straight to the point." Standing before the Hokage was a group of around twelve shinobi of varies ages that waited to be informed of what was going on.

"Two hours ago a group from the former Land of Wood snuck into Konoha and abducted an academy class comprised of twenty students and one instructor." Any remarks that would've been made were halted by the Hokage continuing. "Their demands are that their lands are returned to them, without any strings attached. We got three hours to comply. If we don't they'll kill a hostage every hour until we do."

"Something must be done, Hokage." One of the shinobi spoke up. They were quickly added by the others in attendance.

"That's a given." Tsunade thought to herself. "A counterstrike is of course going to be annunciated. You're being placed into prearranged squads to carry out specific operations. Chances of collateral damage is a possibility but should be avoided at all cost. You're dismissed." At once the shinobis left, leaving Tsunade alone in her office. "Let's just hope this comes off without major repercussions."

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"So how does it look like?" Two miles away from where the hostage incident was occurring, a three man team of Naruto, Shikamaru and Hinata were trying to comprehend the circumstances that were going on. They were using the Hyuga's Byakugan to find where each of the capturers was.

"I could make out that there are at least two dozen of them." Hinata started to explain. "They're spread out throughout the area with a few of the hostages included. All of them have armor on and are heavily armed."

"Clearly they're expecting a resistance." Shikamaru concluded. "What a drag this turned out to be. Can't be helped I guess." Going into a stance that he was known to use while in deep thought, the shadow user tried to formulate a plan. "All right, here's what we're going to do."

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"I want to go home." whimpered one of the girl academy students. Requests were similarly made by others of the hostages but that was among the loudest. "I want to go home."

"Be quiet." hissed one of the capturers. The person had a lanky body build with shaggy strawberry blond hair and dark brown eyes. He gave the little girl a glare that made her cower away in fear.

"No need to be so mean, Masaru." reprimanded one of his associates, a female one. She had an appealing figure and her long black hair that reached to the middle of her shoulders and matching eye color only helped to make her more attractive. "There's no need to be so harsh with someone so young."

"Don't patronize me, Sachiko." shot back the now identified Masaru. "Now isn't the time to be considerate." Turning around he looked at the other person of their group. "You're with me on this, aren't you, Susumu?"

The person in question had brown hair that reached to the top of his neck and gray eyes. He looked over to his comrades and gave them a hard stare that made them flinch slightly. "Stop your bickering. Now isn't the time to act like a bunch of children." Forgetting about them for the moment, Susumu looked at his watch and saw the time.

"The deadline has passed and our demands haven't been answered. Guess we'll have to live up to our part." Going over to the academy students he grabbed the arm of the girl that had been whimpering earlier and pulled him away from the group.

"Whoa, whoa. What are you doing?" questioned Sachiko. Masaru was there with her in the confusion of what was going on.

"What does it look like?" Susumu shot back. "We specifically explained what would happen if our demands were met and I'm following up what we promised to do." That was followed by him reaching into his vest he pulled out a kunai. The girl struggled to free herself but was unsuccessful.

"You can't be serious." spoke a shocked Masaru. "We may have said that but we never actually planned on doing it. That was merely a ploy to get them to follow our demands."

"He's right." Sachiko included. "This is going beyond what any of us considered doing." She stopped when something came to her. "As a matter of fact, it was you who put this whole plan together. What are you up to?"

Briefly Susumu shifted his eyes elsewhere but was quickly covered up. "Don't be absurd. We can't allow ourselves to be kindhearted when it comes to things such as this." There loathing in the man's voice as he spoke. "If we wish to get back what was taken from us we must merciless as our enemies."

"Is that so?" Leaning against a nearby tree was Naruto. "That's the excuse you're going to using when it comes to killing innocent children? Pretty pathetic but by the looks of it, being pathetic is common for you."

Not taking kindly for the jab of his character, Susumu tightened his grip on the girl to the point that she gasped in pain. "I'd watch what you say." Understanding the threat, the blond raised his hands up, indicating that he wasn't going to try anything. "Apparently Konoha are attempting to foil our plans. They mustn't be taken us that seriously if they sent only one shinobi. Perhaps I'm mistaken and he's here to say that our demands were met."

"Wrong." stated Naruto calmly. "You're so called demands were denied. As for myself, I decided to go ahead and put an end to it. No point in the Hokage dirtying her hands on the likes of you."

"You have some gall to mock us." Becoming somewhat more confident, Susumu lowered his guard slightly. Same couldn't be said for Masaru and Sachiko who weren't sure how to react with how things have went. "You either have to be brave or foolish. Otherwise, why else would you come here all by yourself?"

"I've been known to be both." Naruto acknowledged. Even still, he kept an indifferent stance on the whole thing. "Anyhow, who said that I came alone?"

Quickly understanding the meaning behind that last comment, Susumu went for his earlier action of killing the little girl. Before he could though, his body was stopped in mid strike and was unable to move. Reason for it became clear as connected to his shadow was the shadow of Shikamaru.

"Usually I would say that something like this would be troublesome. But I'll make an exception this one time." Clearly the Nara boy didn't appreciate that tactics that had been attempted. Raising his arm he placed his hand near his neck.

Thanks to their shadows still being connected, Susumu was forced to do likewise. The result being that the kunai that he had been holding was now placed against his own neck. "Surrendering would be a good idea. That is unless you want your comrade to lose his head." Slowly both Masaru and Sachiko raised their hands to show that they gave up.

Would seem as though that was the end of that situation but that wouldn't be the case. Even still trapped in Shikamaru's shadow hold, Susumu continued struggling to free. What was surprising though was that he was actually having success as the Nara was starting to strain to maintain his hold.

"What's going on? He shouldn't be able to struggle as much as he is. How is this possible?"

When he had regained enough of his mobility, Susumu used the girl that he still had a hold of and threw her toward the shadow user. Having no other choice, Shikamaru completely released his shadow and caught the girl. Now completely free, the man made a break for it.

"Where do you think you're going?" Naruto went after the fleeing man. He would've caught up to him if it wasn't for Susumu dropping a flash bomb that blinded his pursuers long enough that he could escape. "Son of a bitch! Hate it when they get away."

"Then you'll hate what's going on now." remarked Kyuubi. What that meant became clear as Masaru and Sachiko tried to also get away during the confusion. They wouldn't get far as Hinata got in front of them and used her Byakugan to hit specific points in their bodies to render them incapable of walking. "Not bad. Not bad at all." Naruto merely nodded his head in agreement

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"Is that all of them?" In front of the Konoha shinobis were the shinobis of the former Land of Wood, securely bound to prevent escape. The hostages from the academy were rescued and thankfully they were fine.

"Afraid not." Shikamaru grudgingly divulged. "One of the people that my group was assigned to handle escaped. To make things worst, he apparently was the mastermind to this whole state of affairs."

Before anything else could be discussed, an ANBU appeared before all of them. "I bring important word from the Hokage." Immediately all attention was focused on the new arriver. "A couple of hours ago, Danzo managed to escape from his holding cell. Apparently, members of his trainees, who unknowingly assigned to guard him, assisted in his breakout."

"No way this is a coincidence." voiced Shikamaru. "He misdirected our attention with this hostage situation so we would be caught off guard by his escape." Silently Shikamaru was mentally beating himself for not anticipating such move. He wasn't the only one as the other Konoha shinobi shared their anger over the circumstances.

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"Welcome, Lord Danzo." In a secluded location, the members of ROOT bowed their heads as their now freed leader walked passed them. "Are apologizes for not acting quicker in freeing you from your wrongful imprisonment."

"There's no need for that." instructed Danzo. "I understand that my release required time and the right conditions to allow me the opportunity." He smiled as he glanced back at one of the people that were walking behind him. "I believe I have you to thank for that, Susumu."

"I'm honored by your words but I was merely doing was right." Susumu went so far as to go down to one knee and lowered his head to his leader. "I was your spy in Land of Wood rebels and I saw that we cold use the situation to our advantage."

"Indeed. You did what was asked of you." Sounded as though that praise was all was going to happen when suddenly one of the other ROOT agents used a sword to cut Susumu's head clean off. "Therefore, you are no longer needed." stated Danzo without batting an eye at the execution of one his followers. "Now is the time to realize our goals."

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Days Later…

"I'm home." Looking about, Hinata couldn't find her boyfriend. Going to his room she saw his door was closed. "Naruto, are you there?" Slowly opening the door she saw who she was looking for. But what caught her attention was Naruto standing there without a shirt. "Sorry. I should've knocked first."

"It's all right." reassured Naruto. He could see Hinata averting her eyes and blushing. Even after all this time she still had moments of shyness. "It's one of the reasons why I love her." "Actually Hinata, I could use your help." Getting over the previous incident she made her way over to him. "I need you to use your Byakugan to examine my body."

Another blush appeared but she pushed it aside to do what was asked. With her Byakugan she started to scan Naruto's body. Going over a few times she found nothing until Hinata noticed something. "Your chakra pathways are fluctuating. Both you and Kyuubi's chakras are mixing together. They're seemingly becoming one. How is that possible?"

Naruto said nothing right away as he let out a despondent sigh. "I figured as much." Seeing Hinata's confusion, he explained. "The seal that was used to cause Kyuubi transfer to the next male of my generation in my family has another purpose. As times goes on, the demon fox would bond with the host until he was completely merged and become similar to bloodline ability. However, things are going faster than expected."

"You mean the mission to Ame to stop the Akatsuki." Hinata managed to piece together. "Kyuubi used a large amount of chakra to create that giant explosion."

"Result being as he recovered the lost chakra he's merging quicker with me." elaborated Naruto. "It's affecting me as well since I can't remain as Fox for a long period of time." Making his way over to the mirror in his room, Naruto stared at his reflection.

"For all I know I can become someone completely different. I can't help but worry." Sensing the concern of her boyfriend, Hinata walked over, wrapped her arms around him and pressed her head against his back.

There ends the first chapter to the final story. By what happened it looks as though I'm going to have Danzo and ROOT the main antagonists. While that may be the case, it doesn't mean that it'll just be them as I'll have other things happening. Have to wait to see what I mean by that.