The Mute Shinobi

By Quick-n-Popular

Disclaimer: Naruito isn't mine. Original characters are, though.

Chapter One: Kurenai's Discovery

Konohagakure, the village hidden in the leaves. A proud village known for its powerful shinobi and inspiring leaders. Many had viewed the village as the beacon for others to follow as it held within it, as what its third leader called "The Will of Fire", a powerful presence and a strong will to guide and help those in need.

Konoha had survived many things. Disputes, power-struggles, and still remained prosperous. However, things seemed to have changed after the death of its fourth leader, the Yondaime Hokage. The appearance of the Kyuubi, the nine-tailed demon fox, had almost brought the village down. It was the Yondaime's charge and defeating the beast that had brought peace once again to the village. Sadly though, the problems didn't stop there.

It had all began a week later with the death of a civilian council member at the hands of a shinobi.

Before then, after the sudden death of its Sandaime; the council of the village was in the midst of electing a new Hokage to rule the village. Once the discovery of the murder was made, many of the civilian council members demanded the perpetrator to be brought to justice. The shinobi was never found and it was then that the citizens anger rose.

The once great village soon found itself divided.

It was divided by those who supported the citizens' demands to bring the shinobi responsible to justice and for all shinobis to be held accountable for their actions against the citizens of Konoha, while the other part felt that shinobi shouldn't be questioned in their actions, that they were above the citizens' laws. They claimed that the village could very well run without the aid that the citizens provided, which only furthered the turmoil in effect.

Protests soon rang out against the Anti-Citizen Support members. Death threats were made, public slanderings turned into civil unrest, and then deaths. It was the death of a Pro-Citizens Support family by the order of the leader of the Anti-Citizens Support faction, Danzo, that began civil war in Konoha.

For five long years fighting had began all throughout the once peaceful village, deaths were numerous, and many homes and business lost in the carnage that took place. Then, it all stopped with the death of the Anti-Citizens Support faction leader Danzo. With his death, the power and motion of his group dissipated and the group itself announced defeat.

In the aftermath that followed, clans had soon began to divide amongst themselves in allegiance with Konoha and soon many had disbanded from the village and vacated to other places. Konoha, on that day, had lost its two most powerful clans: the Hyuga and the Uchiha.

A majority of the citizens had left as well and soon Konoha had become a pale shadow of its once glorious self.

In the midst of healing, three clans, reluctantly, brought themselves to rule the once powerful village. The Nara, the Akamichi, and the Yamanaka found themselves the head leaders of the village. The Abarame and the Inuzuka in support and with control and with only a sparce few citizenry left in Konoha.

In this, Konoha had begun to heal itself.

Our story begins two years later.....
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Kurenai Yuhi, Chuunin, had just been relieved her her guard duty at the gate, much to her relief. The weather, in this day of June, had become hot and unbearable. Though, not as hot as it would be in Suna, it still left much to be desired.

After saying thanks and goodbye to Genma Shiranui for relieving her, she slowly made her way into the village.

In the midst of her travel, she looked around and smiled at the continuing relief effort being made by both shinobi and citizens alike to try to bring their village out of the darkness it once was in. The buildings still showed signs of the Kyuubi's attack that happened seven years ago. Kurenai felt it was a shame that these efforts weren't made in time before the civil war that had broke out and more destruction happened around the village.

Kurenai sighed as she thought back to that awful event. She had been only a fresh Genin at the time when the village broke out into the two seperate factions. Many of her friends had broke their bonds with each other due to their families support of one or the other faction. Kurenai herself, and her mother, remained neutral and had isolated themselves from being involved in the terrible outcome that followed. It seemed absurd to her as to how everything happened before the deaths. So many lives thrown away for petty reasoning. One of those lives had been her mother, unfortunately.

Kurenai shook her head, trying to put aside the painful memory as she continued to glimpse at the relief efforts being made. It still amazed her of there no longer being any animosity between the remaining shinobi and citizens. It was mostly due to the fact that the five remaining clans in Konoha were either neutral or supported the Pro-Citizens Support at that time. Under the main Nara, Akamichi, and Yamanaka's reluctant rule, the citizens that decided to stay felt that the village's once large, vast, majority of power was really the cause of the initial problem in the first place. The Clans only having a certain amount of power now, with their primary focus being on the rebuilding of homes and buildings; the remaining citizens, now, have a more positive view of the shinobis. Although, whether or not they felt secure with their presence like they once had, remains uncertain.

As a result of the other clans departure, along with a vast majority of the citizen populace; the Fire Daimyo had removed his support of the village. With the Hyuga clan pulling from Konoha and going to serve him, he seemed to not see any need of the village as he once did. Thus, without his financial support, Konoha was left to fend for itself. Only a handful of shinobi were sent to paid missions outside of the village while the remainder stayed to held with the rebuilding. It seemed, at least to Kurenai, that the main idea was to regain the support of the remaining citizens and to rebuild itself.

Konoha was still in a state of healing two years and a half years after the other major clans, along with the lesser ones, had left Konoha.

Kurenai was walking back to her home, hoping, maybe, to see her friend Anko at her favorite dango shop and, just as she was about to make her abrupt change in direction, something stopped her.

From the corner of her eye she had spotted something irregular in the alleyway to the left of her. A bright, yet, dirty patch of blonde hair bobbing up and down in a dumpster that belonged to a restaurant on the corresponding side.

Curiosity overcoming her, Kurenai approached it and stopped three feet from it. In front of her, she saw, in the dumpster, a young boy, most likely between the age of five and ten; scourging through the heaps of garbage that filled the bin. He stopped when he reached a plastic bag, which he opened and pulled out a molding melon rind and began to eat it, ravenously.

Kurenai looked upon the seen with disgust. Shen approached closer and called out.

"You know that's going to make you sick, right?"

The boy immediately froze and turned slowly towards her. It was then that Kurenai's eyes widened with surprise and a little bit of horror.

The boy, whose hair was matted and crusted with grime and dirt; had his right eye sewn shut poorly, dried puss being evident and swelling due to improper care, and had a small, thick, scar on his neck. Another interesting feature was that he had three visible birthmarks on both cheeks which seemed to almost resemble whiskers.

Kurenai blinked. 'What happened to this child?'

She began to approach closer, her hand extended out. "Hey, are you-" She never got the last words in as his hands went into a familiar sign and soon a cloud of smoke covered over him and was soon replaced by a bag of garbage

'A kawarimi?! Who is this kid?' She thought and looked around. She heard a door nearby closed and set off in the direction of where she heard the noise. His footsteps echoed through the abandoned tailor shop of the store and then another sound emanated when he had opened another door that led outside.

Going as quickly as possible, Kurenai, once outside, could see his form retreating into yet another building. she recognized the building instantly as the weapons depot where she used to buy all her weapons when she was a Genin. This too had been abandoned during the civil war and she knew that there were no other exits other than the entrance itself.

Going on inside, she was amazed as how the once heavily itemized store had been reduced to an empty broken state. The windows were broken, light shimmering in through the many broken panes giving a ghastly glow due to the residual dust that accumulated in the air above. Kurenai coughed a bit when entering, the dust being so abundant. Looking about, she saw that the boy had made this his shelter as there were many rotting, discarded, vegetables and fruit lying about the floor. The stagnant stench was almost as over-powering as the dust itself and Kurenai had to held a hand to her nose and mouth to avoid retching.

Scanning the area with her red eyes, she found the door to the room occupying the store to the metal shop slightly ajar. Proceeding cautiously, she walked to it and opened it. Inside where the various sharpening machines used by the owner in the past. The room was small, yet warm as an unseen generator was still powering the machines, thus giving the room an abundance of warmth.

Kurenai heard a rustling of sheets and turned to her immediate left to see the boy she was looking for huddled on the floor underneath a machine with some cloth tarps, looking at her with unbridled fear with his one eye.

Kurenai squatted down in front of him, hoping both to give off a calm demeanor and to also prevent him from trying to escape again.

"Hi." She said, smiling. "My name's Kurenai Yuhi. What's yours?"

The boy looked at her with suspicion and wide-eyed fear. He didn't answer but merely gurgled something incoherent.

Kurenai looked toward the scar on his neck and wondered it the injury had made him unable to speak. She sighed and looked around.

"So, this is your place, huh?" To her surprise, this got an answer as he immediately nodded.

Exhaling a sigh of relief of being acknowledged, Kurenai smiled again and looked about once more then back to the boy.

"Are you here by yourself?"

The boy nodded, again.

Kurenai nodded as well. Taking closer looks around the boy's makeshift area, she noticed there were many books lying about. Some were shinobi related. Books on chakra form, manipulation, and utilization. Others were on handsigns, beginner stealth practices, history of Konoha and the shoinobi world, etc. What was most intriguing was that these books were academic books handed out to students when the Academy was still in progress.

Krenai pointed to the books. "May I take a look at them?" She asked.

The boy eyed her carefully before nodding.

Kurenai nodded and thanked him before picking up one of the books and opening the flap to the student signature ownership page. She had a feeling that whomever this boy either belonged to, or who had raised him, had most likely given him some tutelage in the shinobi arts prior to his being left to hold out on his own. There was no way, at least in Kurenai's mind, that he could have simply learned by reading all of these books without personal instruction.

The first book she held had the signature "Saigu Rin" on the flap. Again, asking for his permission and then getting it, she looked through the other books and found the same signiture in all, "Saigu Rin".

Kurenai sighed. So she was right, the boy had been trained for some time by a shinbobi. But yet, who was he? The easiest answer she could come up with was that he was an orphan made by the civil war. Yet his bright, albeit dirty, blond hair left him in either relationship with the Yamanakas or some other clan. As far as she knew, the Yamanakas were the only clan who had this type of color yet his was more brighter, closer to a yellower state of blond rather than the platinum kind of theirs.

Kurenai knew, by duty, she was responsible to bring all orphans and, especially, all people who have shinobi skills that haven't been documented, to the Clan Heads. However, she didn't even know where to begin as to persuade the boy to willingly to come with her. Yet, she knew she had to try. Worst case scenario being, she'd have to overpower him and bring him in unconscious.

Before speaking the matter, she decided to try to be friendly and see if she could at least get him to trust her.

"Do you have a name?" She asked.

The boy cocked his head to the side like a bird observing something. He then turned away from her and begin digging into the pile of things behind him. In a moment he had produced a tattered, mouth-eaten baby blanket. He handed it to her.

Kurenai looked at him curiously, about to inquire as to why he had given this to her, when she noticed a monogrammed stitching on the top hem that was a name in kanji.

"Naruto?"

The boy smiled and nodded.

She smiled. 'So his name is Naruto, huh?'

"Well, Naruto. Again, my name is Kurenai. Tell me, have you been by yourself for very long?"

The boy nodded.

"Since the Civil War?"

The boy looked down and nodded.

So she was right. He was a war orphan. "Was, Rin Saigu, your mother?"

Naruto looked up at her and then off to the side. He looked as though he was thinking about how to answer but in the end nodded.

'Well, its answer at least. It may or may not be true.' Kurenai thought. Closing her eyes, she took a deep breath. "Naruto, if I asked you to come with me, would you?"

Naruto's head shot back to her, his eye wide. It then went down into a contemplative state as it seemed he was observing her, searching for anything that wasn't truthful in her features or something that implied false or harmful intentions. He then looked to the floor and closed his eye. He looked back up again and slowly nodded.

Kurenai let go of the breath and smiled. She then extended her arm out to him and he took it. Once out from under the table, she got a better look at him. His hair, like before was indeed a mess. Malnutrition was evident as his ribs were showing and due to poor exercise his limbs were thin. However, his demeanor seemed optimistic and, as far as she could tell, the Yamanakas would be better in finding out more; his mental health seemed to be alright.

"Well then," Kurenai said, "If it's alright with you, Naruto, why don't we get you some clean clothes and something a little more better to eat. Are you still hungry?"

Naruto's face seemed to brighten and he nodded.

Kurenai nodded as well and directed them out of the weapons shop and out into the world outside.

To be continued....

A/N: This is an idea of mine and depending on interest I'll see how many more chapters I can crank out. I'm basically going to be making a lot of changes as in this alternate universe a lot has changed compared to the cannon. How lived after the civil war and who had died, characters stories, and all of that; will be a big challenge. But hey, I'm creative and I like a good challenge. As far as pairings and all that, I'm leaving that up in the air until later on in the story.

Please read and review.

Next Chapter: A Troublesome Piece Missing from the Puzzle.

Q-n-P